“Imagination will often carry us to worlds that never were. But without it we go nowhere.”
-Carl Sagan
What would you do if suddenly, one day, everything changed? What if you discovered an imagined and secret world all your own, infinitely more delicious than the world you have always known. Would you resist? Or would you revel in it? One day everything changes for Sam when he begins to experience the world through a veil of snowfall. The external world becomes foe and the snow, friend. And Sam must make a choice.
The Silents examines the power of imagination and the impact of taking a path of your own. The devising process will be founded in collaboration with people from a diversity of disciplines, gathering stories and artefacts on imaginative experience from artists, people affected by mental health issues and the broader community. The creation of the play will be documented from start to finish through an interactive and integrated web component.
Let us lead you down the snowy path and into The Silents – from concept to curtain.
view a video trailer for the work in progress below
November 7, 2008 at 4:55 pm
I am a 59 y.o. male who graduated from college with a BFA degree. I also suffer from mental illness. I am the third generation (that I know of) to have OCD. Both of my daughters inherited my condition. Additionally I have ADD and PTSD (the result of being emotionally and psychologically abused as a child). I have always been creative and always thought of myself as an odd duck. It wasn’t until about 12 years ago that my condition was diagnosed.
Because of this condition my life hasn’t always been easy but it has been interesting. I never really talked about it until recently because of both fear and shame. I am now on permanent disability because my last employer, a community college who “claimed” to embrace diverse populations forced me out of my job. Because of that I know embrace who and what I am. On my blog, http://emfineartstudio.blogspot.com, I write about both my artistic endeavors and my mental illness and how the two are interlinked.
What you are doing here is a very good thing. If there is anything I can do to help, please let me know. Feel free to use any of my blog postings. If you have anything specific you wish to ask me then by all means please email me. I will be as open and honest as I can.
Ed Maskevich