Young artist makes illustrations about her schizophrenia

“Sometimes I worry that someone I know will find my Twitter or Instagram, and then I remember that I’ve already told everyone on the internet about my mental illness,” she says. social networks Kate Fenner, 19, from California, USA. Some time ago, the young woman decided to tell her story and share her peculiar illustrations.

O awesome.club decided to find out how the artist’s drawings have evolved over time.

At age 17, after a prolonged period of uncertainty, Kate was finally diagnosed with schizophrenia.

To fight her mental condition, the young woman decided to put all her hallucinations on paper.

Kate published the images on social media, adding the circumstances in which she had the hallucinations, what sounds she heard, what the voices said and what she felt in those moments.

For example, this is how she saw herself once she looked in the mirror.

And this is a more recent self-portrait.

Kate often sees all sorts of insects, especially beetles and flies that walk over her body. She believes the flies represent herself, associating them with futility and irrelevance. This fly, by the way, is called Don.

Currently, it is possible to find in the artist’s profiles on social networks several recurring characters who have certain personalities, and even their own mental disorders.

An example of them is Burton, a boy raised by bears. The character’s head is exaggeratedly large, as it grew depending on his level of self-confidence.

Or this bird, Brian. In the drawing, in the upper left corner, you can see another hallucination of the young woman.

Ledger lives in an underground cave and is friends with the fly Don.

As sweet as these characters seem, they reveal more about Kate’s problem than meets the eye. In most cases, schizophrenia is accompanied by low self-esteem, severe depression, anxiety, and other disorders. All this is reflected in the characters.

According to Kate herself, she doesn’t want people to have a false notion that her illness is cool like her work, as there is nothing beautiful about her mental disorders.

On her Instagram page, the girl often writes sincerely about the fears that invade her and about the feeling of being cursed. Her entire life is, for her, as chaotic as her illustrations.

Yes, sometimes she creates colorful and vivid designs. According to her, some are even successful among children.

On some occasions, she draws characters from comics and movies. Symbolically, Kate has many illustrations of the Joker, a character who also suffers from mental problems.

However, art is incapable of healing the young woman, it only distracts her amidst a “hellish landscape”.

Kate is sure that society feeds many stereotypes about schizophrenic people, thinking that they should all be committed to asylums. Therefore, the young woman speaks openly about many aspects of her life that, at first glance, seem absolutely normal.