how hard has it been seeing myself broken into fragments?

How hard has it been seeing myself broken into fragments?

The project delves into personal trauma experienced through chemsex, extending its relevance to a broader and universal scope for all its users who suffer from the spiral of addiction.

It reveals various quests for transcendence and therapeutic dimensions through dance, incorporating both choreographed and improvised rituals to elevate reality following the mental and physical impact of trauma caused by addictions, with a particular focus on chemsex in this context.

I was constantly fighting against the existence of my body which became a place I couldn’t escape from and which condemned me to an immutable self. I tried to create my own utopias on the dance floors. Sometimes, I had an imaginary garden with imaginary colors. My body dedicated itself to this endless search for utopian places where Berlin seemed to be the Eldorado of hedonic pleasure. The most stubborn utopia, in the hope of erasing the supposed sad topology of my body, was to free my soul which finds shelter but escaped through the windows of my eyes and my dreams electrified by the drifting coma that these substances provided.

Destroyed by madness, my mind, hungry, hysterical, and bare, screaming in despair through my windows, trudging at dawn in the meager street in search for a furious sting.

I use art as a therapy and a discipline to enhance a process of healing while using artistic self-expression and applied psychological theory as a guided method to help illustrate the internal struggles and facilitate a deeper understanding of our invisible wounds.

“I've always preferred careful adventures to hazardous wanderings. But as I get older, these nostalgic reminiscences are merely negotiable. After all, we all wander. From these wanderings, some draw reports or books, others show songs or pictures. For quite some time now, I have noticed the same crack at the corners of the streets, the same wrinkles under make-up, the same thrill in summer cares. Most of the time these pictures depict the wounds of the soul, sometimes other wanders pass by.”

Beautiful Lost Minds*

I’ve lost a friend again.

I lost him while burning the midnight oil

In meetings over ethereal incantations.

Eu-o vi pela útlima vez acima do Tejo,

Red flash eyes in the yellow morning.

We were still withdrawing a few ghostly trifles– above a sinking fire,

A little act of courtesy.

After that promised kind of youthful sympathy,

He told in the best modern way,

In some mixture lying in Mascarpone,

That our two natures are not meant to be blent.

A childish day turned into tragedy, with four or more winters on my head.

Betrayed by the honey of my generation,

I struggle to escape,

As old papers or the drug sets up the case.

Or an eighty-year-old smiling public man

Animating my careless reveries,

Sitting, studying reading-books and history.

As man’s enterprise questions in a momentary wonder;

Does the hollow of their cheek still hold the few parsley’s sprigs,

Or the uncertainty of their setting forth to a fit of grief or rage?

* title copied from the album: Beautifully Lost Mind of John Hayes, 2022.

The project is an attempt to draw on the horizon corporeal and spiritual therapeutical practices through personal experiences after traumatic events. It unveils a world that disrupts commonly-held certitudes regarding reality and temporality, while testifying to a constant renewal of forms of spirituality. It investigates the mechanisms humans explore to either escape their condition, or also to help them guide through a self-healing process after disrupting behavioral patterns.

“How hard has it been seeing myself broken into fragments?” explores a personal trauma experienced through chemsex which can be applied to a wider and universal extension to all those who have suffered, are still suffering and will irrevocably suffer. It unveils different searches for transcendence and therapeutical dimensions through dance practices, choreographed or improvised rituals to enhance reality after experiencing mental and physical traumas through all kind of addictions, but within this project, chemsex.

Chemsex refers to the use of drugs to enhance and extend pleasure and physical performance during sexual activities. This practice is predominantly encountered in the gay community, particularly during parties where the focus shifts to exploring new and intense sexual experiences. This being said, it does not mean that homosexuals use more drugs than heterosexuals. However, they do use them more in sexual contexts.

Homosexuals delved into the practice of chemsex to enhance their erotic experiences and to continue the social uprising regarding the sexual revolution initiated in the 1960s. However, this revolution has spiraled into a significant downfall since the rise of access to drugs in the 1990s, becoming a public health risk in the gay community leading to severe anxious and depressive reactional behaviors for many. Chemsex playgrounds are unique occasions where gays explore erotic possibilities with dedication and care, yet they come with inherent risks; many of them easily fall into the spiral of addiction. Despite the psychological and health risks, chemsex is still appealing, driven by a desire for mutual pleasure and a sense of belonging they often seek through social norms imposed by our heteronormative and patriarchal societies. During these parties, many homosexuals adopt a dual personality, conforming to society’s expectations by day while exploring their true selves online by night.

“We're looking for an answer to societal pressures, offering an escape from high-performance consumerism and fostering links between marginalized individuals.”

However, chemsex offers only a temporary relief rather than a lasting solution to deeper issues. The contradictions within this practice often lead to a certain kind of exacerbation of traditional masculinity, with the phone constantly in hand, mindlessly swiping on dating apps. I found myself attending these parties for two years, almost every weekend, adopting disruptive behavioral patterns and initiating myself into an excess of consumption of sex and drugs.

I remember that boy I met in Berlin during my first visit in 2015 uttering: "There will always be that other boy, more attractive standing behind me, breathing over my shoulder and looking at you.” - which accurately reflects the social dimension at chemsex parties within the gay community.

In this perspective, I use art as a therapy and a discipline to enhance a process of healing while using artistic self-expression and applied psychological theory as a guided method to help illustrate the internal struggles and facilitate a deeper understanding of our invisible wounds. While using different techniques of photography and corporeal practices, this project is an incentive to materialize the wounds of the soul into beauty. Amidst a myriad of sources of therapeutical transcendent practices, corporeal dance is the core of my study.

Drawing images as an irrepressible need to tell a story and to understand the world, to understand its territories, its boundaries, its origins, what orchestrates it. Drawing images against oblivion, to commemorate our deaths, to design a platform from where we contemplate our lives. Drawing images at last to understand ourselves and our existence. “I've always preferred careful adventures to hazardous wanderings. But as I get older, these nostalgic reminiscences are merely negotiable. After all, we all wander. From these wanderings, some draw reports or books, others show songs or pictures. For quite some time now, I have noticed the same crack at the corners of the streets, the same wrinkles under make-up, the same thrill in summer cares. Most of the time these pictures depict the wounds of the soul, sometimes other wanders pass by.”

In my pictures and videos, movements are moderated and disassociated in order to magnify this moment of transcendence and to explore the intangible edge between reality and the surreal and the moment when the mind leaves the body.

Régis Dumoulin

sequence

others

travels

How hard has it been seeing myself broken into fragments?