BIO

I’m Chris. Hey. I am a social worker/mental health counsellor. I also have a PhD and am a professor at a school of social work in Georgia. Professionally speaking, I aim to understand how climate and global environmental changes impact mental health. I also want to make therapeutic spaces better for people with severe mental illness and improve rural healthcare. I also REALLY like to teach. And I also paint as a hobby. It sparks joy. As they say.

I was born in Florida. I lived in New Orleans for a good deal of my adult life. I also lived in St. Bernard Parish LA, Indiana, Alaska, DC, St. Louis, Paris, and Brittany. I now reside in Georgia. The Paris of the South. Below I try to write a story about what art means to me.

Some thoughts on painting

I had an art teacher in 10th grade that changed a lot of things in my life. One way was through this exercise where we had to look at our hand and draw it. But we a) could never look at the page, b) never take our eyes off our hand and c) never lift our pencils from the page. Just one continuous line.

The idea here was to look at all parts of the hand. To really see it AS we are trying to represent it. As we were staring at every aspect of our hand, he began describing the way that we conceptualize objects in our minds to make sense of them is different from actual reality. For instance, there are no such things as border lines between my hand and the outside world. And if you stare at any object, you’ll see that solid and steady color schemes are not real. Light reflects from all objects in bonkers ways. Things are really messy. And the physical realm as we perceive it is of course influenced by other things, such as the atmosphere, lust, the amount of hatred we hold, hunger, ghosts, dimensions, and from the sounds in our head.

As the mind wonders, wanders, and reflects how this relates to a grander perspective, it becomes clearer that when we are looking at people, things, memories, etc., we are painting a perspective in our minds. We create a border line. We project an emotion. We insert want we desire to see. Or we project what an other-worldly element needs us to see, maybe.. We try to make sense of the messiness while also making sense of things we can’t put words to.

Sigh. I don’t know what to say here without sounding like a… pompous whatever. And also. This is not new information. This is a really base explanation of what art is. I know. I’m trying. So yes, that teacher had an impact on me. And the hand exercise, I feel, relates to so many ways of teaching, learning, experiencing, and being. And instead of making a dumb joke about that experience for the purposes of dismissing or flushing down a really, REALLY lovely and transformative moment, I’m going to hold on to it. Again, I do recognize that this “lesson” boils down to a fairly simple concept that is well known about art. Art helps us to better understand how we perceive something and it also takes us to a place where words cannot. But still.. that’s such a WILD thing that art can do. It’s great.

Life can suck. Life does suck. It really does. Art is great. In whatever form it takes. I mean, it is really really great. It’s so great, it makes me want to cry and to live. It adds light to the dark, even if the dark is a black hole that sucks life away.

So anyway. That is my bio.