Media: Conditions Apply
Throughout these past few years that I have been working on the project, I’ve reached out to various media outlets in Finland to garner some type of attention from them. So far, only one of those attempts has led to something substantial, and that was in early 2023 when the newspaper of my own county interviewed me. When I reached out to the arts journalist of the paper, I made it a point to let her know that what I was looking for was not a sob story on my abuse and trauma, but a contextual glance at my artistry, what I have turned my childhood trauma into. The journalist was interested in both me as a person and my art; she had checked out my Instagram page and blog articles and was on board with my wish of focusing on the art side of things, promising me to include the few selected scans of my illustrations. I was super excited, this was going to be the starting point of everything!
WARNING!
Have you ever heard of freak shows? Those exhibitions or circus fairs where people with physical deformities and disabilities were put up on display for “normal” folk to look at and be disgusted, fascinated, repulsed by. Thankfully freak shows have been left in the past, at least for the most part. But even after their prime time, we have continued on to treat disabled and chronically ill people with the same kind of disrespect as that of freak shows. And while the exhibitionists during the 1800’s were often paid for their labor as a “freak of nature”, now in the 21st century, we don’t get those kinds of privileges. So, to some extend, things have gotten worse instead of progressing. But isn’t that the nature of things nowadays in general?