Sad Boy Birthday: Call for Art

In September Guy Cry Club will turn 1… which is legitimately absurd. I can’t decide if that means time has moved incredibly quickly or at a snail’s pace. Either way the inevitability of a birthday looms over me. With the ongoing confusion of covid-19 and what we are allowed/not allowed to do there will not be a physical IRL birthday celebration. Instead let’s get creative. I’m calling for visual artists to respond to the theme of ‘Sad Boy Birthday’, so we can still all come together at this time. By visual art i mean anything along the lines of illustration, digital art, painting which is static, a still image, or anything which can be photographed e.g. embroidery, sculpture, public art. All humans who submit will be included in a special ‘Sad Boy Birthday’ gallery here on the website and a selection will be featured in an exclusive publication reflecting upon Guy Cry Club’s first year. For full details click here.

As the name suggests the focus is still very much in alignment with the club’s core ideas; masculinity and mental health. And as we still live in a restricted world - not merely because of covid-19 - it seems very appropriate to be appealing to you all at this time for these kind of expressions. Some of you have “celebrated” birthdays during lockdown, some of you no doubt do not enjoy that one day of the year where you have to acknowledge your own ageing existence, some of you may not even have the opportunity to have a birthday. There are many intricacies often left unspoken about birthdays because we are just expected to enjoy them, to be happy, to have people around us and be grateful for it. It’s not that simple. Personally i shy away from talking about my own birthday. I wanted the attention from it for so long but one day realised quite bluntly that a lot of that attention was false and unworthy of my time. I now crave the opposite, no attention and no expectations, i certainly don’t have it published on Facebook or post about it on Instagram when the day arrives. Aside from family who are seemingly contractually obliged to wish you many happy returns and other vague sentiments, i think about 4 people will communicate the words “happy birthday” to me. And i wouldn’t mind if they didn’t. If the day simply faded into a whisper caught by the wind then… well that sounds sufficiently romanticised for my liking.

With all this being said, it can still be seen as another day of the year that we can express something about ourselves to ourselves or the people around us. Let’s explore that. We all have our own form of creativity within us and this is merely another opportunity to tap into that. Another opportunity to change the narrative of our own lives.