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  • Diary

    Current. Architecture Off Centre Podcast. On Spaces for Mental Health. Online. Disability and... Podcast Online. It’s my life, don’t you forget.  Beacon Centre. January to May 2024. to make an army out of madness (wtf is balmy army anyway?) Keynote presentation. PsychArt x Mad Hearts 2024. 7 June 2024 OH MY GOSH, YOU'RE WELLCOME... KITTEN. Being…
  • What is a mental health problem?

    What is a mental health problem? You hear the term used a lot in mainstream mental health (I mean the charities and press here). Mental health isn’t the same as physical health, there are of course cross overs, but the experience and the way it’s understood and explored are different. As an aside this is…

  • Spam from my therapist’s email account.

    I’m writing this with tears in my eyes, I and my family presently on a short trip to Rome, Italy. Unfortunately, I was robbed in the hotel I booked, all my valuables which includes cash, cell phones were stolen during the attack but luckily I still have my passport with me. I’ve been to the…

  • Latvian theatre critic Silvija Radzobe on Mental.

    Thanks to Anna Zagorska for the translation. — Mental is performed by a young man who is the only member of art and activism collectivecthe vacuum cleaner. In the center of a small room (not bigger than 20 m2) a large mattress is located where someone is sleeping under the blanket. The audience of 15…

  • Mental – Autumn Dates | Madlove and other news.

    the vacuum cleaner. News. Mental – Autumn Dates. Riga. Glasgow. London. Manchester. “One of the most powerful portraits of creativity and depression I’ve ever seen… a heart-rending journey.” RealTime Arts The Metropolitan Police call him a Domestic Extremist. The NHS have described him as ‘highly disturbed’ and labelled him with Borderline Personality Disorder. ‘A real and present threat…

  • Casual Mental Health Stigma in The Guardian today

    People that know me will be fully aware that I have a bit of a bee in my bonnet about the stigma the media has towards people with mental illnesses. It tipped this morning when I read this very offensive piece in the Guardian by Maev Kennedy. http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/mar/25/children-parents-mental-health-problem-poor-care (copied below, I will pull the reposting…

  • Crying into my tea, instead of rehearsing. – Mental Update 5

    Image courtesy of Hannah Hull In a week and a half I’m showing a work in progress of Mental at In-between Time, Bristol. (Afraid the tickets are sold out.) The process from November onwards is going okay, I made an active decision to work with the material on a little and often basis of a…

  • The cuts are not ideological.

    Some other victims of Tory cuts: Benefit bureaucrats Atos killed my father, says 13-year-old boy http://www.scotsman.com/news/health/benefit-bureaucrats-atos-killed-my-father-says-13-year-old-boy-1-2610249 Blinded, half-paralysed man dies day after Atos stop his benefits http://politicalscrapbook.net/2012/11/disabled-man-dies-after-atos-stops-benefits-chris-grayling/ A CYSTIC fibrosis sufferer ­recovering from a double lung transplant has had her benefits cut by 85 per cent. Louise Davidson, 20, who has struggled with the condition…

  • Let’s go fucking Mental. – Fourth Mental Update

    “Let’s go fucking Mental. Let’s go fucking Mental. Let’s go fucking Mental.” Is a chant I’ve heard groups of beer fuelled white men sing before… I think I was on the train to Glasgow, which is odd as some of the UK’s radical mental health practice originates from the Asylums of 50’s Glasgow, with it’s…

  • Mental Health Crisis – A rough survival guide for supporting.

    What follows is an email I wrote earlier this year to a group of friends and activists following a serious suicide attempt that lead to an admission to an acute psychiatric ward. Apart from names and places I’ve keep the email as it is because although it speaks about specifics I hope it also speaks…