Education through art

Do you know someone who suffers from mental illness?

The chances are strong you probably do. About 6 percent of Americans deal with severe mental illness, and many more are affected to a lesser degree, according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness.

Personally, I have a family history of the stuff -- depression, suicide -- and one of my very close friends struggles with mental illness on a daily basis. Of course, with what other frequency would you struggle? Mental illness is tough and nasty, and it doesn't go away.

But that doesn't mean the mentally ill are dangerous, possessed, evil or terribly unstable. Most of the time you probably can't even pick them out of a crowd. They are you and me.

This weekend, the Community Counseling Center wants to get that point across, through a display of art work by people who've been treated at the CCC.

The show, "Gallery of Inspirations," contains about 20 paintings from several artists, mostly abstract and impressionistic. Having such a show is a great idea by itself -- showing the public at large that even the mentally ill are people, too. You don't castigate people who have a cold, do you?

But in light of recent events, it's even more important. This spring, the Cape Girardeau City Council voted against a request by the CCC to rezone property near its current offices. That property would have been used to build a residential facility to give the mentally ill a place to stay while they re-enter society and recover.

The vote wasn't at all close, 6 to 1, though the council said it was a tough decision.

I wasn't necessarily outraged; maybe upset is a more accurate description. Fear took over. The mostly elderly residents of the area were scared some of the mentally ill might get out of control.

With its show this Friday, and possibly more in the future, the CCC wants to show local people that there's nothing to fear, that the mentally ill are still people, and their illness doesn't make them criminally dangerous in most cases.

The "consumers" (people who use the CCC's services) who made the art will be on hand at Friday's reception, 6 to 8:30 p.m. at the CCC offices at the corner of Bloomfield and Silver Springs roads. I recommend any First Friday gallery walker make the trip out there to meet them.

Then again, many in the arts community already know about mental illness, I bet. Sure, this sounds like a stereotype, but artists often are afflicted by mental illness, trying to express their different feelings in the only way they know how.

What might be even better is if people in the greater Cape community, not just the arts subculture, will make their way to the CCC Friday night, and put a face on mental illness.

Stigmatizing and marginalizing the mentally ill will never make the problem go away. They need our help, just like the physically disabled.