What I hope to show with this work, as I am diagnosed with bipolar, is how the condition can express itself. I have sought to explain this with an allegory of the tea drinking institution that is a British way of life. The tea drinking stands in for the medication I have to take. The collection of mugs and my ‘mugshots’ detail the effects of such an intervention. The chemistry is not perfect but a damn sight better than say twenty years ago and in my case I’ve been lucky to find tablets that sometimes work. The highs and lows of bipolar and the psychosis I experience are being managed. I have learned not to say what bazaar thoughts I’m having because experience has taught me they are ‘bazaar’. Coming clean means more medication and in my series you will see that what I do take wears me out. Nevertheless I can function. The mugs themselves show the normality around me and hopefully link with the viewers experience of life in general and the fatigue and recuperation we can all relate to.
This series of self portraits was photographed in 2019