Health Care Fine Art

Featured Artist: Victoria Ryan

Farmhouse Evening by Victoria Ryan, pastel

Victoria Ryan is a California-based artist who specializes in pastel. Her art has been placed in several healthcare settings.   Some of her recent projects include Northwestern Prentice Women's Hospital, Sacred Heart Riverbend in Salem, Oregon, and several Kaiser Permanente facilities on the west coast.

By far, my favorite project I worked on was for a suite of 6 large pastels for St. Mary's Hospital at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota.   This project was completed over ten years ago but it was a wonderful experience.   The committee found me through Mary Bell Gallery in Chicago, Il, and flew me to the facility (which never happens.)  They had looked for an artist for a few years for this space so it was  particular honor.  They let me decide on the entire theme of the collection only asking that I incorporate my impressions on the area.   I chose the convent that is associated with the hospital as my inspiration and then at the end of the project gifted the Sisters a smaller version of one of the pieces to be hung in the convent.   It was a wonderful experience.

To see a 360-degree panoramic shot of her Mayo Clinic installation click here.

More of Victoria's art can be seen at her website: www.victoriaryan.com

Sarah Grimes - Hospital art coordinator

 
Sarah Grimes - Art coordinator at University of Wisconsin Hospital and Clinics

The Wisconsin State Journal has an article this week featuring the hospital art coordinator Sarah Grimes:

Age: 54

Number of years on the job: 18

When someone is in the hospital or visiting one of our clinics, the artwork helps to provide a comforting and restful environment.

My job is to acquire and install the art in the UW Hospital and Clinics as well as in the new American Family Children's Hospital. I schedule, organize and change five exhibits monthly. I also hang exhibits in the Ebling Library at the Health Science Learning Center.

I graduated with a classics degree but decided to attend art school. I moved to Madison from Rockford and earned my undergrad and my master's in fine arts at UW-Madison.

I studied two-dimensional artwork and was the relief print shop assistant with Ray Gloeckler. His wife, Joyce, was the art coordinator at UW Hospital and needed a part-time assistant, so I came to work here in 1980 while still in college. After college, I left to work in an elementary school. I came back as the arts coordinator in 1991.

I've met so many artists throughout Wisconsin and fostered relationships with them for future projects. I've worked with artists on commissioned pieces. There were more than 500 pieces of original art that were created specifically for the Children's Hospital and I worked closely with the artists to ensure that collection was completed in time for the grand opening of the hospital in 2007.

I work with architects when the remodeling of clinics occurs or they are building new facilities. I have a budget that I have to be careful not to exceed as I'm planning new projects.

I keep track of art inventory and take care of repairs and maintenance of art throughout all UW hospitals and clinics, which includes traveling to Portage, Middleton, Fitchburg and other locations. I physically move and hang the art throughout the buildings.

I plan, develop, organize and oversee fundraising events on behalf of the art program and hospital. I also evaluate the events to recommend changes to meet projected goals. I'm a board member of the Friends of the UWHC and coordinate fundraising activities, such as artist sales, which benefit the Friends. I garner art donations for silent auctions for special events. In addition to the visual arts, I schedule volunteers to play piano in the atrium lobby and schedule music performances for patients several times throughout the year.

The article by Jill Carlson is called "What I do: Hospital art coordinator". To see it online click here.

To learn more about the work that Sarah does: click here.

Garden in Winter

Green Hedge_8559

Conventional wisdom is that winter scenes are inappropriate for healthcare. Yet last weekend when I was lucky enough to be at the Missouri Botanical Garden after a light snow I couldn't wait to get out and take pictures.

Garden Bridge_8582

Japanese Garden_8622

Manicured Evergreens_8572

Winter Waterfall_8566

Why LinkedIn is worth your time

Columnist Steve McKee has an article in Newsweek explaining why experimenting with free Web tools like LinkedIn can help promote your company and create business connections. Some highlights:

• Getting up to speed with LinkedIn is like learning to ride a bike; it's difficult and intimidating at first, but once you get the hang of it you can get where you want to go quickly—and even enjoy the ride

• Jump right in. The key is to get your hands dirty. Find a spare hour or two, and sign up. Experience it as a user, and observe how others are using the site

• LinkedIn is like Facebook for professionals. It has more than 30 million users.

• Linkedin is free. You can be a significant player online without laying out any cash, and in this economic environment cash is king more than ever.

To read the full Newsweek article called Why Social Media Is Worth Small Business Owners' Time, click here. 

3,600 Portfolio Boxes Arrived

Today a semi-truck with a 53-foot trailer pulled onto the gravel road leading to my house/studio. They delivered 3,600 new custom-made portfolios on 8 wooden palettes. These portfolios are rigid and covered with a nice black cloth. The fit perfectly inside the express envelopes made by FedEx and the USPS. I use them to ship letter-sized sample prints.

Clients frequently ask where I bought them. Because I could not find what I wanted at any store Bob Elliott and I came up with this custom design several years ago.  If you want to explore purchasing these "Domke Portolios" the contact person is:

Larry Proctor
National Account Manager
New Century Direct, LLC
800-828-6216 ext 1741 

Tell him you are looking for the Domke Portfolio Item number 509902.

Minimum order: 250

Contact Larry for pricing.

 

 

Derek Parker - the Greatest HealthCare Architect

Derek Parker, FAIA, FACHA

Derek Parker just won the American College of Healthcare Architects Lifetime Achievement Award. It is hard to imagine anyone more deserving. Look at some of his accomplishments:

• Brought evidence-based design into the mainstream
  
  
• Founder of the Center for Health Design
  
  
• Developer of the Pebble Project
  
  
• Created the research-based Fable Hospital

Derek was also kind enough to leave an in-depth comment on my blog post "Why No Cool Looking Hospitals?". Click here to read that post.

Here is a News Release about the award from Contract Magazine:

Derek Parker, FAIA, FACHA, current board member and former CEO of Anshen+Allen, was recognized by the American College of Healthcare Architects (ACHA) with the Lifetime Achievement Award's Hamilton Medal. The highest honor bestowed by the ACHA, the award recognizes a significant body of work of lasting influence on the theory and practice of healthcare architecture. Parker was honored at the ACHA Member Luncheon in Washington, D.C. on Nov. 9, 2008.

Parker has had an enormous impact on healthcare design with his passion for innovative design, his ability to inspire and elevate the industry, his celebration and practice of collaboration and dialogue, and his leadership in the firm and the international healthcare community.

After the premature death of Bob Anshen in 1964, Parker took a leadership role in the firm, upholding Anshen+Allen's tradition of modernist design while expanding and elevating the size, scale, and breadth of the firm's work. Because of his belief in healthcare and his even stronger belief in the role of the architect to positively affect change in the provision of healthcare, he refocused the firm on healthcare and academic design. He went on to lead several historic healthcare projects that introduced for the first time a number of unconventional healthcare design elements that contribute to a better healing environment and that are now commonplace in the industry.

Beyond leading innovative design and growing the firm, Parker fostered real change in the practice of healthcare architecture on an industry scale. His commitment to improving patient-centered healing environments has brought the concept of evidence-based design into the mainstream vocabulary of health facility architects nationwide and abroad. His pioneering efforts – including cofounding the Center for Health Design (CHD); codeveloping the concept of the Pebble Project® (a research initiative through the CHD); creating the research-based Fable Hospital concept; and advising numerous investigative organizations such as the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI), the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), and the Scientific Committee of the International Academy for Health and Design (IAHD) – have accelerated the profession's acceptance of and reliance on research-based decision-making as an essential component of the design process.

Ultimately, Parker's greatest contributions to the healthcare design industry are inspirational: he has instilled a passion in his colleagues to pursue new directions in healthcare design, to cultivate deeper relationships with clients, to bridge the gap between healthcare providers and healthcare designers for a greater understanding of their needs, to protect patients and amplify their voices in the design process, and to build organizations whose sole initiative is to elevate and transform the healing environment. His sustained pursuits of innovation, collaboration, and transformation to improve health and healthcare architecture are hallmarks of his career.

Featured Artist: Samantha Knoop

"Adoration" by Samantha Knoop

Photographer Samantha Knoop creates pictures of pregnant women and children to be displayed in birthing centers, Pediatric Clinics and OB/GYN offices.  She feels these kind of images work well in those locations because they evoke the  joys of pregnancy, motherhood and childhood.

I asked Samantha to tell me about her work:

Park Avenue Art is the natural extension of combining my love of photography with my love of that special time in a woman's life before, during and after giving birth to a child.  Having experienced 3 births myself,  I know and appreciate the whole process intimately, and think it is an incredible and amazing experience that can be beautifully captured in photographs.  There is nothing like having a precious new life to hold and care for, protect and love.  Every family can relate in some way to the birth process, but each story is different, and I never tire of hearing a new one from my clients, friends and family.  To me it is so joyful, and as a photographer, I really try to capture the beauty of each special moment in my photographs.

After having my third baby, I began to see a specific need for fine art photographs of babies and pregnancy in my own maternity ward.  The birthing ward is unlike any other section of a hospital.  Life is being celebrated and I felt the artwork on the walls of birthing suites and waiting rooms should reflect this!   Women (and men) can identify with these special moments which define and glorify the joys of pregnancy, motherhood, fatherhood and childhood.   I truly think that it is a new genre of art in healthcare that will be greatly received.

To learn more about Samantha's art, her website is: www.parkavenueart.com

Pulitzer Foundation for the Arts

Upper Deck at the Pulitzer Museum

Today I made a trip into St. Louis to meet with my book editor (I'm writing a book on HealthCare Art!). After the meeting I headed over to the Pulitzer Museum with two friends. The proper name for the museum is the Pulitzer Foundation for the Arts.

The architectural design by Tadao Ando is so strong that it is easy to spend all your time focusing on that. I was excited about taking some pictures but the guards quickly let me know that I could only take pictures outside. Attached to this blog post are some of those shots.

One novelty at the museum is that they don't use labels for the art. At first it feels a little strange since I'm used to quickly looking to see who the artist is. After a while I found that I enjoyed not having the label. It made me focus on the art own it's own terms, without preconceptions.

Another unusual aspect to the museum was the ratio of guards to visitors. I would guess it was 1 guard for each visitor.  I call them "guards' but really they were more like guides. They stayed in the background, but as soon as you indicated a desire to learn more they were happy to enter into a spirited discussion about art or architecture. I sensed they all had advanced training in Art History and had been hand-picked for their good interpersonal skills.

If you love great architecture and/or great art and you are ever in St. Louis you should schedule a few hours at this small gem. This is the most sensuous concrete I have ever seen or touched.

The official website for the Pulitzer Museum is: www.pulitzerarts.org

They also have a very active  blog: click here

Shallow Pool. 

Sensuous concrete

Across the street from the Pulitzer is the Bruno David Gallery. This is the shadow of a tree on the outside of the gallery. 

Inside Richard Serra’s torqued spiral sculpture Joe

Incidentally, I found out I will be able to arrange to get special permission to go back when the museum is closed to the public so that I can photograph the interior.

Why I won't be going to the SAH Conference

"SAH" is the abbreviation for the "Society for Arts in Healthcare".

Last week a reader of this blog wrote asking:
"If you are an artist in this field, do you recommend going to the SAH conference?"

Since she is a visual artist I did not recommend the conference. SAH seems to be preoccupied with performance art: poetry, theater, dance and music. In my opinion these play a minor role in most hospitals. Greater emphasis should be given to the visual arts.

Today in the mail I got the brochure for the 20th SAH conference to be held this April in Buffalo. A quick glance at the 61-events showed only 5 clearly dealing with visual art.

Two of the talks particularly appealed to me: 

• The Effect of Art on Patient Stress in Psychiatric Units by Dr. Sarajane Eisen-Brown

• Different Approaches to to Research on Children's Art Preferences by Dr. Upali Nanda

But as excellent as those talks are sure to be, it is not enough for me to justify taking 3-days out of my work week and spending $1,000 (conference, room and board plus travel). Since I am a visual artist, I don't want to spend the time and money at a conference where the focus is on performance art.

Annette Ridenour was on the board of SAH since the beginning and served as its president for two terms. When I interviewed her about the SAH conference last year she said "I believe that SAH should be spending more time on the visual arts and less time on performance arts." Annette runs one of the largest companies involved with Art in HealthCare: Aesthetics Inc www.aesthetics.net.

Perhaps the conference will be right for you. If you are a music therapist or if you run an art therapy program there are many programs that might interest you.  To learn more the SAH  website is:www.thesah.org

Other blog posts on SAH:

Interview with Annette Ridenour click here

Society for the Arts in Healthcare click here

Why Have Art In Hospitals?

Alison Harrop at Blue Pearl Photographic has put together a 6-page document called "Why Have Art In Hospitals?" You can download it for free by clicking here.

Some quotes:

• Although abstract pieces have been used frequently in the past, the trend is now away from this type of art. It is currently believed (and has been documented by a study done in Swedish hospitals) that patients recover more quickly when the art they view is realistic rather than abstract.
  
  
• Research is clear and convincing. Nature art in hospitals is a positive distraction for patients, visitors, and staff.
  
  
• If possible, limit the group responsible for selection [of the art] to two or three staff members.
  
  
• Today, almost every hospital invests in Art-programs, because we now have research to show that not only can Art improve the image of the hospital, but it can, in fact, aid in healing.
  
  
• If there is one universal truth about hospitals, it is that they are drab, dismal places, not at all designed to soothe and heal… But a few architects and designers are working to change hospitals by humanizing their design...

• the shapes, colours and atmosphere created by [art] have a beneficial effect on patients, being stimulating, soothing or by creating an appropriate ‘feel’ for an area.
  
  
• many hospitals are turning to image enhancement through fine art as one very important element of their total marketing effort

• The Foundation for Photo/Art in Hospitals relies on the most current research on evidence-based design to develop its projects.

Blue Pearl Photographic is a British company that offers the photographs of Richard Osbourne. Many of the pictures were taken where he lives in Norwich. To learn more, the website is: www.bluepearlphoto.com

Richard sent me a note explaining his work:

Personally, I'm really excited about my work making a contribution to healing people. The natural scenes heal me when I photograph them so it's great to be able to pass that along. In addition, our PhotoGlassWorks™ are a new way to present images and have amazing depth of colour and tone - beauty, in other words. Beauty is one of the things that heals and it's hugely under-valued in modern art. In fact, a lot of modern art seems to be anti-beauty, and therefore, anti-healing.