Worthing artist Alison Lapper wants us to talk about grief. She wants us to talk about death and she wants us to talk about mental health.
The extent to which we can open up these crucial conversations will be the way she judges the success of her powerful hometown exhibition Lost in Parys at Worthing Museum running from June 22-September 29.
The extent to which we can open up these crucial conversations will be the way she judges the success of her powerful hometown exhibition Lost in Parys at Worthing Museum running from June 22-September 29.
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00:00Good morning. My name is Phil Hewitt, Group Arts Editor at Sussex Newspapers. It's a huge
00:07privilege and pleasure this morning to speak to Alison Lapper, who has a remarkable, powerful
00:13exhibition at Worthing Museum, starting mid-June and running until the end of the summer. It's
00:21an exhibition called Lost in Paris. Now, Paris was your son who sadly died five years ago,
00:28and you were saying in this exhibition, you are trying to recreate a moment with your
00:33son.
00:34Yeah, I think through the process of, you know, painting him, I mean, painting your
00:40son dead is, I can't even describe how difficult that is to do. And, you know, I think I've
00:49spent two years probably grieving him more than I ever did, because I didn't let myself,
00:56because it was almost like, well, you know, he's dead now and you should be over it now,
01:00and it's all finished. And, you know, the loss of my beautiful boy is going to be with
01:06me forever. And I now realise that.
01:08And you were saying we're not good at grieving. We don't know how to do it.
01:13I think other people are really awkward about what they say, you know, just be kind, just
01:19give somebody a hug. They don't have to say it with words, you know, you can just express
01:25it with a little bit of kindness.
01:28What is it that's holding us back then, do you think, when you say we're not good at grieving?
01:35We don't talk about death, do we? We don't talk about grieving. We don't talk about loss.
01:41We don't talk about mental health. We're getting better at that. But it's still such a stigma.
01:46You know, Paris died from an accidental overdose and mental health issues. And it's almost
01:53like the stigma that goes with that, not only for Paris, but for me as his mother.
01:59It's like there shouldn't be that kind of stigma. You know, I've lost my son.
02:05He's died through no fault of his own, or maybe some people think it was his own fault.
02:13But at the end of the day, you know, the help that he needed, it wasn't there.
02:18The supervision that he needed wasn't there.
02:22You know, and I'm not blaming people. I do blame the government for not investing in mental health services.
02:30You know, there needs to be an awful lot more plugged in.
02:33And, you know, young people are really suffering.
02:37So is this exhibition saying, come on, put the investment in?
02:41Is it a statement?
02:43All of that, you know, please sit up and take notice that this is happening and it's
02:48happening to people all the time.
02:50I can't remember what the statistics are, but I know that somebody dies of either accidental
02:55overdose or suicide from mental health every, I don't know how many seconds it is.
03:02Well, it's particularly men under 45, isn't it?
03:05Yeah. Yeah. But don't forget ladies as well, because it's definitely women and young girls as well.
03:11And I know a lot of it is to do with social media and algorithms and, you know,
03:17all of this isolating ourselves.
03:19Obviously, the pandemic certainly didn't help because we were all so isolated for so long.
03:25But I just feel that we need to somehow start holding these companies accountable for, you know,
03:34I've got young people around me and their noses are in their mobile phones like they're hooked completely.
03:42And that's what the companies, YouTube, all of that want you to do.
03:47I'm very fortunate I haven't got any arms, so I can't hold my phone.
03:51It's the question of looking up and actually properly connecting, isn't it?
03:55That's the issue.
03:56Where's the conversation at the table at dinner time?
04:00When you say, you're saying a fascinating thing, you know, part of the cruelty of grief is that people say you should look and remember the good times.
04:10But your mind is filled with the times that you won't have, isn't it?
04:14Absolutely. I mean, of course, I treasure and cherish all the beautiful times, the hard times, everything that we had together.
04:25But now there's no more history.
04:27There's no more making, watching him grow up.
04:30You know, he would be 25 next year.
04:33That's a big hurdle.
04:35You know, it's gone.
04:37I don't even know what he would look like.
04:40No. And you said just now a thing that I found utterly extraordinary, that while he was alive, in your mind, he was too beautiful for you to paint or to draw.
04:50Absolutely. When Paris was alive, even as a baby, you know, right from the start, I could never draw him or paint him.
04:58I mean, I took hundreds of photographs, but I never, ever said, I always used to say to him, Paris, I can't paint you, I can't draw you, you're too beautiful.
05:07For me to even try and do, I'm not an accomplished enough artist to put you onto canvas.
05:16So the fact that I've now managed to do that, and I'm sure somewhere along the lines that Paris has actually helped me do this.
05:27I think his presence has been around whilst I've been doing this.
05:32And, you know, I have grieved like I've never grieved before for the last two years.
05:38And I think I should have done that in the beginning, but maybe I wasn't ready.
05:43And we just don't talk enough about it.
05:46So tell me, come the end of the exhibition, which is your biggest event in your hometown of Worthing so far, come the exhibition, what will you deem to be success then?
05:56I just think if you've got a conversation going amongst people, and a recognition that mental health is incredibly serious, and that, you know, people are losing their lives, young people are in desperate need and need help.
06:15And that's what we need to be focusing on and concentrating on.
06:20And I don't mean just, you know, I mean, for every young person, for anyone that's suffering with mental health and depression, and, you know, all those things that go along with it, addiction, you know, it needs to stop being such a, what's the word?
06:42I said it earlier on.
06:42Taboo, isn't it?
06:44Yeah, taboo, you know, let's get on with helping people.
06:48Have the conversation out in the open.
06:50Yeah, absolutely.
06:51Fantastic.
06:52Well, Alison, really lovely to speak to you.
06:55And congratulations on the exhibition.
06:58And I hope it achieves absolutely everything you want it to.
07:01Thank you so much for your time.
07:02Thank you very much.