The following is a brief preview - the full content of this page is available to premium users only.
Click here to subscribe...
“… While the day outside glides by like ticker tape.
The night brings violets,
Tapestries of eyes, …”
Sylvia Plath, ‘Paralytic’, 1963
As western society has developed, various prejudices have become things of the past and, if nothing else, politically incorrect. There remain, however, certain stigmas that society simply cannot overcome. One of these is the stigma associated with everyday mental illness. The term everyday mental illness is applied to provide a distinction between the demographic of mentally ill patients in communities and high profile creative persons suffering from mental illness. People remain ignorant about the former while they accept, welcome and glorify the latter. The paradoxical nature of this statement begs to be explored and can be elucidated well in a number of artists’ lives.
Vincent van Gogh shot himself in 1890 and died two days later aged thirty-seven. When he died he was virtually unknown to the art world, and certainly not widely appreciated. Two years before, in what is now a famous act, van Gogh cut off part of his ear with a razor blade, in the ultimate romantic gesture, expressing his unrequited love. He continued to suffer from hallucinations, delusions and paranoia, slipping in and out of bouts of severe depression and harbouring suicidal tendencies, a trait which he shared with Paul Gauguin with whom he lived and worked for a number of months. Years after his death van Gogh is regarded as one of history’s most brilliant painters and an essential contributor to modern art. Despite all of this recognition, for some time van Gogh was terribly poor and lived off his brother Theo’s salary, admitting that he felt ‘stiff and awkward’ when comparing... The rest of this article is available to subscribers of Eyeline
