I read an article the other day about a photography series a woman named Liz Obert is producing, called "Dualities". The series is a collection of coupled portraits of the same person. In one photograph, the subject is shot in a way that represents their experience with their mental illness. In the other, they present themselves in the way they present themselves to others. I'll link it below so you can see what I mean.
I've been thinking a lot about the article since I first found it a few days ago. I have been trying to conjure up images of what both of my portraits would look like. I'm still unsure. Am I only limited to two? The article and photography series specifically addresses depression, but I don't feel like it fully encapsulates the experiences of other mental illnesses. While each person and their life experiences vary greatly, there are also specific symptoms and behaviors that characterize each mental illness. At least for me, I feel like I would need three portraits. One to depict what my depression looks like, another for what my mania looks like and then possibly a landscape photo to show all of the ways I try to "pass" for "normal".
My depression is me, completely hidden from view underneath my blankets in my bed. The sheets ruffled like waves in the ocean and clothes piled high throughout my room like jagged cliff edges. Maybe I could convince someone to put on a fuzzy suit and be my beast? They'd probably end up looking more like a team's mascot (Go, Isabel, go! Fight, Isabel, fight!) than a beast that comes for me when I least expect it. I'm cocooned in my blankets and unaware of how close he is. His claws linger over the blanket as if he is about to rip it to shreds. Drool forming at his mouth and the almost human-like grin an intruder on his muzzle. That is my first portrait.
In the second, I am completely alone. Maybe I'm walking directly in the middle of the freeway at night, the bright lights of cars on either side of me illuminating my ghostlike figure so that I actually become invisible. Or sitting on the rail of a bridge, pointing my toes into the open air as if I'm stepping on the whole world. My eyes are vacant and I'm stick thin, my flesh is eating itself. I look as if I could break into a million pieces at any moment. But I'm smiling a huge merciless smile.
The third, the way I present myself to the world: I don't even fucking know. I guess the person I'm working so hard to become, especially the more unrealistic expectations I have for myself, is what I want people to see. I want them to experience me as the best version of myself. But I don't know what that actually looks like and is it important anyway? I'm never going to be perfect and that is what it comes down to. That's what I want. I recognize (to a certain degree) that my own view of myself is warped. It is not entirely accurate and can't be trusted. So making a list of all of the things I try to be for other people would probably just lead to a mental breakdown. I can never measure up, that's the whole problem with having such high expectations of myself. I'm not meant to. I'm pretty sure, some part of me set it up that way. So I'd keeping working so hard to prove to myself, my value. I will never be all of the things I want myself to be and by extension feel that I am not what others want me to be. I don't know if I have ever managed to "pass", to be anything other than what I am at the moment. I guess that's the important piece though, isn't it? To come to a place where I can accept myself for who I am at any given time.
So maybe the third would just be a black space, open and timeless. Maybe that's all I can do.
I'm probably not making any sense. I guess it's a good thing Liz Obert isn't trying to take my picture.
What do you think? What would your two portraits look like? Or would there be more than two?
Link to the article: "Dualities"
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