Email | Print

Nothing to Hide: Mental Illness in the Family is an exhibit of 20 photos and texts that appeared at the Fountain House Gallery, Ninth Avenue and 48th Street, Manhattan, during the month of October. The National Alliance for the Mentally Ill (NAMI), Metro Chapter, displayed the show at its awards celebration on November 12. Organized by Family Diversity Projects of Amherst, Massachusetts, Nothing to Hide consists of seven related exhibits that are touring the country. According to the press release for the exhibit, the purpose is to "help eliminate prejudice, stereotyping, name-calling, and harassment of people who are discriminated against due to… mental disability."

The photographs consist of families from diverse racial and economic backgrounds posing at home for photographer Gigi Kaeser. At least one member of each family has a mental illness, ranging from schizophrenia to agoraphobia. Jean Beard and Peggy Gillispie interviewed the families. The texts contain the family members' words about life with mental illness.

According to Peggy Gillespie, Jean Beard initiated the project four years ago because of the mental illness in her family. With the recent publication of a book containing photos of and interviews with all 44 families, the project has reached a new stage. Gillespie repeatedly thanked the families for their courage. She said they affirmed and empowered all those living with a mental disease.

Pauline Anderson, a mental health consumer and curator of the exhibit at Fountain Gallery, called Nothing to Hide one of the most popular shows in the gallery's history. Never before had Fountain House allowed non-members to display their art there. I concluded that Nothing to Hide is an underground hit in the making.

Jean Gillespie confirmed this by explaining that National NAMI not only helped identify potential families for photos and interviews, the organization also alerted its membership of the exhibits' locations across the country. Gillespie said the response had been fabulous; they are beginning to get national media recognition, such as an excerpt from the book in the November 3 Washington Post.

Anderson described "four ladies from New Jersey" as typical of the reaction to the display. They walked into the Fountain Gallery on their way to the theater district. One had a mentally ill relative but the exhibit was the first occasion for the four friends to talk seriously about "these people" in the exhibit and "those people" like the relative back home.

When I questioned why the subjects looked so good-natured, why so many people in the show smiled or laughed for the camera, Ms. Anderson challenged my assumption that pain is the truest way to portray mental illness. She suggested that I was playing into the hands of the media because reporters only tell negative stories about the mentally ill. Then she asked me whether I could tell the ill family members from the healthy ones. I could not.

Jean Gillespie explained that Gigi Kaeser chose those photographs that best illustrated the family relationships.. In any case, the impulse of the families was to look "normal," to take a big bite of the photographer's "cheese."

Yet, the photos are a two-way street. Some families are better at "putting a good face on mental illness" than others. In one picture, a husband and wife sit unruffled next to the grand piano in their living room. But in the adjacent text the couple describes how their psychotic son beat them up. They discovered a conspiracy of silence in their community about such behavior, (a silence which seems to pervade the living room's plush furnishings). This is the only photo in the show lacking the mentally ill member(s) of the family (because he's in jail).

At the other extreme, a middle-aged couple wearing T-shirts and shorts are planted next to each other in lawn chairs as if they arrived early for a picnic. Marilou Wong and Jake Koenig are beaming. The story states that the woman is manic depressive and the man is schizoaffective. They have helped each other through good times and bad. The photo celebrates that bond.

In other words, our images of the mentally ill can be misleading. We need to hear the stories of the mentally ill and their families before making up our minds about mental illness. The exhibit offered participants the opportunity to transform their tales of woe into testaments of strength. They succeeded with eloquence and with drama.

Joyce Lindsay describes her son Greg's schizophrenia: "He couldn't sit and he couldn't stand."

Maria Marquez says of her brother, "Cesar continues to say that he does not have a mental illness; however, he takes his medication every day." Tracey Baptiste describes her agoraphobia: "I would lie in bed each night in a fetal position, pressed as close to the wall as I could get. The wall actually became discolored from my breath." Nine-year-old Luke

McDonald says this about his older brother, Jake: "OCD is like a wave when it comes ashore. It gets lower and lower and it will stop. Well, for some people it will stop and for some people it won't, but it will be better in a couple of years for many people."

Karen Avery also suffers from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, "I was ashamed about my illness because my mother was mentally ill and I had a picture in my head of her illness as a dark, gloomy, ugly thing." Said Lynette Margulies about depression, "Every breath was agonizing; every second was agonizing."

Pearl Johnson, who experienced depression in prison said, "They put me on Thorazine and every kind of 'zine' you can think of."

Mike Campbell, the father of daughter Jaime, who has schizophrenia, claims, "Because of our experience with Jaime's illness, I have discovered that my life is much richer. It is a struggle and a real test of your faith, but getting through it proves that the human spirit can survive. I'd like to give a message of hope to other families like ours."

Michelle Cohen is a member of Fountain House and an artist whose one-woman show appears at the Fountain Gallery through January 17. She thought the exhibit was a great idea to bring mental illness out into the fresh air. "Therapy, medication, my membership in Fountain House, and the gallery gave me direction. The old days [for the mentally ill] in prison or an asylum are over. A lot of people get along on their own."

Nothing to Hide shows that "normalcy" for the mentally ill and their families is hard won. Even when the person is in recovery, a relapse is always possible. And that's what makes this visual and verbal account so poignant.