Art is woven into Caroline C Ravello’s healing.
The communicator and mental-health specialist is well-known for frontally addressing her mental health in her weekly newspaper columns. She is currently a full-time student and writes her columns.
The art that is part of her healing is now being shown in an online exhibition called To My Mind. The exhibition runs from November 16-December 16 on Issuu. The link to a 44-page online catalogue is available on her Instagram and Facebook pages.
There are 43 pieces listed for sale in the catalogue, but those are only some of the 60 pieces, painted between 2012 and 2022, that Ravello wanted to show as her 60th birthday approaches. She calls it 60 for 60.
Currently there is only this virtual exhibition, as the other 17 have been exhibited at Arnim’s Art Galleria Ltd, San Fernando, and the Rotunda Gallery, at the Red House.
[caption id="attachment_988060" align="alignnone" width="1024"] To My Mind -[/caption]
Ravello was first diagnosed with mental illness as a teenager in the late 1970s.
“For decades, I had been in and out of psychiatric care. That includes, of course, psychotherapy and pharmacotherapy (medication), helping to manage my health.”
But there was a time in her 20s and 30s when she did not want to take medication. She slowly recognised there was a deterioration in her health.
“I went back into psychotherapy and taking the meds for decades, to have balanced days, to be able to function in the workplace.”
Ravello manages bipolar disorder II.
“It is not moodiness. It is a mood disorder that takes you to highs and lows, depending on your current situation.”
Up to mid-2004-5, Ravello managed her condition with medication and therapy.
When she stopped working in 2010, she wanted to try something different. She moved to Moruga, where her family is from, and took up horticulture. She is still in Moruga, but has moved to another part of the area.
[caption id="attachment_988061" align="alignnone" width="1024"] Cityscape IV -[/caption]
She also wanted to paint ever ever since taking an art class at the University of the West Indies (UWI) in the 1980s. She also began collecting art supplies.
“I just decided I could paint.”
Ravello would use the Internet to learn even more about art; looking at other people’s work. She also did a free course where she could practise.
Being around some of Trinidad and Tobago’s experienced artists also helped her refine the craft.
She had been doing some research on her own on late artist LeRoy Clarke, which led to a book about him commissioned by the government, as part of a plan to start a series on TT artists.
“I had that opportunity to look at a master and I had many, many days looking at him paint. But I also did some years of research. When I started researching, he did not know. This was me, just curious,” she said.
This helped her grow as an artist.
From those early days to now, Ravello has built a large body of work, which is included in this exhibition. She has been painting for more than te
