Blue Fringe Arts
Blue Fringe Testimonials
I always look forward to entering the Blue Fringe Arts exhibition each year. As a sufferer of a mental Illness I find art is very rewarding. Being able to exhibit/show my work with others is also a great opportunity and raise awareness of mental illness, in a "non threatening" way to the public. Also as a professional fine artist I understand not everyone can hold their own art exhibition, so the Blue Fringe Arts Festival gives us another avenue to showcase our work.
I entered Blue Fringe Arts for the first time in 2006. Blue Fringe is for artists recovering from and living with mental illness. It was a way for me to reconnect with the outside world after experiencing schizophrenia and severe depression.
At first, I only took photos at my window, then walking outside, images on the ground. Finally I could look up at the sky, and nature surrounding me.
That sense of separation, isolation and deep
emptiness had changed to allow me to engage in the world again. Art can be healing,
creatively fulfilling and engaging. It can also be the opposite of those things.
Without Blue Fringe Arts my journey to a state of relative well-being would not
have been possible. I learned that creativity is essential to me and despite the
fear of exposure on exhibiting, a powerful tool for change and growth.
Donna Huntriss
To be shown in a gallery is hard enough for any artist to achieve, to be shown in a gallery when it is the last thing you think you can do, or even do, is even more difficult.
Blue Fringe gives everyone a chance to have the dignity and mutual joy of sharing their very personal visions with friends, family and their community, the freedom and the right to share their lives with us. For me, it has been a liberating experience, a step away from the stigma of mental illness and into acceptance.
Jan Brown who worked at the Schizophrenia Fellowship in the 1980's began mentoring me and encouraging me to enter art exhibitions and writing competitions. Some time later while I worked for Penrith Living Skills Centre I had the opportunity of encouraging others to exhibit their own artworks, poems and short stories in the Adrienne Brown Awards which came into existence in the early 1990's.
We also established the Voices magazine to publish people's work locally in the Blue Mountains and on the plains.
Soon after retiring from Living Skills in 2000 I became involved as a
voluntary committee member of the Blue Fringe Arts Group where I enjoyed the
friendly camaraderie and was able to mentor other artists and writers who had
mental health issues. These people to my delight often came alive through their
participation and through the encouragement and support they received.
Amy Cutler
Like me they found real hope and satisfaction by sharing their artwork and writings. With the development of the Varuna writing workshops in 2006 came a new kind of sharing of works, some lively conversation, and empowerment for many of the participants in very exciting ways. Blue Fringe has helped me gain personal strength, enabling me to take the wild initiative of engaging in two shared Art Exhibitions locally and to publish and to circulate several of my written works. Twenty years ago the prospect of developing my talents to this extent would have seemed impossible.
Except for that unfortunate personal tragedy of one talented young woman and
the continual support of mentors and committee volunteers, hundreds of our
struggling mental health participants would never had been validated, empowered or
have been brave enough to exhibit or publish their fine works.
Col Jennings