For the second year running Unit 51 will host the exhibition of World Mental Health day celebrations, this year fittingly entitles ‘Respect’.
The private view was held on Friday the 7th of October, officially opened by Liverpool’ home grown internationally celebrated artists: The Singh Twins. Liverpool Mental Health Consortium did the city proud with a vast variety of works exhibited to open the two weeks festivities planned around psychological wellbeing.
Alan Murray’ presents a self-port of himself on the brink looking directly into the gallery space and the visitors as they enter. Alan’ career as a painter has gone from strength to strength over the last few years, his most recent highlight being commissioned to paint a portrait of Jamie Carragher. In this he presents Carragher as a Gladiator and surrounds him with aliens, the work will be displayed at the former LFC defenders New York bar. In this work, ‘Curtains’ he uses emotive photo-realism to present an image of himself contemplating suicide, holding his head as it is cracking apart. The shower represents the cleansing of the mind, the tattoo drawing attention to underground narcotics culture so prominent in Britain in the nineteen nineties rave scene, contributions to the mental health issues in today’s climate. Alan looks to draw attention to male suicide rates through his work, currently, the leading killer of men Globally and he has clearly achieved this with this unforgettable image of mental turmoil which we encounter.
In the work of Sue Leach we are presented with a perspective on motherhood, in this, we have a perspective on motherhood showing the stress’s a new mother might feel. Susan has lived in Liverpool for over forty years, on retirement, she began a BA in Fine Art at Wirral Metropolitan College, based in Birkenhead. We are presented with a baby book like form, three solid panels where an infant can help turn the large page like forms as part of the reading process. The panels are made from porcelain to symbolise fragility, bound together with ribbons using methods similar to those used for items of baby clothing. On the panels, there are images of items which relate to childcare, knitting needles, safety pins, nail scissors, zips, but also a hammer. These ‘tools’ of motherhood present opposing views, in this we have items which could help care for a child, but items which could also harm. Sue looks to highlight the anxiety a new mother can feel and how this is dependent on her support
network.
Alison Little presents us with ‘Life from the waist down’ representing the healing process from an act of sexual violence or more specifically: rape. Alison began working with psychically based concepts several years ago when she presented ‘BiPolar B’ for the 2014 World Mental Health celebrations. This form presents the idea of strength and recovery in terms of the later stages of Rape Trauma Syndrome when the healing process is under way. The feathers within the structure indicate a woman who is still fragile, but they are also a very natural material and draw attention to nature’s healing process. The pubic hair is represented by foliage showing regrowth in the position around the groin. Green leave in particular depicting hope renewal and revival. This form shows a woman in recovery and all the strength which surrounds that process.
‘Respect’ brought together a chaotic mix of artists and medium, but with one clear goal to raise awareness around mental health. We have a stunning miniature from Denise Armstrong showing many different version of herself, Virginia Chandler mixed emulsion, acrylic and oils to show us how mixed up she felt struggling with a personality disorder. A hallucination was introduced by Ross Clark, while Anna Middleton shows us how vivid dreams can be on medication. Mickey Mouse was brought in by Chris Mulray to tell us about Aspergers, Ruscoe Ceramics reminded us that things could be fragile with their porcelain. Finishing it all off with Naomi Simone’ Weeping ladies, a haunting image of three heads together bound to impact on your visual memory.
A ‘Must not miss’ exhibition:
Unit 51, Jamaica Street, Baltic Triangle.
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