Psychological trauma burrows deep beneath our consciousness, into our flesh and joints. It can keep us bound in tight knots for years, even decades. It hides in the darkest of domains, from which eyes are averted and words are not spoken. As a means of survival, we turn away, pushing it out of our minds and deeper into those depths.
Dysmenorrhea is an unearthing and revealing of the shunned aspects of our lives. What happens when we turn towards the pain, even hold it in our hands? What if instead of affliction, our pain could be power?
Creating art is ritual and spiritual. Craft is important and has its place, but without your heart and soul on the paper you have nothing really. Making art involves just as much spiritual alignment with the work as it does having the right words or materials.
There is a video project in the same vein as Dysmenorrhea titled “Accumulation”.
Watch “Accumulation”