Experience Art in a New Way at Dorset County Hospital
Hospital patients in Dorchester can enjoy art in a new way with a project celebrating 35 years of art in Dorset County Hospital.
A Sense of Place brings the art to you wherever you are with a collection of stories and sounds you can listen to on your mobile phone.
Artists Sharon Hayden and Alastair Nisbet from ScreenPLAY, the group behind the new project, have been to Dorset beaches, summer fetes, the top of the Cerne Giant at dawn on Mayday, and a farmyard in North Dorset, to find stories that enhance the experience and give context and insights into the artwork.
Sharon Hayden explained: “Our aim is to give context and insights into the artwork. We ask a leading portrait photographer why he wanted to take pictures of huge oak trees in the dark, we listen to the sea during a storm at Portland Bill, and we tell the stories behind the hospital’s Wall of Words.”
A Sense of Place features 22 art works in the hospital and each has a new exhibit label with its own QR code linking to the story about that piece, plus a link to the full app.
There is also a set of three art postcards with the QR code link as well as links on the Arts in Hospital website.
Sharon added: “A volunteer organiser working with us described A Sense of Place as ‘a gift for patients,’ something they can listen to in hospital and ‘revisit when they continue their healing at home.’
But it’s more than that. This collection of stories is a gift for everybody – patients, staff, visitors and the wider population who would like to experience the art in an enhanced way.”
The app has been designed to easy to use so anybody with a smart phone or tablet can access it. “If you have ever listened to a podcast or BBC Sounds, you will find it very familiar,” said Alastair Nisbet. “Users simply click to play and click to pause or move forwards and backwards using +15 and -15 second buttons.
We’d like to say a huge thank you to the patients, staff, volunteers and wider public who have contributed to this project, and to partners, Arts in Hospital and the Dorset County Hospital Charity and to funders, Dorset Council and the National Lottery Heritage Fund who made it possible.”
With around 100 members any business in Dorset can join Dorchester Chamber from business for £60p/a (no VAT).
