Rorschach

20111129

Translation:

"Hunger
In the kitchen.
In the ashtray
a mountain.
Airplane after airplane
cuts through the grey"

Words

This is a song of my sadness.
Of the Heavens and the Earth.
Of this wonder and loneliness I feel.

For mans blindness and ignorance
of itself and of the creatures of the Earth.
It is a song of wonder and great sadness.

The Drop

Untitled

What's your cycle?

Black Dog (2006)

Liptember

*** Update: Well, Liptember is over and what a month is was. Who knew there was so much work involved in being well-groomed! After a month of looking fabulous though, the Lady of the Beast can return to her usual casual lip balm self.

A big THANK YOU to all those who sponsored me during Liptember. Together we raised $AUD280 for mental health. An excellent outcome!

-----------------------------

Every year, the Lady of the Beast financially supports Movember - a charity drive that encourages men to grow beards and ugly moustaches to raise money for organisations addressing mens health issues, including depression. But as a pre-menopausal woman with stable hormones, there's not much chance that the Lady of the Beast can join in the bearded fun any time soon.

But now there's another way to get involved! Liptember asks women to wear lipstick all day every day throughout September while other people sponsor them to do so. Money raised from sponsorship will go directly to the Centre for Women's Mental Health and Lifeline Australia, a crisis support hotline.

Looking hot and raising money and awareness for mental health - what's not to love!?

So please check out this worthwhile cause and, if you've got a spare dollar or maybe even two, sponsor the Lady of the Beast to be her most fabulous best in Liptember :)

http://www.liptember.com.au/profile.aspx?u=draw.that.beast

Cheers
Meagan (aka Lady of the Beast)

Draw that Beast turns one!

First of all, some serious apologies to Alice Carroll for adding truly dreadful photoshopping to her beautiful logo but it had to be done because Draw that Beast has turned one! :)

This past year has been fascinating and heartening. I am continually humbled by the courage of people to trust me - a virtual stranger - with such highly personal glimpses behind the masks they wear everyday. That trust has allowed this project to become a place of insight and understanding into a common but often unreported condition. So a big thanks to all you brave souls out there - you know who you are!

While this is a project about depression, I find it to be ultimately uplifting and I hope you do too. I see in the comments and emails a sense of connection among people where they may have otherwise felt isolation. Honesty encourages connection.

So onwards we go, further into the journey. As always, feel free to add your beast to the rogues gallery by emailing it to:

drawthatbeast(at)gmail.com

Cheers
Meagan

A touch in the dark

In the Wash

The Hole

Cross_red

Hole

Black / White

Beast on the go

The Lady of the Beast has been leaving her mark along the way of her merry travels to get the message out there. Berlin, Dresden, Dusseldorf and Bonn are all on beastly notice now!

As always, if there are any beasts lurking out there then feel free to send them this way: drawthatbeast(at)gmail.com

Portrait of a lunatic

"The invincible fear of our hearts moving up to our heads and our brains escaping into thin air, to vanish and fly away" - Anon -

Despair

Flawed

Broken

Word-Fest

I have had a flurry of beastly descriptions from people after Draw that Beast was linked somewhere. I'll post the all the descriptions as a stream of thought.

Remember folks, you're always welcome to get visual and email me pictures/photos/montages/drawings/etc. Release the beasts! As always, it's drawthatbeast(at)gmail.com

Cheers
Megan


"Mine looks like a big black mess" - Anon -

"Me with an 'I told you so' smug expression" - Anon -

"Mine is a dimly lit space with no sides but no way out" - Anon -

"A black swirling mass with a frail shrieking creature in the direct center of it" - Anon -

"Grey water, with the surface out of reach" - Anon -

"A big, horrible black storm cloud that wont go away" - Anon -

"A very dark, thick blanket" - Anon -

"A glass vase filled with question marks" - Anon -

"Something out of a horror film- a dark cold scarey fog with a mocking demon that throws insults at you to keep you a prisoner" - Anon -

"Me as a child" - Anon -

"Mine is a crying dark angel who has rapped its wings around himself to shut out the world" - Anon -

"A big thumb pushing me down into the ground" - Anon -

"I see depression as a dark grey cloud - ominous, heavy, sticky and bleak. I can taste it's unpleasant features, feel it's vice like grip. At times it's a monster chasing me through the woods that have no end, over a cliff that has no bottom. It can be scary and ugly, frightening and yet challenging. Depending on what level or form of depression I have I feel like sometimes I can dance with it, play with it, wrap myself up in the cloud and burst the seams with colour and vibrancy - energy far more powerful than the depression. I can feel sorry for it and dialogue with it, make poetry to help it through its dark days. Depression is a friend not a foe. It's hard hard work but when you win it's love it is left with only the name and human meaning of 'depression'. Om shanti" - Anon -

Lines of control

As a matter of principle, this website is strictly anonymous to encourage people to be less inhibited and reserve the right to disclose their beastly battles without google getting its search engine claws all over their name.

That said, I find the comments people email with their beasts interesting and give a sense of context. In some way, it feels selfish to not publish these offhand insights but the idea is to let the beasts speak for themselves.

One contributor's comments in particular though stuck with me. They submitted art that they did to keep their beast at bay through distraction and channelling abstract emotions. The work wasn't an analogy or interpretation of their beast but closely intertwined because of the battle through which it was born.

I thought of this approach in the past weeks while I've been working on keeping my own beast contained. I wondered about trying my own hand at painting to distract. It was worth a shot and the result is below. I'm a long way from being an artist but the point is more in the labour rather than end product. Perhaps though I have graduated from considering myself a stick figure artist.

And, for what it's worth, concentrating on this piece did help get me through an ebb. Thanks to the original contributor for planting their wise words in my thoughts. You know who you are.

So, just as a side-thought to Draw that Beast, what else do you guys out there get up to to distract yourself? How do you battle your beasts?

New logo!

The Lady of the Beast has had herself a facelift. Well not so much as a facelift as a complete makeover! Draw that Beast now comes with added new logo.

The official logo exists thanks to the wonderfully talented, generous and artistic Alice Carroll.

Alice and I put our heads together to come up with the new Lady, which we hope you like. She is intended to be a positive character, one who carries a weight but isn’t completely weighed down by it. She has a quiet inner strength to her.

The mask represents that we all, to varying degrees, wear masks to hide our true selves in the day to day. It ties back to the original and driving intent of Draw that Beast, which is to give people a virtual space to express what is behind their own masks. The mask intentionally blends in with the rest of the picture to make it not immediately obvious. This reflects that you can’t see depression in others as easily as you can a broken arm, it’s more subtle.

So, that’s all the news from Beast Central. If you feel like submitting your beast, then email drawthatbeast(at)gmail.com If you have trouble drawing, then remember you can always take a photo, make a montage or digital mash, paint, write a line or two, knit, sew, sculpt – whatever helps to give your beast a form.

Cheers,
Megan

Please leave me alone

Words

"I always see my depression as a dark bird. Small. A wren maybe. I don't know it's gotten in until I've already closed the windows" - Anon -

Caged bird singing

Calm before the storm

Mastiff (stamp effect)

Pompeiian Cleaned

Solitude