Painting “Mania”

Bipolar mood disorder (manic-depressive illness) has many artistic references, especially in the painting domain, depicting moods and associated features. The title of some paintings directly refers to the psychopathological state of the disorder. There are a great number of painting masterpieces showing the depressive pole of manic-depressive illness. In some paintings bearing the title Melancholia, some admixture of the opposite manic pole can be traced, the phenomenon named today as “mixed depressive state”. On the other hand, a painting depicting a pure manic pole, as an element of bipolar mood disorder is very difficult to find. However, it seems that such criteria could be met by the painting presented on the next page entitled “Mania” whose author is Florencio Yllana, a contemporary artist of Philippine origin (born 1977), studying in USA and presently living in Brazil. The painting was done in 2001 following the acute manic episode in the course of bipolar mood disorder in the artist.