ART IN MENTAL HEALTHCARE SETTINGS
The intersection of mental health and art
Nafeesa Arshad, Digital Art School Producer, and Haley Moyse Fenning, Head of Impact, at Hospital Rooms, discuss the intersection of mental healthcare and art. They highlight some of the charity’s current art installations, ‘the transformative impact of integrating creativity in mental healthcare facilities’, and the impact of the Hospital Rooms Digital Art School initiative, now re-launching, on bringing creative intervention to mental health service-users.
In 2016, artist, Tim A. Shaw, and curator, Niamh White, now co-founders of arts and mental health charity, Hospital Rooms, first stepped into an inpatient mental health unit. They were visiting a close friend who had been hospitalised following a suicide attempt, and were shocked to see the condition the ward was in – not just plain, clinical, and uninspiring, but actively dilapidated. Mental health service- users would later tell us that their clinical environment was ‘dreary’, ‘bleak’, and certainly not a place that tells patients arriving – often at one of the lowest moments of their lives – that this is a place where you will be cared for; the place where you will recover. Fast-forward eight years and, under Tim and Niamh’s direction, our growing team at Hospital Rooms brings the highest quality
artwork and creativity activity into these spaces, working with acclaimed artists to catalyse a fundamental shift in the way we consider and treat people with the most difficult of mental health diagnoses. To date we have completed 23 projects nationwide, transforming the clinical environment of NHS mental health services ranging from adult acute, specialist, and forensic, to psychiatric intensive care (PICU) and child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS). A key success of our wide-ranging
art programme – which includes mural installations by artists, Sutapa Biswas, Hurvin Anderson, Dame Sonia Boyce, Anish Kapoor, and Julian Opie, is our co- design model. Project teams work closely with service-users and staff through an extensive research and development
Hospital Rooms’ wide-ranging art programme includes mural installations by artists, Sutapa Biswas (left) and Hurvin Anderson (below).
process, to get to know them, their clinical environment, and their aspirations for the space. Artists then lead an intensive season of creativity, facilitating workshops to inspire creativity and establish themes, colours, and mediums, in collaboration with the service-users, which will underpin the resulting mural design.
Maintaining a sense of dignity Evidence tells us that participation in the arts in clinical settings can help patients maintain a sense of personal dignity and control in what are often distressing circumstances (The Power of Art, 2006) At Hospital Rooms, our own evaluations continually tell us that patients desire to take part in creative activity. ‘I would have given anything to paint, and significantly benefit from it’ (Service-user, 2021); ‘Hospital Rooms has breathed beauty and comfort into a once clinical and cold space’ (Occupational Therapist, 2022). The long-term impact of these murals
is evident in the anecdotes NHS staff share with us once the Hospital Rooms team has moved on from the site. For example, a group of service-users at men’s secure service, Catton Ward, Northside House, in Thorpe St Andrew, operated by Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust, were so inspired by printmaker, Carl Rowe’s conversation-inviting mural, that they adopted its flamingo pink as the signature colour for their community football club, Catton Kittens. When COVID-19 hit and hospitals went
into lockdown, it made it impossible for us to continue to work in these units. Restriction was even more persistent than before for service-users detained under the Mental Health Act in over 600 NHS inpatient units in England. Visitors were no longer permitted on site, face- to-face therapy ceased, and occupational therapists had to get creative with the social activities many service-users rely on for weekly ‘escapism’ and ‘distraction’ (Lived Experience Expert, Springfield Recovery College 2022). These are units which look after people with severe and enduring mental illness, and we knew that
20 MAY 2024 | THE NETWORK
All photos used courtesy of Hospital Rooms
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