Muhammad Masood SAMSODIEN

My body of work tries to break the negative stigma around talking and helping with mental health. This is in regard to being a male with mental health disorders, which in itself is a negative stigma around it due to males being held by the ‘’Be A Man’’ mentality which prevents men talking about anything that might be consistent with anything that is shown to be sensitive and vulnerable to the individual. This is not the only idea I’m trying to bring up but also the struggle of being a Cape Malay Muslim who has grew up in a very strict and rigid Muslim household while also having mental illness which is a taboo in of itself. I’m trying to relay my emotion through my art to convey in a visual sense how it feels to be isolated within my own community and even family because of their fear of breaking tradition and also belief that is so ingrained within the Cape Muslim community that mental health does not exist- it’s just a side effect of not praying enough.

I predominately work within prints because the methodology suits my work well because of the black, grey, and white colour is most preferable to help relay the positive and negative and conflicted aspects of being apart of a community that looks at people like me as a taboo subject. Within the print methodology I prefer to use etchings to convey the feeling and conflicted emotions best because of the harsh line work that can be achieved but also the variation within it. In the end, within my body of work and main topic is that of positive and negative aspects that can be achieved while using mental health as an asset to emphasise emotion.