Dead Skin
- ArtBomb
- Aug 6
- 1 min read
(2023) Ciara O’Rourke | 11m11s
ArtBomb'25 | Saturday 16 August | 11am-1pm @ Unitarian Church
“An angst-ridden teen has an itch she can’t scratch and she’s willing to do whatever it takes to be rid of it.”
18-year-old Jess is under the usual teen pressures: suffocating under the pressure of her mother, unable to fit in at school and prom anxiety fast approaching. The last thing she needs is any more complications. But when she wakes to find an annoying rash, Jess must resist the urge to scratch. Even as it begins to grow during her increasingly terrible school day.
I’ve always loved the concept of transformation and subversion in horror. Partly due to my own identity growing up as a bit of a ‘happy-go-lucky’ child when, really, there was a lot of pent-up anger boiling beneath the surface.
This influenced the Hellraiser meets Derry Girls atmosphere and made it authentic to the terrors of puberty we’ve all fallen victim to. I think horror is and always will be a place for transformation and the transformed – a space for us to process our constantly changing bodies and minds.
Whether it be for better, for worse or for no purpose at all – horror has always celebrated these moments as a liberation. This liberation was something I wanted not only Jess to feel, but the audience too.
