Painting #4 - Day 4 (16/05/19)

This morning I received confirmation that we had secured 2 tickets to the Strictly Come Dancing Professionals tour at Portsmouth Guildhall next week. This completely threw me as I had hoped to take my daughter with my husband (R) too. I don't like going to events such as these alone as I suffer hugely with anxiety in these situations. This news unsettled me and it led to me sending many text messages to R to try to relieve my anxiety and ease my urge to cry! I know it seems ridiculous but these are the extremes of emotion that I can be dealing with on an almost daily basis (when things are very bad). Sharing my concerns with R meant that I felt calmer and more able to move on with my day. I am frustrated with myself that I still hide behind him instead of tackling my problems independently. I threw myself into my artwork which definitely helped; art is almost always a good distraction.

Painting #4 has today become a more political piece, focusing on gambling and the way we are bombarded in the media and on our devices by adverts tempting/luring us in. I absolutely love mixed media so on noticing that the newspaper I was using to protect the table was from Grand National weekend, I took the decision to use the horse racing pages to collage a section onto the canvas. As it is Mental Health Awareness Week I felt that it would be good to do a piece of art that highlights the chaos that comes from addiction. The bright colours and busyness reflect the struggle that gambling addicts battle against on a daily basis. Addiction isn't something I have any experience or history of in my family but I learnt about it in my Psychology degree. I have also listened to discussions on Jeremy Vine's current affairs programme on BBC Radio 2: 17.5.18 - Fixed odd betting terminals and 2.11.18 - Resignation of Sport's Minister Tracey Crouch over the Government's failure to tackle gambling addiction.