Festival highlights ‘ordinary’ nature of mental health issues

Mental health issues are a "normal experience rather than something extraordinary", JP Swaine says as he takes a break from the last minute preparations for this year's First Fortnight festival.

The festival which runs through January aims to challenge mental health prejudice through the creative arts with a series of events, most of which are Dublin based.

In 2009 Mr Swaine, a mental health social work manager and cognitive psychotherapist, and arts professional David Keegan decided to "test out" an idea they had to use the arts as an aid in opening up discussion around mental health.

“We decided to take our passion and our experience of the arts and see if we could do something different,” he said.

The idea of the “ordinariness” of mental health issues is one that he, and the other organisers and volunteers who are the driving force behind the fortnight’s events, are very close to.

“For many generations there was a very heavy veil of silence that surrounded mental health and where there is a veil of silence people imagine that it’s something to be ashamed of. That’s a cocktail for a problem that will never get solved,” he said.

Mr Swaine had his own experience of mental health issues: when he was 16 his older brother David died by suicide. The idea for the festival began as a way of honouring David’s memory while also aiming to be beneficial to others.

“I think it’s valuable that when bad things happen we don’t try and undo the pain that is caused but that we integrate that experience into something that could be useful for someone else,” Mr Swaine said.

In 2010 the first event took place and has grown ever since. Now in its fifth year the festival line up encompasses music, poetry, theatre, art, film and dance and a tongue-in-cheek National Therapy project which is “compulsory on a voluntary basis” for all occupants of Ireland.

Sport is also represented in the line up with a panel discussion entitled Over the Bar which sees figures from the sports world explore mental health issues.

An event unique to the festival is Co-Motion, which takes place on Sunday January 4th in St Stephen’s Green at 2pm, where participants are asked to load their MP3 players with music which they then share with others using headphone splitters:

“It’s like a silent disco except you are walking with a stranger and listening to the music that gets them through,” Mr Swaine explains.

More information about the festival can be found at firstfortnight.ie.