THIS SCULPTURE IS THE WORK OF EIGHT YOUNG PEOPLE AT
BLUEBIRD HOUSE, IT TOOK APPROXIMATELY 10 WEEKS TO COMPLETE – IT REPRESENTS THE MONSTER THAT IS MENTAL HEALTH.

EACH HEAD IS REPRESENTING THE WAY THAT YOUNG PERSON FEELS ABOUT THERE OWN MENTAL HEALTH.

Blue and pink FACE:

My name is xxxx and I am emotionally unstable. My face represents happy, sad, fear and anger. There are some of the feelings I often have AND CAN NOT CONTROL.

Serpent:

Serpent represents the temptation to do things one should not do. I feel this is an appropriate effigy of mental health problems that cause people to do things that they might not want to do.

Red and green FACE:

My head is called nameless. It is showing two extremes of emotion- happy and angry, like a split personality, like not knowing why it really is and feels. This is how I feel about my mental health. It makes me feel like I am when medicated and makes me feel what it’s like to be locked up when you don’t know who you truly are.

Black dog:

My head is the big black dog of “frustration with the world.” It’s how I feel sometimes when things get me down.

Dragon:

My head is based on a dragon from A Studio Ghibli film as this represents a dragon flying me away from my mental health problems, and taking me to my escape which is fantasy.

THE Eye:

THIS EYE HEAD IS HOW I FEEL IN SECURE SERVICES – WATCHED ALL THE TIME. I KNOW I NEED WATCHING BUT I DON’T LIKE IT.

Skull:

My skull head represents feeling dead inside and having no hope,

Feeling like you have no emotions and also the feeling of not feeling real.

The claws represent hearing voices and the idea of it being a creepy crawly. Also I did the claws because it’s like the devil (evil) crying to escape your body and take over you.

Step 1: The Skeleton / Frame

Because the sculpture is quite large we decided to build a wooden frame, the necks are removable and numbered so that they go back in the right order.

We just used 10mm shuttering ply and some soft wood batten, cut, screwed and PVA glued into the rough shape.

Step 2: Constructing the Cardboard Shape

Using old cardboard and our favorite tool the hot glue gun we made tubes around the wooden necks then filled them with expanding foam to give the structures rigidity. Cheap building stuff worked really well but is messy and will wreck clothes and pretty much anything you don't want it on!