For my own good was designed to participate in a conference about phycic health and madness, organised by a mental health activist group Initiative for a Diverse Movement in Mental Health, in 3 & 4 of March 2023.
The Multimedia Exhibition “Learning – Unlearning: Dialogues on Madness” speaks about psychiatric experience, dominant knowledge, collective power, the right to self-determination and pluralism. The dialogue is not limited to the “discourse” through presentations but also arises through artistic processes that condense the contemporary narrative in the image. Dialogues are created through comics, visual art, handicrafts, poems, and photographic works by people who have been engaged around the themes of the biennial, either as creators or by choosing to be present through the images they share.
Inspiration-text
The central themes of the comic are incarceration and obligation of treatment. An initial inspitation was the tragic deaths of people dying from fire while being chained on beds and abandoned inside mental institutes.
Inside the work there are several references to old greek rock songs, such as “Για το καλό μου” (For my own good -starting inspiration for the whole comic), “Η πρώτη φορά” (The first time -second page) and “Η ελευθερία δε νικιέται” (Freedom cannot be defeated -third page).
There is also an indirect reference on how most states chose to deal with the covid crisis (enclosures, prohibitions, compulsory treatment for our own good, resistance).
Visual style -comic
The visual style follows my older work “For a breath of freedom“. Black and white panels, crosshatching (I feel it conveys more intensity as a final sketch), close-ups (often from the narrator’s point of view).
An unusual choice I made for my other works was to illustrate the white space around the panels with doodles. The main goal was to create a free and perhaps chaotic space where the mind and hand drawing travels outside of the closed contours.
The translation of the comic was made by Ntina Poursanidou.
For my own good
