Persimmon Blackbridge facts for kids

Persimmon Blackbridge (born in 1951) is a Canadian writer and artist. Her art and writing often explore themes of feminism, being lesbian, disability, and mental health. She openly shares her experiences as a lesbian, a person with a disability, and a feminist. Her work combines these parts of her identity through sculptures, writing, and performances.

Blackbridge's novels often feature characters similar to herself. This allows her to share her unique perspective honestly. Her own journey with mental health has also become a big part of her art. She uses her experiences with mental health institutions to share her views on them. Blackbridge also took part in the film SHAMELESS: The Art of Disability. This film explores what it's like to live with a disability. Her work helps to change how people think about disabilities. She has won many awards for her art and writing. These awards recognize her work on identity and its many challenges.

Life and career

Persimmon Blackbridge was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She moved to British Columbia, Canada, as a teenager. She has lived and worked in Canada ever since. She was a member of the Vancouver-based Kiss and Tell collective. This group included artists Susan Stewart and Lizard Jones.

A picture of Blackbridge, painted by Susan Stewart, is kept at The ArQuives. This is Canada's LGBTQ2+ Archives. It honors her important role in building LGBT culture and history in Canada. She also appears in the 2006 film Shameless: The Art of Disability. This documentary was made by the National Film Board of Canada.

Blackbridge has worked in many different art forms. These include performance art, installation art, video art, and sculpture. In 1991, she received the VIVA Award. This award recognized her amazing sculptural installations.

Major exhibitions

Doing Time was an exhibition by Blackbridge in 1989. It was shown at the Surrey Art Gallery. For this project, she worked with four women who had been in prison. The art included twenty-five life-sized paper figures of the women. It also featured texts written by them. This was Blackbridge's first large-scale mixed-media art project.

Still Sane was another exhibition from 1984. Blackbridge created it with Sheila Gilhooly at the Women in Focus gallery. This show focused on Gilhooly's experiences in mental health institutions. They spent 36 months creating sculptures and writings for the exhibition. These pieces documented Gilhooly's time in the hospital.

Both Still Sane and Doing Time were mentioned when Blackbridge won the 1991 VIVA award.

In 2016, her exhibition Constructed Identities opened. It was the first show at Tangled Art Gallery. This gallery is fully accessible and focuses on art about disability issues. The Constructed Identities exhibition aimed to change how society views disability. The art and the gallery itself highlighted the importance of new perspectives on people with disabilities. The collection used mixed, found materials to create body shapes. These shapes explored the many forms of disability. They celebrated bodies that do not fit typical ideas.

Disability in the arts

Blackbridge was diagnosed with a learning disability when she was young. Her artwork explores the many types of disabilities. It also looks at how different parts of people's identities connect. She attended Emily Carr University of Art and Design. At that time, it was called the Vancouver School of Art. She was able to earn a degree despite her learning disability.

The film Shameless: The Art of Disability features many artists with disabilities. It shows how art can be a powerful way to express yourself. Art can also help to change culture and how people think.

The term "crip aesthetics" describes how different identities connect. It looks beyond just a person's disabilities. This idea tries to recognize all the diverse parts of a person's ability and identity. "Crip aesthetics" considers how society views disabled bodies. It also looks at the many aspects of an individual's identity. Blackbridge's sculptures in her Constructed Identities exhibition explore her own identity. She is a lesbian woman with a learning disability. Her sculptures celebrate diverse bodies. They challenge the idea of a "normal" body.

When we talk about accessibility in the arts, we often think about how audiences can see art. This is important, but it's also key for artists with disabilities to create art. Blackbridge's work helps to bridge this gap. Her Constructed Identities sculptures celebrate the look of disability and different body types. She also showed this exhibition in a gallery that was fully accessible.

Mental health

Blackbridge's art helped her to understand the conditions in Canadian mental health institutions. Her work gives a unique view of these experiences.

Writing

Blackbridge mainly writes non-fiction, but she has also published two novels. Her novel Sunnybrook won a Ferro-Grumley Award for Lesbian Fiction in 1997. Her novel Prozac Highway was nominated for a Lambda Literary Award in 1998. She also wrote often for Rites. This was a major Canadian LGBT magazine in the late 1980s.

Novels

• Sunnybrook: A True Story with Lies (1996): This story is about a woman named Diane. She is dealing with her mental health. She also hides her learning disability from her coworkers and girlfriend. Diane lives a double life, using the name Persimmon at a lesbian bar. A woman from the bar, Shirley, convinces her to live a more honest life.
• Prozac Highway (1997): This novel shares many similarities with Blackbridge's own life. The main character, Jam, is an artist, a lesbian, and someone dealing with mental health challenges. The story doesn't have many big plot points. Instead, it moves forward through online discussions Jam has with others.

Non-fiction

• Drawing the Line: Lesbian Sexual Politics on the Wall (1991, with Susan Stewart and Lizard Jones)
• Still Sane (1985, with Sheila Gilhooly)
• Her Tongue on My Theory: Images, Essays and Fantasies (1994, with Susan Stewart and Lizard Jones)
• Slow Dance: A Story of Stroke, Love and Disability (1997, with Bonnie Sherr Klein)

Awards

• Winner of the VIVA award for visual arts in 1991
• 1995 Lambda Award in Washington DC
• 1997 Ferro Grumley Fiction Prize in New York City
• 1998 Van City Book Award
• Emily Carr Distinguished Alumni Award in 2000

See also

In Spanish: Persimmon Blackbridge para niños