Owning Our Madness by Whyte&Zettergren

Owning Our Madness is a pre-study initiated by Whyte & Zettergren on how mental illness, PTSD, and historical traumas impact artistic expressions. Today's society is marked by conflicts, violence, and environmental disasters, which create generational traumas and increase mental illness both locally and globally. We aim to investigate how these psychological effects shape art and how art, by processing and visualizing traumas, can contribute to healing on both micro and macro levels. The project aims to explore this synergy and its role in artistic renewal. Historically, culture, religion, and rituals have been used to provide comfort in times of mental illness. PTSD treatment with art therapy is believed to help heal the brain's structures and functions damaged by trauma. In the pre-study, we will gather knowledge through interviews and practical sessions. By experimenting with methods to visualize the body's changes during trauma, we aim to develop techniques that combine choreography, moving images, and neurotechnology (EEG and EMG). We are exploring the stage of chaos and transformation that unites the creative process and trauma processing to develop a new artistic method. The question of the 'mad artistic genius' attributed to the creation of groundbreaking art is long-lived, but is there any truth to it? The goal is to lay the foundation for a future project where more participants contribute to exploring the connection between mental illness and artistic innovation. The pre-study is supported by seed money from Kulturbryggan, Konstnärsnämnden.

Owning Our Madness is a pilot study initiated by Whyte&Zettergren that leverages dance, video, and neural technology to map how mental illness, such as PTSD caused by historical trauma, affects artistic expressions and influences contemporary culture.

Today's society is marked by conflicts, violence, and environmental disasters, which contribute to generational trauma and exacerbate mental health issues both locally and globally. Our aim is to explore how these psychological effects shape art and how art, through processing and visualizing trauma, can aid in healing on both micro and macro levels. This project seeks to investigate this synergy and its role in artistic renewal.

Historically, culture, religion, and rituals have been used to provide comfort in the face of mental illness. PTSD treatment with art therapy is believed to aid in the healing of brain structures and functions damaged by trauma. In the pilot study, we will gather knowledge through interviews with researchers, healers, and therapists, as well as through practical sessions. By experimenting with methods to visualize the body's changes due to trauma, we aim to develop techniques that combine choreography, moving images, and neurotechnology (EEG and EMG). Practically, a dancer will create choreography based on a traumatic experience and another based on healing rituals. We will then record the choreographies with a camera as well as the dancer's brainwaves through EEG. In the pilot study, we will find technical solutions to visualize the EEG data as moving images, as well as further develop artistic expressions. We will explore the stage of chaos and transformation that unites the creative process and trauma processing to develop a new artistic method.

The question of the ’mad artistic genius’ attributed to the creation of groundbreaking art is longstanding, but is there any truth to it? The goal is to lay the foundation for a future project where more participants contribute to exploring the relationship between mental illness and artistic innovation.

The project's title is an homage to the late Jamaican psychiatrist Frederick W. Hickling's keynote lecture, Owning Our Madness: Contributions of Jamaican Psychiatry to Decolonizing Global Mental Health, delivered at SAVVY Contemporary in 2020

The pilot study will be carried out during 2024-2025 with the support of Kulturbryggan (Swedish Art Grant Committee).

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