Listening with open eyes
'Met Open Ogen Luisteren’ is an artistic investigation into psychological vulnerability. Six people who know or have known a psychological disorder, recently or long ago, in themselves or in a loved one, created a listening story in collaboration with writer and radio maker Corinne Heyrman. These audio stories can be listened to as a podcast and experienced as a stage program at festivals, stages and symposia. I am involved in this project as a photographer and producer.
Nowadays, as many as a quarter of Dutch people struggle with psychological complaints, according to recent research by the Trimbos Institute. How can we as a society embrace disruption a little more? How can we learn to deal with psychological disturbance? And how does one become confused? These questions form the basis of this project, which consists of six 15-minute audio stories in which confusion and clarification are mixed, in which - regardless of the diagnoses or terms - they are about people, people who have more sides than their condition. 'Listening with open eyes' assumes equal cooperation in which the interviewees have a say in both the process and the results.
A selection of these audio portraits will be set up as listening sessions on stages and symposia. During the presentation, the subjects are present in a theatrical manner. The portrait always ends with a song or poem about the person in question, after which a discussion takes place. Topics such as TBS, anxiety disorders, psychoses and bipolarity are discussed. In the follow-up discussions, led by Corinne Heyrman, (experienced) experts have their say.
'Met Open Ogen Luisteren' premiered at the Nijmegen Wintertuin Festival and has since taken place at various locations. The project is a collaboration between six experienced experts, Corinne Heyrman, Wintertuin, GGzE, De Woenselse Poort and Plusminus and is supported by the Fund for Cultural Participation and Kunstloc Brabant.
Portraits in Poetry
Tsead Bruinja was Poet Laureate in 2019 and 2020. In this role, he gave a workshop to three elderly people in Dokkum in which he put their life stories into poetry, resulting in special portraits of the participants.
In 2020 he developed the project for eleven healthcare institutions in Friesland and supplemented his team with musician Zea (Arnold de Boer), a group of guest poets and me as a photographer. It became a beautiful participation project with poetry in a connecting role. A project in which the many talents of the residents were highlighted. However, due to corona it failed after four sessions. Leeuwarden City of Literature took over the project from the Poet Laureate Foundation, so that it could still be completed.
In 2022, Tsead, Zea, fellow poets and me revived the project and visited the healthcare institutions. We spoke extensively with residents and followed the daily rhythm of the nursing home. The healthcare staff selected four participants per institution, with whom the artistic team worked on four personal 'portraits'. A self-portrait by the residents, framed with poetry by the poets. The end result was always presented during a festive program.
Thanks to Tsead for allowing me to be part of this heart-warmingly beautiful project, to Tsead and Arnold together for making it feel like we were going on a school trip every time we went out, to all the guest poets who stepped into the project so wonderfully uninhibited and always made it work and put their own new spin on it, but above all to the beautiful people we met in the nursing homes, where we arrived on day 1 and with the first cup of coffee and an Oranjekoek and had no idea what exactly was expected of them. And just started telling us about their lives, war stories, how hard they worked, the loves they found, children they lost, that doing gymnastics all your life doesn't necessarily make you walk smoothly when you are old, that it's okay if you have doubts about religion, fathers who cheated with a neighbor, the first kiss under the rhododendron, we were allowed to hear it all and I am very grateful for it.
16 x trust - 16 x ver(t)rouwen
My father died when I was 16. A few years ago I started photographing 16-year-old daughters and their fathers at an activity they enjoy doing or in a place that is special to them. I wanted to see again what that bond with your father looks like when you are 16. To look back through my lens at what was a very defining age for me.
I went looking for 16 daughters and their fathers and attended unofficial driving lessons, went into the water when they were surfing, or walked through the North Holland polder landscape.
What the project has brought me is a bit of processing; 'verrouwen'. But what made it special was seeing what an important role he played for her in that year of her life. At the first meeting with a father and daughter we were in nature reserve Het Twiske, they had specially rented a jeep with a tent on the roof that they liked to go camping with. Towards the end he told her that she could drive back a bit in the Jeep. I stood there with my camera in hand and saw how he taught her to trust herself that she could do this. Something that was so beautiful to see and which actually became a theme throughout the series.
I photographed girls who were still at the beginning of that year of life and their father said that she often had to discuss with him whether she had done something right or not. To daughters who were almost 17 and that those fathers said that they were more next to the daughters, that they already had one foot in adulthood and had the confidence to make decisions themselves; 16 x trust.
16 x trust has already hung in three places. It is nice to notice that the work provokes many reactions and creates space for people to talk about grieving, (young) parent loss and parent-child relationships. I would like to show this project in even more places for that very reason. For tips and/or more information, be sure to email [email protected].