Creations of Hope

Molly and Corinna both have work showing in the Creations of Hope show at the Upstage Gallery in Topeka this month.

It's on display the rest of the month, but the opening was last night as a First Fridays thing.

I guess strictly speaking, Molly should have been disqualified from this show on the basis that autism isn't a 'mental illness' diagnosis per se. Though a lot of the same issues apply, though if not for her seizures, Molly wouldn't be taking a lot of prescription drugs and most people with mental health diagnoses end up hocked to the gills on all sorts of toxic stuff that does nothing to solve their problems but shortens their lives more dramatically than cigarette smoking.

So every artist in the show has basically been diagnosed at some point with a mental illness. I've been to a lot of gallery openings and known quite a few artists, and I'm not sure how this differentiates Creations of Hope from all the other showings I've been to. I don't know, I can think of one artist I know who has probably ducked psychiatristry his whole life, but the guy I'm thinking of, if he ever went in and got on the couch, yeah, he'd be offered a fistful of scripts.

But Molly enjoyed herself, there was popcorn, broccoli and celery to snack on, and her art on the wall. Corinna had fun, too, took the mic and did a couple of poems. To my astonishment, she actually got the room to shut up for the second poem, I didn't think that was going to happen. She was topical, but she also has a lot of charisma when she wants to.