"OCD Ritual Lines: Layers" by Gabriella Fredrick

Acrylic on Canvas

24'' by 36''

My name is Gabriella Fredrick. I’m a 24 year old residing in Chicago, born and raised in New York City.

The painting I submitted is from a collection I have that I refer to as the “OCD Ritual Line” paintings. While my earlier works were primarily oil paints on canvas, my new ones, including this one, are acrylic.

At first glance, my paintings look like a bunch of random lines. Behind the thick and colorful brushstrokes though, is a compilation of the repetitive line sequences I had to do in my head due to my obsessive compulsive disorder. I was diagnosed with severe OCD when I was just three years old. Having been diagnosed so unusually young has given me a unique perspective on the disorder. When I created these paintings, one method to cope with my intrusive thoughts consisted of drawing two lines before doing the ritual and three lines after. Each line correlated with me having to blink (aka two blinks - ritual - three blinks). That adds up to a total of five lines which can be seen repeated in my OCD paintings. These lines gave me a way to visually confirm that I had done the ritual “properly” (although it obviously was never that simple). I decided to transfer this pattern to canvas instead of just keeping it in my head or on scrap pieces of paper. My OCD has manifested into other forms over the years, this just being one of many eras throughout my lifelong battle. My overall hope in sharing art that represents the inner workings of my mind is to spread awareness about OCD and mental illness.