An extraordinary thing happened during the recent opening night of “We Learnt to Fly”. I was talking to two women who had come to see my paintings when one of them told her friend that she had her own “Betty” and that for years she had never told anyone. She had been so afraid of having a vocal tic in public. I felt so honoured that she had felt able to open up about it, simply because of my new Betty Said paintings. She has decided to name her tic too and so far has a couple of names to choose between, Boo or Mandy. She said:
“What I felt was ‘there’s somebody out there like me!’ your art gave me the courage to speak out and it felt surprisingly easy, once said everybody including yourself were so lovely and it was such a relief to have said it, to laugh about it and nobody made me feel weird”.
The point of my work is to raise awareness and to encourage people to feel ok with disability as an observer or as a person with disability. I know that sometimes when Betty speaks up that people look at the floor or pretend it didn’t happen, but Betty is there for a reason, she wants to be heard because my voice was silenced for so many years. Betty is hilarious, I love her but it took a long time to feel that way. My closest friends and family help so much with that process. We should all be supportive of each other. I feel like my purpose is achieved and I am really excited to have a friend with a vocal tic for the first time ever.
Artwork with audio: Betty Said – Big Tits
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