New Photography Project Gives Voice to Young People's Mental Health Experiences

A thought-provoking new photography project is set to bring to life the mental health challenges young people experience. Images from the project, called (in)visible, will be exhibited in venues across Exeter and East Devon from May to November this year.

The project aims to challenge the familiar but limiting ‘head in hands’ image often used to depict mental health struggles.

Inspired by a call in a charity newsletter to rethink how mental health is visually represented, local photographer, Theo Moye - drawing from his own experience with anxiety - set out to create images that reflect the real, complex, and varied nature of mental health challenges.

What began as a solo artistic exploration quickly grew into a collaborative project. With the support of Arts Council funding, Theo was able to partner with Action East Devon’s Headlight groups in Ottery St Mary, Axminster and Seaton. Young people aged 11–24 worked with Theo to co-create images that reflect their personal experiences of mental health. Action East Devon enables children and young people in East Devon with mental health issues to work through them and move on to live happy, healthy lives.

Theo said: “While the ‘head in hands’ image depicting mental health challenges is widely recognised, it often fails to convey the internal realities of conditions like anxiety or depression. Mental health issues are deeply personal and often invisible. The standard imagery often doesn’t show what’s really going on inside.”

Action East Devon’s Headlight groups, which provide safe, non-judgmental spaces and optional 1-to-1 mentoring, aim to build resilience and peer support networks—helping young people avoid crisis through connection and understanding. Together with the photographer, participants have produced powerful, authentic visuals that move beyond stereotypes and highlight the individual nature of mental wellbeing.

Chris Botham, the Action East Devon Chair said: “Theo has brought both his photography skills and his lived experience to enable the young people we work with to express what is going on for them. It has been a powerful project, and we are looking forward to displaying their images to a wider audience.”

The resulting images will be exhibited in venues across the region, inviting the public to see mental health through a new lens. The exhibitions will be made accessible to people with visual impairments with recorded audio descriptions available by scanning a QR code next to each photo.

The images will be exhibited in venues as follows: