Feingold Gallery: Hidden Disabilities

My first thought was: they are both beautiful! My second thought was: the young model had an accident in the runway, became paraplegic, has grown older and hopefully wiser.

I love this piece of Artwork. It actually affects me personally, as I have an invisible mental health disability and look great on the outside, for example my hair, makeup and cloths. Without being conceited, I look similar to the model in the right photo. It portrays the outward beauty, but there is so much more within. The photos express the stereotypes that society has in regards to disability. I always get the But you look great" comment and I want to scream.

Excellent Art work!

What is beauty? In my opinion, beauty is a combination of good morality, being responsible and dependable and to some extent, to be good looking.

The woman on the left may qualify (according to my definition above) to be Miss America even the way she is. However the one on the right may just be beautiful on the outside (skin deep) and may be a child abuser that you can't trust with your children or your resources.

I looked at this as if the lady (?) on the left was visualizing herself as the lady of the right. When we have a disability we often fantasize ourselves as different than the reality. (Even so called normal people do this.)

I have stuttered most of my life, yet I see my inner self as perfectly fluent. Indeed, I often notice imperfections in others speech that are often overlooked or ignored by those with more normal speech.

I hope this makes sense in such a brief post!

is't this ultimately, why we are here on earth- because, none of us are perfect in the firdt place? We all have shortcomings, but our ultimate purpose in life is to reach, self awareness...i.e. to acnowledge whereand what we would like to improve/ better about our self, and go about making / facilitating this change. This (According to Maslow's Hierachy of Needs), refers to teying to attain Self-Actualisation).

Your picture also highlights the fact that we, as a human race, visually delude ourselves, so often. Hence, we somehow, find it 'easier' to 'accept a physically ailing person more readily, than, one ailing from a mental or emotional point of view.

Regards,

HB

The Lady on the right makes me think of sexual disorders or addictions. The bottom half of the pic is kind of fogy to me that ssems to be lie or a cover up to one of these disorders like a pic says there are hidden disorders.

Different kind of disability, good point but it is exploiting a weakness in language. 

Who is the more disabled?  On the inside or the outside?  Which is greater?  

I am not sure how I feel about this image. I don't disagree with the concept that is presented here but I feel that the beautiful perfect woman over simplifies the situation. Or at least- makes me  think that she is ugly inside and that "ugliness" is not only skin deep. Is this the right kind of message or even an accurate one?

Disability cannot be seen or judged from the outside or by another; that which is inside and hidden can be equally disabling.  

The bridge here, which seems to be holding up the man and the woman, does not seem structurally sound. At any moment it will break and they will fall, and while we may expect that the man could fall, it would be much more shocking for the woman to suddenly fall. It is the same weak bridge holding up both mental and physical disabilities.

I liked this one a lot, because I think physical disabilities are often seen as so much worse because one can't hide them.  This really drives the point home that no one is perfect, and even the idea of perfection is a myth.

Mental and emotional disabilities can feel just as disfiguring for the bearer as physical. (And the hard part can be, nobody even knows they're there.)

Everyone is disabled in some way.

Hidden disabilities—the ability of people to carry on appearances while being tormented inside. Appearances can be deceiving.

Maybe hard to get one's head around, but important. Perfection is a fantasy. We all have both strengths and weaknesses, and we'd all be better off acknowledging both, in others as well as ourselves.

(posted for a friend)

Reality