{"id":782739,"date":"2026-05-08T20:49:19","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T20:49:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/782739\/"},"modified":"2026-05-08T20:49:19","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T20:49:19","slug":"mental-health-awareness-month-marked-with-unique-art-event-local-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/782739\/","title":{"rendered":"Mental Health Awareness Month marked with unique art event | Local News"},"content":{"rendered":"

KIRKSVILLE, Mo. – Northeast Missouri Health Council of Behavioral Health partnered with A.T. Still University to help raise awareness of mental health through art for Mental Health Awareness Month<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The organizations invited Kirksville residents and ATSU students submit artwork to display them on ATSU\u2019s campus for a Creative Connections Art Exhibit.<\/p>\n

This was the first event of its kind with roughly 40 pieces of art submitted by community members.<\/p>\n

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\u201cMay is Mental Health Awareness Month, and we thought you know what would be a unique event for the community to come together and talk about,\u201d said Dr. Jennifer Blacksmith, behavioral health director & licensed psychologist at Northeast Behavioral Health. \u201cIt\u2019s OK to not be OK. Expressing yourself in a way that people feel safe or just showing art talent we thought that would be fun.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Multiple artists from the exhibit shared their thoughts on the importance of mental health and why events like this can help promote mental health conversations.<\/p>\n

\"Art<\/p>\n

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\u201cIt brings people together and they can tell their stories or just let the pictures speak for themselves,\u201d said Fenley Corte, creator of Train Wreck. \u201cSee if others resonant with it.\u201c<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\"Art<\/p>\n

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\u201cBeing expressive and open and being able to actually see other people that struggle with the same thing makes you want to be able to talk about it with others,\u201d said Jayla Wiggins, creator of Mirror of Doubt. \u201cIt makes you breathe a breath of fresh air knowing that you aren\u2019t the only one in the world.\u201c<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\"Art<\/p>\n

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\u201cEven if you personally haven\u2019t struggled with something, I think it\u2019s so important to support the people in your life that have,\u201d said Kata Bowen, first year medical student at ATSU-KCOM. \u201cThis event and events like this can help bring awareness to that.\u201c<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

ATSU and Northeast Missouri Health Council of Behavioral Health hope to make this an annual event going forward.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"KIRKSVILLE, Mo. – Northeast Missouri Health Council of Behavioral Health partnered with A.T. Still University to help raise…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":782740,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[36],"tags":[320239,40653,36596,210,320242,517,312756,2642,320240,106633,320241,67,132,68],"class_list":["post-782739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mental-health","tag-a-t-still-university","tag-art-exhibit","tag-community-engagement","tag-health","tag-kirksville","tag-mental-health","tag-mental-health-awareness-month","tag-mental-health-support","tag-northeast-missouri-health-council","tag-self-expression","tag-student-art","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116540930271318849","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/782739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=782739"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/782739\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/782740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=782739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=782739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=782739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}