Stonewalled, Doug McLeod
Round rocks form a wall. A bare blurry leg and arm are against the stone wall. The skin tones and lower right rocks are lit reddish from a light coming from the bottom right of the image.
Title: Stonewalled
Artist: Doug McLeod
Date: 2025
Medium/Materials: Digital photograph
Dimensions: 60 cm x 90 cm
Form/Genre: Digital photograph
Key Terms/Subject/Tags: FND (Functional Neurological Disorder); Movement; Barriers to Care; Perseverance
Artist Statement:
Doug McLeod deals with Functional Neurological Disorder, with tremors, spasms, and limb weakness impacting all aspects of his life. He discovered that though he couldn't hold a camera steady, when mounted to a tripod the focus of composition and image capture would distract his brain's attention on those disordered movements.
As he spent months and eventually years practicing the movement of stillness, Mcleod’s body would move effortlessly for longer periods of time, and the time spent photographing the space he inhabited led him to see movement everywhere he looked.
McLeod became very curious about the forces driving movement in clouds, ocean waves and flowing streams, branches whispering and moaning in the moving air, and plants moving toward the sun's light. He is looking for clues about how movement all around him affects how his body navigates its environment, and has come to understand how vital the sensory experience of the space he inhabits is on his journey toward better health.
Stonewalled is an attempt to convey the anger and frustration people with FND have when the medical community has almost nothing to offer those suffering. There are almost no treatment plans or even a consensus about what FND is, and the obstacles people face are almost impossible to climb over or get around, especially when movement is the problem.
Cultural Context / Story Behind the Work:
An exploration of the feelings a movement disorder exposes.
Rights for this Image:
This digital image is licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0. You are free to share it for non-commercial purposes, as long as you credit the artist.