We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Stacy Nethery. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Stacy below.
Stacy, we are so deeply grateful to you for opening up about your journey with mental health in the hops that it can help someone who might be going through something similar. Can you talk to us about your mental health journey and how you overcame or persisted despite any issues? For readers, please note this is not medical advice, we are not doctors, you should always consult professionals for advice and that this is merely one person sharing their story and experience.
Creating has been a lifeline throughout overcoming my mental illness challenges. In 2019, I nearly lost my life due to depression. Since then I’ve worked tirelessly to grow and improve. One of the few consistencies that has helped me with this is the ability to create. Whenever I’m struggling to motivate myself, or to feel interest in anything, I create something just for me. Whether it’s crocheting a little bee, painting watercolor frogs, or quilting myself a bandana, I create to bring myself joy. No matter how busy I am, no matter what else I have going on, I carve out a little bit of time simply to make something that makes me happy. The lack of pressure or expectation helps me to push through creative blocks, burnout, imposter syndrome, and other difficulties I’ve faced that were directly or indirectly caused by mental illness, and that affected my ability to persist.
Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?
I am a photographer and an artist. While photography is my main professional and academic practice, I consider myself to also be a mixed-media and fiber artist. Professionally, I have several goals that I’m currently working toward. One long-term goal is to teach, and to foster the same love for creativity that’s been encouraged and supported in me. I also want to create and share my work, and there are many avenues I’m interested in exploring. I recently exhibited a photography and textile arts series for my Capstone (or thesis) project at Rochester Institute of Technology, and I found it to be one of the most challenging and fulfilling experiences of my life. I find it so important to utilize my art to speak about, and bring awareness to, mental health, and the Capstone series allowed me to tell my story and celebrate my growth that has occurred over the past five and a half years. I also really enjoy sharing my work on a smaller scale by selling at craft fairs and art shows. This allows me to create just for fun while still supporting myself financially, and it gives me a platform to showcase my work while connecting with other artists and gaining knowledge and inspiration through some absolutely incredible people. In addition to selling, I like to “give back” when possible, and recently met a personal goal of creating 50 knit wool hats to donate to a local homeless shelter. With donations from friends and family, I was able to complete that goal in about a month, and I look forward to achieving a much higher donation goal of 200 knit wool hats by the end of 2025. I think one of my favorite things about art is that the sky really is the limit. There are so many different things I can do with these skills to bring joy to myself and others. This summer, I’ll be launching my online store, where I will have a variety of my different pieces listed for sale, and I’ll be working at craft fairs as well. Updates for both will be available on my Instagram throughout the summer!
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
Some of the most impactful qualities in my journey have been initiative, creative problem-solving, and the constant willingness to grow. If I could give anyone starting out advice, it would be to never stop being excited to learn. As soon as I began seeing my lack of knowledge as an opportunity rather than a hindrance, my entire world view changed. No one person is going to be objectively all-knowing about their craft, especially when it comes to something as subjective as art. Acknowledging that there will always be some way in which you can grow or improve, while also being able to still appreciate how far you’ve already come is the best thing you can do for yourself. That skill, accompanied by the ability to adapt when things don’t work on the first try (not just blindly trying again, but learning from the experience) are crucial to success.
We’ve all got limited resources, time, energy, focus etc – so if you had to choose between going all in on your strengths or working on areas where you aren’t as strong, what would you choose?
I’ve always worked best when trying to improve in areas in which I’m not as strong. As somebody with ADHD, I’ve found that only focusing on my strengths would cause me to lose interest faster. I seem to be a much stronger artist because of my willingness to grow and improve on skills that I feel less confident about. I’ve found this also helps to keep my interest in the art forms and alleviate burnout. One example of this is fiber arts. During the summer of 2023 I began teaching myself to crochet. For a final project in a design class the following fall semester, I was tasked with creating something (open to any two-or-three-dimensional art medium) that told a story that hadn’t been told before. I decided to crochet dolls of my dog and I. This was two months before I celebrated ten years of having her in my life. I crocheted the dolls while also featuring wires and magnets inside of them so they could move, hold forms, and interact with each other (i.e. a magnet in my doll’s cheek and one in her tongue so she could lick my face) and to this day those are some of my favorite things that I’ve ever crocheted. The work was described in critique as “professional quality” and I received a perfect grade, and I decided that while I still love crocheting, and would begin to sell my crochet pieces professionally both on my own and as consigned pieces in an art gallery/shop, my next goal would be to branch out and learn how to knit. The following semester, I taught myself to knit. In the fall of 2024 I bought my first sewing machine and began to learn how to sew. I then decided to take a quilting class during the spring 2025 semester, and I have been learning how to quilt. Once I feel confident in my ability to produce one art form, I do continue to learn and grow in that art form. I work specifically on aspects in which I’m less confident, but I also allow myself the ability to branch out and focus on other areas of interest.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://stacynetheryphotos.com
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/stacy_nethery_photos
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/stacynetheryphotos/
Image Credits
Images 1-7 were taken by me – Stacy Nethery
Image 8 was taken by Beth Nethery
Image 9 was taken by Rebecca Villagracia
so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.
