the mad hours where once we danced on the sofain progress, 2010 Rico
I'm bi-polar. For years, I've survived and functioned through the standard ways of self-medicating, my well-known strength of will, diet, exercise and the fact that so many people tend to sleep walk through life and not really pay attention to anyone else. Lately, and by this I mean over the past year, the surf has become too rough. In the highs, I walk shoulder to shoulder with gods and angels. I am the Hero and the Tyrant, for they are one in the same archetype. I can't sleep, I seem to move through my day in vibration.
The lows have become soundless hollow pits, from which I can barely look out at my wife and children. I exhaust myself during the day trying to appear "normal" and when I get home I can hardly speak to anyone and this, -at worst, can go on for weeks. I can feel myself going down, but like being caught in a rip tide I lack the strength to escape and instead am swept away. The added hell to this is the fact that I am, all the while, completely aware of what is happening.
The time has come to try medication. I have so many fears and anxieties about this, but the things I fear losing the most pale in comparison to what I know I am losing now. I worry that I will lose creativity, because I know that true creation comes from resistance. I'm deeply conflicted because while my mental health has been on a steady decline, my work has seemingly hit a notable arc and we artists are a superstitious lot who fear the slightest change in routine will somehow shatter that fragile thing we believe is inspiration.
I've come to understand this is a lie.
One can no more turn being an artist on and off than with any other imprinted way of being. We are born stamped with certain things: sexuality, intellect, predisposition to safety or adventure, and yes, the artist. With this in mind, so-called inspiration does not truly exist outside of one's self. It is the soul, the hard-wired personality which interprets the external world (every moment of it) as inspiring. We feel compelled to speak about it, -through words, through the making of things, music, and so on. Who in their right mind would choose this, after all?
So a new adventure begins in my life, and one on the outset of which, i confess, that I am very anxious and unsure. I've documented 4 years of my little life within these bandwidths, and at times I know it has been like watching a slow-motion train wreck. So I'll document this, because this is inseparable from the artistic practice.
It's a cliche', but I'm making the first step toward change by admitting the problem, -at least the major symptom of whatever the larger problem truly may be.
You may well say that, in light of this I have no business using the works of Anne Sexton as my current point of reference for the work going on in the studio. You might be right. But Anne and I have been together for a long, long time. The moment finally came when it was time, and "no" was simply not an option. Forgive me if I obsess on death and loss. It doesn't mean I'm feeling sorry for myself, or indulging my black-beret-wearing stereotype. It's just my moment for wrestling with it, nothing more.
eating soil and drinking bullets from a cup
in progress, 2010 Rico
So these are the mad hours. The funny thing about time is that it is always moving. Time is the shark and we are the prey. We could worry ourselves about the inevitability of our death, or we could enjoy swimming in the vast sea while we are able. Sometimes in schools, sometimes alone in the nooks and coral of the shallows. We cannot escape the time, and no man or nation or corporation can stop it.
It's hard to believe that art matters. By extension, it is often hard to imagine that my life and its pursuits matter either. What good does it do to make work that so few see, and that far less care about? Yet I can't stop. What tolls have been paid, and at what cost?
I am off to Missouri next week for a family wedding. Weddings and funerals are magical because we often simultaneously dread and enjoy them. Family gets together, and we observe life outside of ourselves. I think this is why they are healthy things, that sense of taking a moment from our busy, self-absorption and focusing -utterly and entirely on someone else's life.
I'll leave off with one final image, still untitled and larger than the other canvases I'm working on right now. More later this week.
The lows have become soundless hollow pits, from which I can barely look out at my wife and children. I exhaust myself during the day trying to appear "normal" and when I get home I can hardly speak to anyone and this, -at worst, can go on for weeks. I can feel myself going down, but like being caught in a rip tide I lack the strength to escape and instead am swept away. The added hell to this is the fact that I am, all the while, completely aware of what is happening.
The time has come to try medication. I have so many fears and anxieties about this, but the things I fear losing the most pale in comparison to what I know I am losing now. I worry that I will lose creativity, because I know that true creation comes from resistance. I'm deeply conflicted because while my mental health has been on a steady decline, my work has seemingly hit a notable arc and we artists are a superstitious lot who fear the slightest change in routine will somehow shatter that fragile thing we believe is inspiration.
I've come to understand this is a lie.
One can no more turn being an artist on and off than with any other imprinted way of being. We are born stamped with certain things: sexuality, intellect, predisposition to safety or adventure, and yes, the artist. With this in mind, so-called inspiration does not truly exist outside of one's self. It is the soul, the hard-wired personality which interprets the external world (every moment of it) as inspiring. We feel compelled to speak about it, -through words, through the making of things, music, and so on. Who in their right mind would choose this, after all?
So a new adventure begins in my life, and one on the outset of which, i confess, that I am very anxious and unsure. I've documented 4 years of my little life within these bandwidths, and at times I know it has been like watching a slow-motion train wreck. So I'll document this, because this is inseparable from the artistic practice.
It's a cliche', but I'm making the first step toward change by admitting the problem, -at least the major symptom of whatever the larger problem truly may be.
You may well say that, in light of this I have no business using the works of Anne Sexton as my current point of reference for the work going on in the studio. You might be right. But Anne and I have been together for a long, long time. The moment finally came when it was time, and "no" was simply not an option. Forgive me if I obsess on death and loss. It doesn't mean I'm feeling sorry for myself, or indulging my black-beret-wearing stereotype. It's just my moment for wrestling with it, nothing more.
eating soil and drinking bullets from a cupin progress, 2010 Rico
So these are the mad hours. The funny thing about time is that it is always moving. Time is the shark and we are the prey. We could worry ourselves about the inevitability of our death, or we could enjoy swimming in the vast sea while we are able. Sometimes in schools, sometimes alone in the nooks and coral of the shallows. We cannot escape the time, and no man or nation or corporation can stop it.
It's hard to believe that art matters. By extension, it is often hard to imagine that my life and its pursuits matter either. What good does it do to make work that so few see, and that far less care about? Yet I can't stop. What tolls have been paid, and at what cost?
I am off to Missouri next week for a family wedding. Weddings and funerals are magical because we often simultaneously dread and enjoy them. Family gets together, and we observe life outside of ourselves. I think this is why they are healthy things, that sense of taking a moment from our busy, self-absorption and focusing -utterly and entirely on someone else's life.
I'll leave off with one final image, still untitled and larger than the other canvases I'm working on right now. More later this week.
ahh.. there is some truth on the internet. best of luck with the surfing.
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