A Brush with Life

A film by Glen Salzman and Martin Duckworth. 1994. VHS video. 52 minutes. Color. Available from First Run / Icarus Films, 32 Court Street, 21st floor, Brooklyn NY 11201. Website: http://www.frif.com.

Reviewed by Aaris Sherin, Department of Art, University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, IA 50614-0362, U.S.A. E-mail: aaris.sherin@uni.edu.

This film is about Diane, a Canadian woman artist who is treated periodically at the largest psychiatric hospital in Montreal. Throughout the film, we watch as Diane moves and speaks within the familiar surroundings of the mental institution and her apartment in the city, where she also has a painting studio. We learn that she is a victim of severe child abuse, and that she suffers from dreadful dissociative states and suicidal urges. Her dark and sinister paintings provide a murky connection to her magnified feelings of personal pain. Her paintings, which are often large, range from obsessively detailed scenes to seemingly carefree expressions, depending on her state of mind. During one of her stays in the hospital, Diane paints a mural in the institution's chapel that is somewhat reminiscent of a Hieronymus Bosch altarpiece. She is far more stable than most of her fellow patients in the sense that, while undoubtedly troubled, her functioning is normal enough that she is occasionally able to make surprisingly accurate comments about her own mental condition. Indeed, on several occasions, she appears quite healthy and animated in the hospital setting, specifically at times when she is working in the hospital's art studio as a person who helps other patients. The film is comprised of interviews with Diane and her therapists, combined with cinema verité scenes of her normal daily life, at home and in the hospital. Interspersed (unfortunately) are somewhat heavy-handed clips of vocal and pictorial overlays, which are intended to suggest the bizarre mental states of disturbed or confused psyches. Near the film's end, when Diane leaves the hospital, there is a scene of her talking to one of her therapists, in which she claims to be more able now to be in touch with her anger. She thanks her therapist for helping her to gain control of her troubled life. Unfortunately, if this is an attempt to end this painful documentary on a note of optimism, it falls short, since it is not easy to believe that Diane's relief is anything but temporary. To its credit, A Brush With Life provides a candid look into the agonizing inner life of a gifted but tormented artist, and shows us how creating art in a psychiatric setting may enrich the lives and experiences of some of its patients.

(Reprinted by permission from Ballast Quarterly Review, Vol. 19, No. 2, Winter 2003-2004.)

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