Teenage Mechanisms
Cover of Teenage Mechanisms by Kamryn Woloschuk
Youth Divulge Experience with Mental Health in Local Book
By Abigail Heron
Even in this day and age, the topic of youth mental health can still be considered taboo, typically discussed through euphemisms, if at all. So what is unveiled when a snapshot of 10 young people’s mental health and their ways of coping with it is not hushed up or downplayed, but instead proudly displayed for all to bear witness to—unadulterated? In Teenage Mechanisms, Kamryn Woloschuk seeks to answer that question.
Woloschuk began working on Teenage Mechanisms in the summer of 2023, and concluded a year later. She interviewed 10 youth to whom she was a peer mentor to at the Regional Multicultural Youth Centre and transcribed the uncensored dialogues to make up the text of the book. “I wanted, when people are reading it, to feel like a conversation that they’re eavesdropping on,” says Woloschuk. “A lot of the time when we talk about mental health, people use buzzwords so much [and] when we use buzzwords, I find that it degrades what people are actually saying. So I tried to keep it like this is what’s really going on in these people’s lives.”
The book also includes black-and-white portraits of the subjects and still-life compositions of their coping mechanisms such as art, video games, or dancing, all shot by Woloschuk, but with some individualized direction. “When it came to putting [the still lifes] together in a studio, it was the youth who did it,” says Woloschuk. “They kind of got a sense of autonomy over the project in doing that. I think it was fun for them, and made it more interesting and personal.”
Teenage Mechanisms is available in all branches of the Thunder Bay Public Library. There will also be a free book launch and exhibit opening event on May 2 from 6 to 10 pm at the Co.Lab Gallery & Arts Centre at Goods & Co., where attendees will be able to purchase the book, as well as prints of the original portraits. The event will also include a performance from local rapper Deebo and opportunities to support the Regional Multicultural Youth Centre.
Go to kamrynwoloschuk.com for more information.