Health Care Fine Art

Forget Fog

Spring Forest in Fog_2884

For Hospital Art, most authorities say forget it when it comes to fog; don't do it. But when I got up this morning and saw fog out the window I immediately grabbed my camera and headed out for the woods.

I like the moodiness of fog; the softness. It reduces contrast and reveals subtle colors. However, research suggests that clear blue skies are preferred; at least in patient rooms.

The shot above shows our bluffs overlooking Hiller's Creek. It was one of the pictures from this morning.

What's New with Healing Gardens ?

Kay's Garden, Santa Fe, New Mexico
Design and photo by Naomi Sachs

As director of the Therapeutic Landscapes Resource Center Naomi Sachs follows developments with Healing Gardens. Recently she answered a few questions:

What are some new trends you see with Landscape Gardening used in HealthCare?

The key trend is an acceptance that Healing Landscapes make financial sense. Hospital Administrators understand that to creating special gardens for patients and also staff helps the bottom line.

Hospital Administrators can see that creating a holistic healing environment is what their clients want. Many people have a sense that strict Western Medicine just isn’t cutting it; not by itself. Complimentary approaches are gaining wide acceptance.

Interestingly, a novel, but strong selling points for healing gardens is that they help hospitals attract and keep nurses. There is a serious nursing shortage in North America. Roger Ulrich has reported on studies showing reduced staff turnover in hospitals with healing gardens.

It is important to understand that Healing Gardens are not just for the patients, but also for visitors and staff. They can provide someplace to go; a refuge. This can help reduce stress by allowing an escape from the clinical environment.

What percent of hospitals in North America have true Healing Gardens (as opposed to conventional landscaping)?

The numbers are clearly growing; most hospitals are looking at adding them. My best guess is that between 5 and 10% of hospitals currently have bonafide Healing Gardens. 

This is an exciting and rapidly growing field. At this time there is no National organization for Healing Gardens and no formal certification process; but I expect that to change soon.

What is happening in countries outside of North America with Healing Gardens?

I’m aware of projects in England, Sweden and Germany. Clearly there is a global reach to this movement. My best sense is that simply because of our size, that America is where most activity is at the moment.

Is there any new Evidence-based Design Research on Healing Gardens that you can tell us about?

New evidence-based design is coming out every week - I can't even keep up! While I try to list key articles on my website and blog, some other great resources for information are:

1. The ASLA Therapeutic Landscapes Research Initiative - a compendium of current research on the health benefits of therapeutic landscapes. They also have a blog: http://therapeuticlandscapes.blogspot.com/.
2. InformeDesign
3. Research Design Connections
4. EDRA - the Environmental Design Research Association
5. HERD Journal

Naomi Sachs, ASLA is the Founder and Executive Director of the Therapeutic Landscapes Resource Center. She is also the Principal at Naomi Sachs Design (design and consulting for therapeutic landscapes) based in Beacon, NY

Passion Pop Curve

Seth Godin's Blog has been my favorite blogs for a few years. He has given me lots of ideas about how to offer better customer service. Yesterday he did a post that relates directly to Art.

He compares the market for those with deep passion to those want something that's not too edgy and not too (in their opinion) trite. This illustrates well the dilemma of those who pick art for HealthCare. If the job falls to a connoisseur then the work is more likely to be edgy and challenging. The trouble is, most of the patients and staff who see the art every day are not art experts. Edgy turns them off, they want what he calls "Pop"

But how can a Connoisseur select something that is popular and might even be called kitsch? It goes against all their instincts, all their training.

Click here to read "Avoiding the Passion Pop Gulf" by Seth Godin.

Center for Arts in HealthCare Research & Education

The names of some organizations are just too long; too much of a mouthful. Try saying: "The Center for Arts in HealthCare Research & Education". It just does not roll off the tongue easily. So it is abbreviated as "CAHRE". But even that is awkward.

A better name would be "Florida HealthCare Art".

They study the effects of art in HealthCare settings in Florida. They also have an educational component to help train others how to best use art in hospitals. The educational part of their work has a global reach; with a variety of projects in Africa.

CAHRE was started in 1999 following the establishment of the nation’s first university level coursework in the arts in healthcare. The Center grew from the groundbreaking clinical work of the Shands Arts in Medicine program. In their first decade they have grown to be one of the leaders in the field.

They established the first online database on research in the use of Art in Healthcare. This database in now hosted on the Society for Arts in HealthCare website: click here.

Center for the Arts in Healthcare
University of Florida
PO Box 100141
Gainesville, FL 32611
Phone: (352)265-0768
e-mail: cahre@arts.ufl.edu
Website: www.arts.ufl.edu/cahre

Spring Birdwalk

Pete (the black dog on the bottom left) entertained the group.

Today was the 28th Annual Spring Birdwalk at the Prairie Garden Trust. The leader was Jim D. Wilson. Despite cool windy weather and deeply overcast skies it turned out to be a wonderful 3-hour walk. We covered the range of various habitats: domestic, woodland, swamp, prairie, creek and savanna.

Here is the list of the 52 bird species identified:

• American Goldfinch
• Yellow-throated Vireo
• Cooper's Hawk
• Eastern Kingbird
• American Robin
• Barn Swallow
• Black-and-White Warbler
• Black-capped Chickadee
• Blue Jay
• Blue-Gray Gnatcatcher
• Blue-winged Warbler
• Brown-Headed Cowbird
• Canada Goose
• Carolina Wren
• Chipping Sparrow
• Common Yellowthroat
• Eastern Bluebird
• Eastern Towhee
• Eastern Wood-Pewee
• Field Sparrow
• Great Blue Heron
• Great Crested Flycatcher
• Great-horned Owl
• Green Heron
• Harris Sparrow
• Henslow's Sparrow
• Hooded Merganser
• House Sparrow
• House Wren
• Indigo Bunting
• Louisiana Waterthrush
• Mourning Dove
• Northern Cardinal
• Northern Parula
• Orchard Oriole
• Pileated Woodpecker
• Red-bellied Woodpecker
• Red-Eyed Vireo
• Red-tailed Hawk
• Red-winged Blackbird
• Rough-winged Swallow
• Ruby-Throated Hummingbird
• Song Sparrow
• Summer Tanager
• Tree Swallow
• Tufted Titmouse
• Turkey Vulture
• Wood Duck
• Wood Thrush
• Worm-eating Warbler
• Yellow-rumped Warbler
• Yellow-throated Warbler

Parkinson's Law - Why we are too busy

My sister Cathy asked in an email this week:

How are you enjoying your "new" career?

You see, 8 months ago I left my job as a Family Practice Physician to devote my full energies to being an artist. The transition has gone very well. Not once have I regretted the decision.

However, I still feel too busy.
I thought by eliminating one of my two jobs that I would get rid of the sense that there was too much to do. That has not worked out (yet); but I keep trying: click here.

My cousin Harold explained why this is happening: Parkison's Law: Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.

The decision to leave medicine was covered on two previous posts: Click here & here

Wikipedia has a good article on Parkinson's Law: Click here

Fine Detail is not Fine Quality

Unititled Film Still #14, 1978 Cindy Sherman
© Metro Picture Gallery & Cindy Sherman

Photographers seem to think that fine detail in a pictures means fine quality. This is not true for Artists. This point was driven home to me in 1998 when I saw the Cindy Sherman: Retrospective at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago.

The show had many large prints by one of America's leading artists: Cindy Sherman. She happens to use a camera. One technical thing that struck me was that many of the images were bizarrely grainy. They had been taken with 35mm film and enlarged to 4 x 6-feet, way beyond the "technical" limits of the film. Many of the craft issues that photographers obsess about were ignored by Cindy Sherman. By looking at the prints I would say that she:

• Does not care about shadow detail
• Does not care about fine detail
• Does not care about blown-out highlights
• Does not care about smooth tonal gradations

What was going on here? I called the Curator of Photography and asked him. He explained that her interest as an artist is conceptual. The idea was everything. The craft; the technical details meant little.

I've approached the difference between artists and photographers before on this blog: click here. Some took offense (one photographer friend was so upset that he has not talked to me since). I don't want to offend anyone here, I just find the idea interesting and enjoy trying to understand it.

City Wildlife Photography - A Fox in the Garden

Red Fox (Vulpes vulpes) photographed in the city of St. Louis

Recently I've been traveling to the Missouri Botanical Garden about once a week. I make the trip because the spring flowers are spectacular; prefect for healthcare images. I've never considered going in to photograph wildlife; after all, the garden is right in the middle of St. Louis.

However, this morning at 7 AM I caught a glimpse of a Red Fox on the grounds of the garden and was able to get this photograph.

Apparently foxes are becoming increasingly common in big cities, especially London. National Geographic recently had an article titled "10,000 Foxes Roam London"

Orioles Have Arrived

Male Baltimore Oriole (Icterus galbula) with Shagbark Hickory Bud

A few days ago I did a post on my crazy bird feeding system: click here.
I'm happy to report that it is working.
Most satisfying of all is that the Orioles have found it are using it heavily. I have seen up to 6 Orioles waiting to get on the feeder at one time.

This is the flashiest bird that occurs in my back yard. Stunning!

To learn more about Baltimore Orioles, Wikipedia has a good entry: click here.

Dezeen - a Global Design Blog

Dezeen (www.dezeen.com) is a Design News Blog that you might want to check out. Based in London, it's covers Design News from around the world. I liked the layout of the website; very stylish, uses lots of pictures and is easy to navigate. It is updated frequently; usually 2 or 3 times daily.

The Categories of Design covered are very broad:

• Architecture
• Interiors
• Media
• Graphics

HealthCare does not seem to be an area that is well covered on this blog. When I searched the site for "HealthCare", "Health Care" and "Hospital" I got no results.

Design Jobs (called dezeenjobs) is a new and active part of the website. It has extensive global job listings: click here

Dezeen is run by Marcus Fairs, a furniture design graduate who has shifted his career to be a journalist. He has also written a book: Twenty-First Century Design