Bethlem

Bethlem was a real insight into the subject that we are studying this term- mental health. I expected a dark setting with stories about the mistreatment of mentally ill patients in the past. However I was greeted by a  light, bright setting filled with colour and art that highlights both the positives and negatives of mental health. There were certain parts of the gallery that touched me and inspired me to take forward into our performance:

This was a paint palette of different colours that expressed different emotions from the perspective of someone suffering from different forms of mental health. I thought this was such a simple way of portraying mental health and its connotations. In terms of how this could influence our performance, the different coloured drinks could be based on the colours on the palette and they could use the names of the colours as the name of the drinks. Or we could use them to decorate the room, almost like a Dulux colour chart, but expressing mental health. I think using something as simple as colours can stimulate all sorts of emotions for the actors and audience.

This was one of my favourite exhibits at Bethlem- a mobile of tags that use labels that can all be interpreted by different people in a unique way. The one that stood out to me was Father. This is because the link between mental health and family is something that explains my experience with mental health well. Therefore seeing this made me think about mental health when it comes back to my personal experience. Being in this form, apart from being atheistically pleasing, reminded me of a tree, interlinking all of these factors together- mental health is a tree with branches extending in all directions. It was such a simplistic, minimalistic display, but they reached all sort of layers under the umbrella of mental health.

Going to somewhere like Bethlem opened up a perspective on the whole topic of mental health- it can be art. You can express this sensitive topic in an artistic form which I hope our experimental piece can too.