What are the limitations of the mind? What are we allowed to see and experience in this lifetime? What happens when you’re not ready for what you’re about to see? How much stress can one brain or body take? Several things are unexplainable in this world whether it is nature, science, religion, even the government. In most instances it’s easy to show ignorance to things we don’t understand. Some will drive themselves crazy to understand things, but what about those who run from insanity due to things they have seen, experienced, or understands? What is PTSD? Besides the fact that it’s the name of my thesis, what does it mean? The Medical Dictionary defines Post Traumatic Stress Disorder as an anxiety disorder affecting individuals who have experienced profound emotional trauma, such as torture, rape, military combat, or natural disaster, characterized by recurrent flashbacks of the traumatic event, nightmares, eating disorders, anxiety, fatigue, forgetfulness, and social withdrawal.
If you were to ask me what PTSD means I would simply say an absolute character changer, insanity of the mind, a never ending battle of two separate realms. What’s ironic is that most times you wouldn’t know what it looked like if it was standing right in front of you. I am the son of a very Honorable War veteran who served for almost 30 years under the U.S. Army. Most of my inspiration that came from this series of paintings was my father’s journey and the struggles he faces everyday dealing with PTSD. This disorder is hard on him and it has changed his thinking and perception on a lot of things. My family wasn’t familiar with it and didn’t really know how or when to expect it upon his arrival from Iraq in 2007.
Having haunting war images in your mind of murders, deaths, and devastation is enough to drive the mind into permanent psychosis and has been the reality for millions of soldiers throughout history. Because I have never been to war I don’t feel that I will ever fully understand this mental nightmare. I feel like my role as the artist is to observe, analyze, and be opening minded, and make connections through thought and feeling. Having that kind of stress introduced into my life gave me plenty of things to observe such as tendencies, emotions, moods, and that helped me to generate the energy I put into these paintings. Some added effects to the pieces are my own visual aspects as to how I see them from my perspective. A lot of the work has my own raw emotion added to the situation as well as emotions or actions I’ve seen for myself. Frustration, sadness, guilt, and anger are apparent in some works in my series, and warmth and relief are present in the others. PTSD opens up a realm of life endangering situations like extreme alcoholism, drug abuse, flashbacks, nightmares, and suicidal tendencies. Some people have it worse than others but nevertheless it’s a domino effect and it affects everyone around it like a virus.
My interpretation of this disorder is more of a spiritual battle. I painted some of the pieces with the intention to make my subjects look very depressed and out of their elements or stress that is unfortunately consuming the person. There is no identifiable cure for PTSD and the military has already put out millions of dollars to treat the problem, making it an individual battle of the mind. In my depiction I wanted to show the nightmare from the perspective of the soldier and from the knowledge I have from dealing with this disorder in my life. My goal wasn’t to have your stomach in a twist from gore and explicit war images but to engage the viewer in a more psychological way and create a feeling from experiencing the piece. I also want those who deal with the disorder to relate to it and make connections with the images I’ve painted. I feel my goal is to make the viewer aware simply through the power of the artwork. Because PTSD is triggered by sensitive memory and sight, I chose images that show the aftermath of war or immediate combat from the eyes of the viewer and the painter.
