This project marks my first experience working with animation. I chose to challenge myself by using experimental, frame-by-frame techniques as a method to express something deeply personal: my lived experience of dissociation. Growing up, I didn’t have the language or support to understand what I was feeling, and mental health wasn’t widely acknowledged by the world in the way it is now. This work is a response to that silence; it’s important to me, and I hope it can contribute to greater awareness and understanding.
 


Rooted in a hand-drawn style, my animation uses visual fragmentation, texture, and repetition to evoke the disorienting and often invisible nature of dissociation. Looping sequences mirror the recurring and disconnected sensations that come with dissociative episodes, while unstable, flickering marks reflect the instability of perception and identity. My process is intentionally slow and tactile; each frame is a way of feeling through, and not just illustrating, a fragmented psychological state.
 


Through this work, I aim to foster dialogue around invisible or misunderstood psychological experiences. I aim to create a space for viewers to reflect on their own embodied realities and connect with difficult, often hidden states of mind. For me, animation in this context has become a tool for emotional expression, a means of giving form to something that is often internal, unspoken, or overlooked.
 


While this may not define the future direction of my practice, this project has allowed me to engage deeply with personal subject matter, challenge my creative boundaries, and explore new ways of visual storytelling.