Luisa Freitas reflects on her Talking Birds Hatching Residency

For my Hatching residency with Talking Birds I wanted to explore the best methods to approach and talk about the topic of Trichotillomania and the overall Body Focused Repetitive Behaviour Disorders. As someone who struggles with the Trichotillomania condition (hair pulling disorder) and only recently learned about it due to my own research, I wanted to educate the audience on it so that people are better informed and equipped to deal with it. With special focus in reaching out to those who have the same issue but feel lost and don’t know what is happening to them, or who to go to to learn about it.

I started by writing down the basic concept of my project and mapped out the beginnings of a plan. With the help of my post it notes I narrowed down the method that best fit my practice and a series of approaches that will best fit this project.

As a visual artist I will use my artworks to depict this condition, so they can function as starting points to initiate the conversation on this difficult topic.

I produced a series of sketches of potential art installations and illustrations that portray the mental struggles of dealing with Trichotillomania via the physical form, from which one of the sketches was isolated and selected as the final artwork to be created for this residency. All of the ideas sketched during this time will be created in the future.

Another question that was explored was the platform in which to showcase these artworks, and throughout the residency I realised that the best format was digital, more specifically YouTube, so that I could reach a higher number of viewers and this way also facilitate interaction between viewers who want to talk to each other and discuss the topic.

Each YouTube post will showcase a video of the process of creation of each artwork that depicts the topic of Trichotillomania and the Body Focused Disorders, with a voiceover narrating what the artwork portrays, as well as talking about aspects of the condition that are pertinent to the video, such as tips on how to manage the hair pulling impulse and relaxation techniques.

I find this video format more dynamic and interesting to the audience to learn about this subject, instead of having someone staring at a camera talking away.

By the end of the residency I made the first video of the channel, with the recorded process of an illustration depicting a hand pulling hair from a head that is disappearing with each pull of the hand. This image symbolises the feeling of losing parts of oneself with every hair that is pulled out.

The voice over is the introduction to this project and future series of videos, as well as a short explanation of what Trichotillomania is. The channel is now open for views and the video is available for the public.

Feel free to follow me on social media to hear more about this and other projects:

Facebook: @LuisaPaintingIllustration

Instagram: @this.is.lis

Website: www.thisislis.com

This residency was fantastic and a really good way to help me sort out my jumbled thoughts and make sense of the ever growing pile of ideas that were then turned into a coherent goal. I’d like to give special thanks to Talking Birds for this experience and for all of their support and guidance.