06
Artlink Annual Review 2009/10
www.artlinkedinburgh.co.uk
07
Reassuring Continuity
Today Laura is in the Artlink Hut at the Royal Edinburgh producing specially designed cotton bags which will be given to everyone who helps out at the hospital’s apple picking day. When I visit the hut, the bags are hanging up to dry on two makeshift washing lines strung up the sides of the room. The text and drawings on the bags have been designed by patients, and staff and patients have been called in to volunteer their time to help with the printing process. The hut is a marvellous guddle of ideas and objects. One of the patients likes to paint witches, almost life size, all in profile, and they lean against walls looking like giant puppets from a shadow theatre.
It is pouring with rain the day I visit Whyte Place. Patrick, Brian and Dougie are already waiting for me in the potting shed, a converted bike shed with a roof made of corrugated, transparent plastic, so that when you look up you see the water pooling in the curves.
The identities and interests of people from the hospital are defined and valued, the room rustles with the personalities and evidence of past and future projects. Projects often develop as a result of expressed interest from members of the hospital community. At St John’s Hospital, patients from the Pentland Court rehabilitation unit worked with an artist to develop a map of a healthy walk around the grounds. Staff at the Royal Infirmary and the Western General were keen to participate in photography workshops: the resulting shots make up an exhibition which will show in the public gallery spaces of both hospitals.
hyte Place is the base for Artlink’s Growing Spaces project which brings together W people with different knowledge and expertise to support greater involvement in the greening of Edinburgh and support emotional wellbeing. The central location of the Potting Shed, and The Diggers, the project’s newsletter which was launched in June, exist to encourage people to join the many groups and activities which are on offer, informed by the interests and talents of service users and residents.
he hospital experience can, by definition, be stressful for everyone involved. T The intense environment of the neo-natal unit was recognised as one that would benefit from an input. There are around a hundred staff in the unit, most of whom work shifts, so the Foodie project was introduced, as a series of fun, monthly events focusing on food and nutrition, from Name that Cheese! to a smoothie making day.
The allotments and growing spaces are small, hopeful areas of green in an otherwise built up environment. This year the team have been building raised beds, planting up corners and edges of greenery, and propagating new stock, supervised by Brian the gardening expert. Residents who contributed ideas for the project were offered custom built and planted window boxes, many of which Patrick points out to me. The drying green is a tarmac covered area, with a criss cross of raindrop jewelled washing lines; around the edges the borders are planted with sunflowers and nasturtiums, peas and spinach.
The ideas and projects which spool out through the hospitals are like loops of wool, stitching communities together with shared experience and tangible results.
(left) silkscreening bags for the Harvest Day at the Royal Edinburgh Hospital (right) Image description here
The raised beds on the otherwise sterile lawns outside the modern blocks of flats grow enormous, blossomy, blue-green cabbages, potatoes, courgettes. If you come along on a Friday afternoon and help out with the gardening you will be rewarded with both produce and participation. As Brian shows me round the allotments his enthusiasm for the project is infectious. Spikey fennel, curls of parsley, sage and burnet cuttings are flourishing in small pots resembling earthy ice-cube trays on a table in the potting shed.