Empress Gibbs'
Mental Health Journey
Date
Lola Tartaglia-Baker
Skate Buddies Birmingham Festival 23 Performance
Empress is the artist who choreographed the Rolling Out performance at Birmingham Festival 2023. She is also the founder of the now national organisation Skate Buddies, which works to bring the rolling skating community together and helps introduce new people to the sport.
Empress hasn't had an easy life but it's one of the reasons there is so much genuine passion poured into her projects. Empress has battled with anxiety and depression for most of her life as well as dealing with painful losses. She was introduced to skating by a good friend who she was staying with during lockdown. Her friend convinced her to buy some skates and spend some time outside. They went to Cannon Hill Park and the Empress found that she loved skating. After this, she would go down to Cannon Hill Park almost daily. Skating gave her a space to escape her own mind and it's where she ended up meeting some of her closest friends. Since then her mental health has been on a steady incline.
With skating being the first thing to significantly improve her mental health, and keep it better, she has slowly begun to do more and more with it. Empress wanted others to have a similar experience to her; in order to do this she wanted to make it less daunting to begin skating and become part of the skate brum community. This was when Skate Buddies was founded. Skate buddies originally began in Birmingham, connecting new prospective skaters with experienced skaters but under passionate and creative leadership has continued to grow. They now work in many major cities throughout the UK. This advancement is moving them steadily closer to achieving their goal: to get 1000 people into roller skating as a form of self care and personal healing.
On top of expanding where they work they are expanding what they do. They recently performed at the Birmingham festival 2023 and have now officially put together a performance group. Empress tells me that there are also many more exciting things in the works (potentially even the first instance of rollerskate yoga?!) so watch this space.
Talking to Empress about the creative process behind their most recent performance it is clear to see why they are making performance officially a branch of Skate Buddies. Empress described the creative process of choreographing her dance as an almost spiritual experience. It was an organic progression that stemmed from powerful emotions and deeply personal connection to the song.
The performance itself can be broken down into parts, each reflecting a stage of the healing journey.
The first part of the dance represented personal struggle. It showed the struggle of being in a dark place and how draining this place can be. It showed how battling mental health especially alone can be so draining that it makes it difficult to even begin healing. The next stage represented by the dance, was the whirlwind of embarking on your healing, finding people and with their support growing stronger. The final stage of the dance was reflective of the skate park and how it feels to be well established in your healing journey and have a community and a family surrounding and uplifting you. The creative depiction of this experience explained the struggles with mental health in a way that words never could.
When teaching her dance to others, Empress made sure to ‘speak from the heart’ as a way to connect with others on a deeper level. Not only did her passion and authenticity inspire the dancers but it also created a shared space of healing. As a group they worked through difficult emotions that were brought up by the performance and supported each other.
In the process of choreographing the performance, Empress found that the creative side of skating could facilitate one reflecting on powerful emotions and personal struggles, it could also help express these emotions and experiences. Learning the dance together could create a space of shared healing and support as well as strengthening bonds with others in the Skate Buddie community. By officially establishing their performance group Skate buddies are now harnessing creativity as another powerful tool in battling mental illness.
Skate buddies was founded because, for Empress, skating has been the biggest part of her healing journey, however, there have been other parts that have come before and after skating.
When Empress first began her skating journey she needed an escape, she used skating to ‘free her mind’. As Empress’s healing journey has continued she has begun to confront and manage her emotions more. This hasn't just been through dance and choreography. After a year or so of her healing journey Empress began using tarot cards to reflect on her trauma and better understand her emotions and herself. This worked in tandem with skating to progress her healing journey. After using tarot, skating became more than an escape, it became a place to rediscover herself.
Her new ‘self’ was inspired by the tarot card Empress, which represents, mother, creator and nurturer. Although Empress had always found it came naturally to nurture others, her new self was someone who had to learn to be nurturing to herself. In order to fully embody her healing journey she changed her name to Empress, symbolically leaving behind her old self.
Before she found skating, Empress had entered other creative spaces hoping they would lead her to healing although nothing worked as well as skating did. She did become especially talented at sewing. In fact, her outfit for the skate buddies performance was entirely designed by her, she even drew the design printed on the fabric.
Although her sewing started purely as a form of self expression and fun for herself eventually she began to make clothes for other people. Empress’ first client was not requesting a small or simple project, in fact it was a grandmother, daughter and two granddaughters who wanted matching outfits for the grandmother's 90th birthday. She hand made their dresses and even covered shoes to complete the ensemble!
Despite her being talented at it, sewing didn't impact her mental health the way skating did and it wasn't the time to pursue a business and was more beneficial from a creative standpoint. However, now that Empress is in a more stable place she is taking another look at uneekempress (her clothing brand) and hoping to combine it with her new passion, skating.
Empress is an inspiration and a testament to what can happen if you don't give up. Empress struggled with mental health for 15 years, attempting her life twice and believing that she was ‘going to live with [her depression and anxiety] for the rest of [her] life’. She has now rediscovered herself and is managing her depression and anxiety through skating and tarot. She has met a new community of people who she has continued to grow closer to. She is even revisiting previous parts of her life with a new approach and attitude that are revealing new opportunities to her. Moreover, Empress’ working on herself and developing her emotional understanding has allowed her to have a greater understanding and empathy towards others too and assisted her in moving past previous trauma.
Empress Gibbs and Iris Bertz
Empress is one of the most kind and considerate people I have met, she radiates positive energy and she is someone who can instantly put you in a better mood just by being herself. Her strength and resilience is inspiring. Her use of skating to combat mental health is not only innovative, but also scientifically beneficial; as a fun and creative form of exercise, out-door activity with a supportive community of people it ticks all the boxes. We can all learn a lot from Empress’ and her approach to mental health. Whether you have a mental illness or not, our mental health is something that everyone should be nurturing, our painful experiences and emotions we should all be exploring and understanding. Through community, creativity and exercise Empress has begun managing her own mental health problems and though skate buddies is sharing these invaluable tools with others.
