Cynthia Carson

Red Tape and Other Invisible Barriers: Mixed Media and Canvas; 8 x 8"; $250

The Space Inside: The Struggle My Brain - Not My Cage: Mixed Media on Maple Wood; 7.5" wide x 6" depth,  7.5" height; $250

Image Descripton - From Left to Right 

1) Red Tape and Other Invisible Barriers: A person climbs a steep, winding path up a rocky hill lined with orange traffic cones and barriers. There is red tape tied around her legs and she is a leaving a trail of it behind her. A blue sign near the bottom reads Disabled Person Crossing. The sky is dark blue above the hill.

2) The Space Inside the Struggle: My Brain - Not my Cage: A colourful mixed-media artwork shaped like a brain, featuring three sections: a woman in a blue dress, a person painting cherry blossoms, and a hoop adorned with beads and feathers on a gold background.

3) A long shot of The Space Inside: The Struggle My Brain - Not My Cage, showing its wooden stand.

Artist Description:

Red Tape and Other Invisible Barriers: 

There are mountains to climb. Boulders, roadblocks, obstacles that show up out of nowhere. Every step taken barefoot, in your PJ’s, wrapped in red tape, on the rocky uphill path you do not understand. After a brain injury, you’re expected to fill out forms, take tests, explain yourself over and over—while barely able to process what’s being asked. Help is “available,” but somehow always just out of reach. Doors close. Applications get denied. The places meant to support you ask you to define what support even looks like, when you’re in no position to know. You’re sent back and forth, like a ping pong ball between systems, each one insisting the other is responsible—until eventually, neither is. And you’re left there, trying to navigate it all alone. Every day is an uphill climb. You’re still expected to move forward, to figure it out, to keep going—barefoot, tangled in red tape, finding a way through something that was never designed to be clear.  

 

The Space Inside the Struggle: My Brain - Not my Cage

I chose the brain as the central form for this art piece for several deeply personal and conceptual reasons. I am a severe traumatic brain injury survivor, and I turn trauma into art, one piece at a time. There are many things I can still not do, and might never relearn, though there are things I can do. I can sing, probably not professionally, but I can sing, and I can create art, though not outside, and dancing I do in my mind, because the dizziness and vertigo are just not worth it. There are obstacles in my way every day. To put it in the words of a Neurologist that I once got to see: “Your brain is a bunch of scar tissue, what the F do you want me to do?” - I didn’t have an answer back then. Maybe my brain is filled with a ton of scar tissue, and maybe nothing can be done about that, but it’s also filled with dreams, ambitions, and hopes. Some I can work towards and fulfill and some I might just get to appreciate from afar. There is a struggle in my brain, but I refuse to be caged by it.

Artist Biography:

Cynthia Carson is a severe Traumatic Brain Injury Survivor, who turns trauma into art, one piece at a time. Professionally trained in photography, she's always had an affinity for the arts and crafts. After marrying into a Métis family, Cynthia was taught the art of beading and making moccasins, which quickly became a favourite way to relax and rewind after a busy and hectic day in the office. 

However, in late 2017 everything changed in one second of one day. The “normal” she knew was gone forever. Cynthia suffered a severe traumatic brain injury that left her fighting for her life. She had to relearn a lot of things, reading, writing, walking without an aid, managing stairs, even putting jam on toast, and more. Gone were the days of working, peering through a camera looking for a great subject, or getting lost in crafting detailed beadwork. Unwilling to simply give up and accept her fate as a medically lost case, she decided to start her own kind of rehab by digging up some leather she had in her basement after seeing an art piece by an unknown artist inspiring her to do so. In the beginning it was not about creating art, not at all. 

That is something that developed over time. It was all about relearning lost skills. It was a way to work on her cognitive function, fine motor skills, concentration, endurance, and overall rehabilitation. She'd spend 5 minutes, 10 minutes, maybe even 20 minutes on a task before calling it a day. Cutting some leather, trying to make something, anything. Even if it didn’t work out she kept trying to make something. Cynthia uses leather to create, but likes to dip into mixed media with beads, feathers, pebbles, acrylics, and epoxy resin, and has since re-learned how to bead. 

She recently rebranded her website to Artful Brain Creations where she also offers small items, such as earrings, DIY kits, and other small items. Each piece is significant as it has helped her to redevelop lost skills, as well as work through trauma and emotions, and are symbolic of our unrecognized inner strength, the fragility of life, letting one's soul dance even if physically unable to do so, the rediscovery of one's own imagination, and all the calming music helping one through the day. Cynthia's art became a CAN in a world of CANNOT's. She adapted the mantra "When life is filled with things you can no longer do, you need to find something you CAN do.

Follow the artist on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ArtfulBrainCreations