Die Schwarze Decke de Mary Mayrhofer (AT)

With this stiffened textile object, I focused on symbolizing and depicting characteristics of a depression. My work relocated this mental disorder in the world of objects, thus making it comprehensible and tangible even for viewers who have no personal contact with this subject matter. *Die schwarze Decke* (The Black Blanket) is a symbiosis of the creative media I chose deliberately because I regarded them as suitable for turning this project as a whole into an allegory. My work is built on factors such as script and color and shows depression as a deep black, stiffened shell that shuts one off from the enjoyment of life.

If I succeed in expressing and creating something from my pain, then I feel it was not all in vain. It also helps me to lay bare my innermost feelings and make comprehensible to others what words cannot express.

I wrote this poem at an emotional low point, on April 10, 2021, at about three o’clock in the morning—long before the beginning of the creative process, which commenced about half a year later. If things had taken a different course, this poem would have accompanied a suicide note and never would have become part of a project. Today, I am not only happy but also extremely proud that I am still here to transform my pain into something morbidly beautiful and ideally to create a kind of art that reaches and touches people.

Through this project, I want not only to confront my own inner feelings but to reveal them to others as well. I also want to commemorate all the tremendous artists, parents, siblings, friends, strangers, and other people who suffer from this illness or have already succumbed to it.

 

 

Die schwarze Decke (The Black Blanket)

The Black Blanket encases a person,

But the person is no longer there.

The fabric became rigid;

It hardened and stiffened

As life dissolved in fog.

The person is already gone,

Perhaps escaping from their thoughts,

Or exploring the bottom of the Danube.



The Black Blanket has absorbed tears

And eavesdropped on prayers.

It has muffled screams

And adorned itself with bloodstains.

The Black Blanket,

Like the last resting place of a mummy,

Like a coffin for those still alive.

As a final memory to all

Who were too tired

At the end of the day

To simply lie down again.

 

Fonte: Prix Ars Electronica 2022