Mental Health Support For Artists
Another Good Idea For Cinema (and many more...)
As I’ve mentioned, I am compiling a master list of good ideas to improve the art, business, industry, culture, and experience of cinema.
I have published some of them before as parts of a larger list — like this one below from August 2023. I am publishing them again as one-offs and online only (don’t want to clog your inbox after all!) so I can more easily link to the specific idea on subsequent posts and lists. I think I will do it only on Sundays until I have caught up.
Mental Health Support For Artists
I am not saying artists need more help than others, but I sure know a lot who need help and often can’t afford it. We need to solve this. Support could come in the form of trying to get mental health professionals to donate their time and for different sorts of recovery centers to donate a spot or soliciting donations specifically to help fund such programs. It’s surprising that there isn’t already an organization dedicated to this – or maybe there is and I am just ignorant of it. I don’t personally see how one can seriously pursue a sustainable and generative creative life without a lifelong commitment to 1:1 therapy , of course finding an appropriate therapist is as challenging as finding a lifetime romantic partner or creative collaborator, so good luck with that, but more power to you!
We could also start to build a Best Practices in the area of mental wellbeing. Whereas, the cinema has made some great headway at addressing issues like sexual misconduct, it is still rife with other forms of abuse and lacking in guidelines for good behavior.
A great deal of mental well being comes down to issues of inequality and general survival. We need to have our basic needs of health, education, security, and child care covered, before we can truly pursue a life in the arts, at least a sustainable one, so living in a land that helps provide for those equally is a head start. Just feeling free of oppression helps you on your way. Where one’s lives is a great determination in this regard of course.
When it comes to mental well being for any one in any creative field, I am a great supporter of establishing and maintaining a lifelong creative practice driven to a set of first principles. Making sure you are able to create and complete things on a regular basis is great food for well being, but when you’ve chosen cinema as your art form, it is not so easy due to the financial ramifications, so it needs to be complimented with other modes of expression.
I generally recommend considering your own personal hierarchy of needs.
It is nice that folks are now writing more about mental health needs in our field. Particularly regarding dealing with the economic downturn.
And there are some organizations and efforts already in this space, like Sane Cinema.
And DocuMentality (HT: Doug Block)
But we need more.
I am also compiling a list of therapists who make a point of working with artists. If you know and recommend any, please let me know.
If you were a fan of “Dude, Where’s My Car?”, you might want to see the screenwriter. He’s now a psychologist.
Anyways I greatly appreciate any recommendations you have for improving mental health in the arts.
Got any?
Sometimes though it does seem to be a bit of an occasional given in the field:
And of course it is good to know this:
And if you want more good ideas for the film industry,
here are some other suggestions of mine:
Ted, are you aware of DocuMentality?
https://documentality.org