Artist Puts Together Collection of Self-portraits While on Different Drugs

[Swimmingdancer]

Author: Jeff Bausch
Date: July 25, 2012
Source: BoomBotix
Original article here

Artist Puts Together Collection of Self-portraits While on Different Drugs

Bryan Lewis Saunders is a performance artist / poet who has been drawing self-portraits every day since 1995. Literally. ... He has over 8,000 of these self-portraits at home. As you could imagine, it can get a little boring doing the same thing over and over for a while. ... To spice things up, Saunders decided to do a series of self-portraits while on various forms of drugs. And not that easy stuff. We’re talking everything from mushrooms to crystal meth, Adderall, and bottles of cough syrup. ... When you’re looking at each of the portraits, note what the drugs are doing to his motor skills and how he tries to compensate while also trying to communicate what he’s experiencing via the drug.

Psiloybin Mushrooms:

Adderall:

Cocaine:

Klonopin:

Morphine:

See many more on the artist's site here

 

[Swimmingdancer]

I loved these and I hope this is an ok place to share them Here are a few more that I liked that were not shown in the article. I've NSFW'd them for size.

Dilaudid:

NSFW:

Cannabis:

NSFW:

PCP:

NSFW:

Ativan/Haloperidol:

NSFW:

more art...

An interview with the artist in Vice Magazine: Getting Abilified With Brian Suanders

 

[skillet]

Well I wanted to be a famous comedian in China.

This bit was hilarious! (from the vice article)

 

[stardust.hero]

Awesome article SD. Seriously one of the best one's I've read in a while. That is so wicked. You can definitely see the vibe of the drug in some of the pictures. The weed one, the morphine one, and the way it's pasted together like that.

So very cool thanks for sharing.

 

[Thorns Have Roses]

Oooh, pretty neat stuff.

 

[slimvictor]

So cool.
Loved it.

 

[Swimmingdancer]

Oh! Glad i wasn't the only one who thought this was awesome

I love how the Klonopin one looks like a child's drawing, lol.

 

[shishigami]

Makes me never want to do abilify.

 

[the toad]

Makes me not want to do several of those... abilify being one... some are awesome tho.. many missing lol

 

[MrGrunge]

Someone needs to give this guy some better drugs.

 

[ro4eva]

The morphine one is... disturbing, I find.

Then again, it might be because it brings back memories of me in opiate withdrawal.

Too bad there's no mdma one, that would have been interesting.

I tried playing some WoW while on some quality molly - I ended up flying circles (via the flight masters) in Hellfire Peninsula for about 2 hours straight while listening to trance and bopping my head Roxbury style.

 

[RedLeader]

Where is the bath salts one with a big chunk of his face bitten out of the canvas?

NSFW:

8)

 

[amanitadine]

Goddamn the PCP one is spot on, and brilliant. As is the "computer duster" one. Great find.

 

[Newbierock]

diladuid one is classic, I love how theres loads of well drawn pictures then all of a sudden, that lmao.

 

[23536]

The morphine one is... disturbing, I find.

Then again, it might be because it brings back memories of me in opiate withdrawal.

It reminded me of a part from Junkie:

Morphine hits the backs of the legs first, then the back of the neck, a spreading wave of relaxation slackening the muscles away from the bones so that you seem to float without outlines, like lying in warm salt water. As this relaxing wave spread through my tissues, I experienced a strong feeling of fear. I had the feeling that some horrible image was just beyond the field of vision, moving, as I turned my head, so that I never quite saw it. I felt nauseous; I lay down and closed my eyes. A series of pictures passed, like watching a movie: A huge, neon-lighted cocktail bar that got larger and larger until streets, traffic, and street repairs were included in it; a waitress carrying a skull on a tray; stars in the clear sky. The physical impact of the fear of death; the shutting off of breath; the stopping of blood.

To me it's been similarly hallucinogenic. IV.

 

['medicine cabinet']

very cool indeed. love the morphine one.

 

[The Network]

The klonopin one made me piss myself with laugher.

 

[ro4eva]

It reminded me of a part from Junkie:

Morphine hits the backs of the legs first, then the back of the neck, a spreading wave of relaxation slackening the muscles away from the bones so that you seem to float without outlines, like lying in warm salt water. As this relaxing wave spread through my tissues, I experienced a strong feeling of fear. I had the feeling that some horrible image was just beyond the field of vision, moving, as I turned my head, so that I never quite saw it. I felt nauseous; I lay down and closed my eyes. A series of pictures passed, like watching a movie: A huge, neon-lighted cocktail bar that got larger and larger until streets, traffic, and street repairs were included in it; a waitress carrying a skull on a tray; stars in the clear sky. The physical impact of the fear of death; the shutting off of breath; the stopping of blood.

To me it's been similarly hallucinogenic. IV.

That is a near dead on experience of what I felt like the first time I IV'd a narcotic (dilaudid). The fear, the feeling in the legs and in the (lower) neck - spot on. It really kicked my ass.

Speaking of morphine, by chance, I also saw someone trying to describe what it's like to live with a heroin addiction (and I suppose this could apply to other strong opioids, particularly if your preferred r.o.a. is IV). The following paragraph - word for word - is what he said:

Let's say you were sent to a desert, all by yourself, without any supply of water. You would dehydrate, right? Now let's say you collapse from the unbearable heat of the desert. You wake up and there's a person standing there with an ice-cold bottle of water. He puts the bottle of water next to you and makes you promise not to drink it. You agree, he leaves. Now what do you think is gonna be on your mind all day? This is the state of a heroin user's mind.

It struck a cord with me as - at the time - I was struggling to describe to my immediate family, who themselves were struggling to understand why I would - for example - trade my 52" LCD HDTV (which I paid roughly $2200 for) for a 3 weeks worth of Dilaudid.

 

[laCster]

LMAO THE KLONOPIN ONE!!!! omg hahahahah

 

[Swimmingdancer]

diladuid one is classic, I love how theres loads of well drawn pictures then all of a sudden, that lmao.

Yeah, it looks like he was nodding off, lol.

Let's say you were sent to a desert, all by yourself, without any supply of water. You would dehydrate, right? Now let's say you collapse from the unbearable heat of the desert. You wake up and there's a person standing there with an ice-cold bottle of water. He puts the bottle of water next to you and makes you promise not to drink it. You agree, he leaves. Now what do you think is gonna be on your mind all day? This is the state of a heroin user's mind.

So true. I have used a very similar analogy to describe opioid addiction before.