Harnessing the healing power of art to support wellbeing
This week, our Chair, Sir Nicholas Serota and Relationship Manager Richard Ings visited Springfield University Hospital in Tooting to see the work of Hospital Rooms.
Hospital Rooms is an arts and mental health charity that believes in the power of art to bring joy, create hope, support healing and offer dignity to people in their most vulnerable moments. It’s entering our National Portfolio of funded organisations for the first time in the 2023-26 funding period.
In collaboration with patients and staff across South West London and St George’s Mental Health NHS Trust, Hospital Rooms led an innovative programme to co-design vibrant and uplifting artworks that have helped to shape a new creative landscape for mental healthcare in South West London.
As part of the development of two new mental health facilities, the charity was commissioned to produce 20 bespoke artworks to transform how the facilities are experienced by patients, service users and staff.
Hospital Rooms enlisted an internationally acclaimed and diverse roster of artists, many of whom put vulnerable people at the centre of their work and specialise in participatory practice. Through a series of 159 workshops, the artists worked directly with patients and staff to come up with the final artworks.
Liam, one of the service users, said:
“Joining the Hospital Rooms project has been lifechanging for me. The opportunities I’ve had to meet new people, learn new skills and spend time being creative has had enormous positive effects on my mental wellbeing and recovery. Without Hospital Rooms I don’t think I would have recovered and got back to normal life as quickly as I did.”
Installation of the artworks at Springfield University Hospital will be finished later this month, and Nick and Richard loved seeing their progression.
Niamh White and Tim A Shaw, co-founders of Hospital Rooms, said:
“Our first ever Hospital Rooms project took place at the Trust’s Phoenix Unit. Six years later, we are delighted that our most ambitious project to date is a collaboration with everyone at the Trust.
“After 159 artist-led creative workshops that took place at the hospital with service users and staff, we are now well underway installing 20 extraordinary, co-created artworks throughout the new Trinity and Shaftesbury buildings. From murals to video installations, wall sculptures to opera, there are many firsts for us, and we are proud to be part of this new vision for a mental health hospital. We have loved working so closely with everyone at Springfield Hospital over the last 18 months.”
Sharon Spain, Executive Director of Nursing & Quality, South West London and St George’s Mental Health NHS Trust, said:
“Research has long demonstrated the positive connection between art and mental health – but this project is about so much more than putting art on walls to make people feel good. To create healing environments which genuinely support recovery, we needed to go beyond delivering modern buildings.
“What makes this project so special and unique is that our patients and service users are at the heart of it. Co-production has been key throughout the process, with over 120 workshops held with patients to ensure that the final artworks are genuinely informed by what they want to see.”
Arts Council England and The National Archives have signed a new collaboration agreement for 2024 to 2027.
New cultural bridges between the UK and Germany
The Arts Council has announced funding for 20 partnerships between UK and Germany based cultural organisations, as part of the ongoing Cultural Bridge programme.
We have awarded £500,000 from our National Lottery Place Partnerships Fund for a three-year cultural initiative, Together Gloucester.
Several items are currently under a temporary export deferral
Statement: our Relationship Framework with funded organisations.
Allwyn becomes new operator of the National Lottery
Allwyn has today formally taken the National Lottery’s reins as the Fourth National Lottery Licence comes into effect.
New £6m investment to help artists and cultural organisations unlock creative potential of immersive technology
As a cross-UK programme, Immersive Arts will be delivered by a partnership of four arts organisations, with one in each nation of the UK – Watershed in England, Cryptic in Scotland, Nerve Centre in Northern Ireland, and the Wales Millenium Centre. It will be led by the University of the West of England, with the lead hub at Pervasive Media Studio in Bristol.
Victorian Radicals: Birmingham’s world-famous Pre-Raphaelite art collection to go on display in home city
Birmingham’s collection of Pre-Raphaelite art is going on display in the city for the first time in more than five years.
J.R.R. Tolkien manuscripts and Spitting Image archive among treasured cultural objects made available to the public
The Cultural Gifts Scheme and Acceptance in Lieu Annual Report 2023 details the items - worth over £52 million - recently accepted for the nation.
We’ve awarded the West of England Mayoral Combined Authority £1 million from our National Lottery Place Partnerships Fund to transform the region’s creative and cultural sector.