DESCRIPTION:
Are you worried about how you look?
Are you obsessed with your body image?

Most people are conscious of the way they look. Both the fashion and cosmetic industry is built around people’s image of themselves. The majority of people make an attempt to look as good as they can. It helps them to feel good about themselves. But what happens when this need to look good takes on a life of its own? What happens when we will stop at nothing to change the way we look?

While most people fantasize about changing some aspect of their bodies, people suffering from Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD) believe that they are so unattractive and unacceptable to others that they even avoid social interaction for fear of being ridiculed. BDD has also been dubbed “imagined ugliness” and the majority of sufferers are perfectly normal-looking people who have developed a warped sense of their own image.

For artist Leigh de Vries her appearance became an all-consuming obsession. Having developed body dysmorphic disorder (BDD) in her early teens, she would spend hours in front of a mirror and isolate herself in her house due to a fear of scaring people.

Exposure is an immersive, potentially disturbing, installation, debuting to the public at the Old Market Gallery in Rotherham, on September 26th 2015, in association with Rotherham Open Arts Renaissance.

The mixed media installation explores the little-understood medical condition of BDD. During the exhibition period, creator and fellow sufferer, Leigh de Vries, is also engaging in Youth Outreach workshops and talks in the week before the open day, to raise awareness of the condition which, only as recently as 2013, was recognised as being on the ‘obsessive-compulsive spectrum’, related to Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). Groups invited to view the installation include Rotherham's Thurcroft youth group, Myplace, R.C.A.T and RUSH (a homeless youth group).

For more info go here -
http://mybrokenreality.com

Exposure: The Broken Reality Tunnel of BDD is sponsored by Arts Council, England