Mental Health in the Arts
Making a conscious effort to look after your mental health when having a career in the arts is essential.
The added pressure of lockdowns and isolations has thrown even more uncertainty in an already difficult industry.
The constant highs and lows can take a toll if we don’t develop healthy practices to help keep us balanced through all the uncertainty. Rejection is part of being an artist but often it can become overwhelming, leaving us feeling incompetent and asking “will I ever be good enough?”
There are also effects from financial strain. In the beginning stages, the currency offered to performers is ‘exposure’ and even when you finally get to the stage of getting paid work, a lot of working contracts only last for a period of a few months and the pay often isn’t great. This can leave artists and creatives feeling down from being constantly undervalued.
At the beginning of the first lockdown we both lost a lot of work. I (Kel Matsena) was on a UK/US Tour of an Olivier award winning play and my brother (Anthony Matsena) was receiving choreography commissions for National and International dance companies we’ve admired for years. We both felt we had finally made great strides in our careers and were finally taking the right steps in achieving our hopes and dreams. However, due to COVID-19, within a week, 2 years’ worth of work was either cancelled or postponed with no sight of when these opportunities would return.
The arts went into panic mode and I soon found myself without an agent and all potential representatives that had expressed an interest in working with me either lost their jobs or withdrew their offers to represent me as an actor. I felt helpless and had lost all sense of direction or control over my career. My brother Anthony was in the same difficult situation and he couldn’t rehearse, perform or continue to choreograph for these wonderful companies. We both were deeply frustrated.
After months of feeling helpless we realised we’d been spending the last few years waiting on emails from other people to tell us we were good enough to do what we love doing, either getting cast in a soap or being offered to choreograph on a company.
We were always waiting on someone else to give us the green light so we could be creative which is a really unhealthy way of working.
It dawned on us that we don’t need a big budget, cast or dance group to allow us to be creative, if we want to dance we can put some music on and just move freely. If I want to act or feel connected to the world of theatre I can record my practice when doing monologues and assess my own learning and performing. We all want things to “return to normal” but in the interim we need to find ways to satisfy our creative needs and keep our tools as creatives and performers sharp.
The way we’ve done this is by creating our own work and performing it through digital platforms. Recording choreography and small scenes, on our phones even, has kept our creative juices flowing. Artists have a tremendous amount of energy to create but when that energy is not used positively and productively it can transform into negative and unhealthy feelings of anxiety and little self-worth. Therefore it is important to keep using the skills and attributes we value highest in ourselves.
The arts is also a largely collaborative industry, you’re often surrounded by like-minded passionate people and that sense of community is essential to allow all the different elements of performances on stages and screen to flow seamlessly from one to the next. Writers work with directors, directors with actors, choreographers with dancers, dancers with musicians and so on. The social side that plays an important role in our industry is a beautiful thing as it allows us artists to build meaningful bonds that can be reflected through the work but when COVID-19 first struck our lives that sense of community was lost.
However we both found ways to stay connected to fellow artists whilst at home.
Doing things such as zoom calls with trusted friends in the arts industry to talk openly without any judgement about our frustrations and worries or simply doing read throughs of scripts or leading each other through dance and yoga classes. What quickly becomes evident when you engage with other artists in this way is that you are not alone in your struggle even though it may feel as if you are. The reality is that there are thousands of people experiencing the same difficulties in the arts and by sharing our stories together we can find the strength to make it through these challenging times. Surrounding yourself with a network of positive thinkers and developing your own healthy practices will help protect your mental and physical health.
The creative process doesn’t come without its own difficulties too.
To make authentic work that connects to people, honesty is required. Actors, dancers, musicians, etc are often asked to work from personal experience to help enrich their work however the constant trudging up of old memories and events from your personal life can be damaging and we need to acknowledge this so we can reverse the negative effects of rehearsals and performances on our mental health and pursue a healthier and sustainable way of working.
Words & photo by Kel and Anthony Matsena
Find out more on their website or follow them on @Matsenaproductions