Michael Tillyer founded the Anchor House of Artists (AHOA) by opening his rented studio space to artists living with mental illnesses he had befriended.  Initial funding came from his resources and a small grant from the Northampton Arts Council.

The spirit of the opening days for AHOA was "anything goes", which is never far from the ongoing idealism of the space; however, where we now concentrate on finding independent venues for individual artists, in the beginning the focus stressed the group exhibit. The idea was to give everybody a chance at what ended up to be the same thing: to show in preparation for getting an independent exhibit, to learn how to manage public exposure and handle critique.

A sensitive concern central to our mission is the manner of disclosing the association of our artists with mental illnesses. Throughout our site find examples of our stumbling inventions in language. The quest to find the right language is--paradoxically so--unavoidable since our mission is to help some artsts and not others, artists who have had serious life breakdowns. Our public expects some rationale for the special approach as do other artists who would like the same level of subsidy we are able to offer artists in target of our mission.

Here comes the paradox: We know that mental illness is so often put in front of the person.  We would prefer to express that our artists live... and that episodes of distress and discomfort touch their lives in earthshaking ways. Our language? We believe in our artists who live with mental illnesses and in the beautiful work that they accomplish, social barriers notwithstanding.