Billie Eilish is the youngest artist in Grammy history to win Album of the Year and Record of the Year. This year she swiped 4 Grammy’s including Best New Artist and Song of the Year.
In various interviews, Eilish reveals where she gets her creative juices from. Coming from a family of musicians, she was exposed to singing and song-writing at a young age. Eilish’s parents encourages and supports her every interest from music to horses and allows her life to be shaped in the way she wants it to be. Eilish says: ‘’You don’t have to be in love to write a song about love, you just need to focus on it, put yourself in a place that you won’t be.’’
Perhaps, however, there is more to her talent. From various interviews, Eilish has revealed struggles with Body Dysmorphia, Separation Anxiety, Self-Harm, Depression and Tourettes syndrome. Kay Redfield Jamieson, Clinical Psychologist and author of several books including Touched with Fire finds a co-relation between manic-depressive illness and the artistic temperament. She writes: ‘No one understands what gives some people access to these ‘worlds beyond.’ Or why- once in contact with these worlds- some art derived from them can be so rich and vital’.
Jaimieson suggest that changes in mood, thinking and perception that is experienced by people suffering from a mental health condition supports original creative thought. She writes that the ‘intensity of emotional experiences, diversity of thought, and rapidity of associational processes are highly characteristic of creative thought.’
So perhaps, it’s this suffering and struggle that Eilish experiences, a condition that ‘will always be there’ and her resolve to make it her greatest strength, that is the creative genius behind it all.
‘I’m just taking my agony and making it art. The only person that can change how I feel, that person is me.’
Reference: Jamison, Kay R.(1993), Touched with Fire: Manic-depressive Illness and the Artistic Temperament. New York: Free Press. Article Image by Glenn Francis, www.pacificprodigital.com, Wikipedia Feature Image by crommelincklars, https://flickr.com/photos/142899511@N03/48590442776, Wikipedia
