Markers

An alternative tour of The Royal Edinburgh Hospital

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Markers
An alternative tour of The Royal Edinburgh Hospital

A N N E V A N E S S A G R A C E A L B E R T M A G G I E A N N A J O H N J O A N G A R E T H A I L E E N

E L L I O T L A W R E N C E B E L L O H A R A N I C O L S O N K E P P I E

J E A N E T T E

D . C . R E D P A T H R O B E R T S O N C O R B E T T C O N S T A N Z A B E G B I E T E M P L E T O N

D O N A L D

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Markers
An alternative tour of The Royal Edinburgh Hospital

Ever / Present / Past

The history of the Royal Edinburgh Hospital (REH) spans 200 years, covering many lifetimes and diverse experiences of the psychiatric system. These experiences, some sad, some heartening, some funny and some downright odd, give a unique insight into the everyday life of this hospital and the ways in which it has changed over the years. When Artlink was set the task of capturing the Hospitals history, it decided to approach the whole project in the same way it runs its workshops. First start with the individual; learn from their experience; then see where it takes you. The artists involved in the programme became researchers, meeting with individuals, slowly unearthing stories, collating these experiences, offering new perspectives, turning their research into artworks. The result is EVER / PRESENT / PAST, a year-long programme curated and co-ordinated by Artlink, which exposes the history of the REH through events, talks and exhibitions and publications. Walk down Tipperlinn Road on your way into the hospital and just before you pass the Unison cottage look over to your right. In amongst the bricks of the wall you will see a stone lintel and carved into the stone, nearly legible, are some letters and a date. They are all thats left of Tipperlinn Weavers Village, which used to sit on the very same site. Go past that, down the hill and slightly to the left and you will see a large stone memorial with a bronze bust of Phillippe Pinel in a niche, and bronze medallion busts of famous physicians and campaigners down each side.

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Underneath the oorboards in the basement of McKinnon House the names of plasterers and painters are graftied from the time of the Great War. In the rafters a lone rewatcher scratched his name as he watched for German bombers in the skies over the Waters of Leith. In all of this, the patient is missing. There are no markers, no sculptures to commemorate the many thousands of people who have passed through the hospital doors. Now, that has changed. We wanted to create a view of the hospital from the perspective of those who have used the hospital as patients. We asked artist team leader Anne Elliot to talk with people who attended her workshops, look at their work and together select artworks and spaces of particular signicance throughout the hospital. Anne explained that we wanted to use the artworks as markers and memorials. Painted on walls, on poles and trees they would in effect honour each person who made the original painting, in the same way that the bronze honours Pinel. Painter Vanessa Lawrence then recreated each painting as exactly as possible at an agreed scale, in selected locations. Our overall intention is perhaps best summed up by Anne Elliot. As ways of caring for people change and parts of the hospital are replaced by new buildings, then look over to the painting of the care worker on the telegraph pole, or to the landscape on the trunk of the tree and remember some of the people who spent time here.

Alison Stirling and Trevor Cromie Co-curators EVER / PRESENT / PAST

Thanks to: Artlink Director, Jan-Bert van den Berg, for his invaluable support and guidance throughout the project.

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Artwork Map
1

Jeanette Bell Heather

John Robertson Serenity

11

Gareth Constanza Portraits of Two Staff

Painted on the lamppost next to the boundary wall at the main entrance.
2

Miniatures on door knobs on the wall of the Verandah Tearoom.

9

Above the entrance to the Greenbank Centre.

Grace OHara Tea Party

Aileen Corbett Highland Town

CARNETHY HOUSE

Painted on the corridor wall leading to Meadows Ward.

3

Albert Nicolson A New Dawn

Painted on the trunk of a tree near the boundary wall and opposite theNursery.
10 Joan Templeton Kingsher On the entrance door to the middle Glasshouse.

Painted on the notice board next to Patients Council.

4

Maggie Keppie Our Planets

ORCHARD CLINIC

YOUNG PEO UNIT

Painted on the window ledge outside the Link Gallery.

5

D.C. Landscape in a Gale

Pavillion

Car Park

Painted on the hut just off Mackinnon House Car Park.

6

Anna Redpath Hair Spectrum

Bowling Green

Joinery Workshops

Painted on the door frame of the WRVS Shop.

7

Donald Begbie Portraits of Visconti

9
Nursery

Painted above the Library door.

Plant

AFFLECK CENTRE

CHURCH CENTRE

GARDENERS Spare Ground and Orchard

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Cullen & Rivers Centres

Car Park

PE TIP AD RO NN RLI

THE WILLIAM FRASER CENTRE

Car Park

11
THE GREENBANK CENTRE
Car Park Union Offices Car Park Greenhouses Car Park Staff Offices

SCOTTISH AMBULANCE CENTRE

OPLES T

10
Cottage Plumbers

LECTURE THEATRE
Courtyard

KENNEDY TOWER

Post Room

Laundry

Car Park

7
Sewing Room

6
MACKINNON HOUSE
WRVS Car Park

Reception

PSYCHOLOGY UNIT

Car Park

4
LINK GALLERY

2 3

KINNAIR UNIT

JARDINE CLINIC

Shelter

MORNINGSIDE TERRACE

Workshops Engineers Boilerhouse

Jordanburn Huts

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Jeanette Bell
Heather

A colourful portrait of a staff member, with the inscription Heather is a real nurse and does everything perfectly. The painting was created at a workshop which looked at the hospitals history, and uses the roundel form of the portrait medallions that weve seen on the Pinel monument to celebrate the present day, in this case a nurse who Jeanette respected and liked. The painting is situated on a lamppost by the hospital exit, because Jeanette herself has exited the hospital, after a stay of many years, and now lives in the community. The painting is next to one of the old boundary walls, along which ran a longstanding right of way through the hospital grounds, allowing the textile workers of old Tipperlinn Village to reach the waters of Jordan Burn, where they dyed their linen, and the waters reputedly ran red with pigment.

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Grace OHara
Tea Party

This engaging painting of a tablecloth laden with treats was adapted from a lace-edged banner made by Grace for the summer fte. It is a celebration of the tea parties and coffee mornings organised by the project nurse on Meadows, where Grace stayed for a while. She found these little gatherings over scones, tea and chat uplifting. These things aid you in your recovery, she says, Getting you to do things that interest you in life again. The painting is situated in the corridor beside Meadows Ward, one of several wards in the hospital where art, printing and craft workshops are conducted. In the 70s, this ward accommodated mothers suffering from puerperal psychosis along with their babies, so that a bond might be formed between them.

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Albert Nicolson
A New Dawn

This bright pinwheel-like design appears like an intricate origami rosette pinned to the woodwork of the noticeboard in the Andrew Duncan Clinic. The artist, Albert, trained in architecture and worked as a draughtsman, and this skilled precision informs his work, be it abstract or gurative. Albert is a long-standing member of the Patients Council, whose current ofces are just along the corridor. If you step back slightly from the noticeboard, you will see it is part of a larger wooden structure, with a door. This was a former shop for sweets, cigarettes and sundries, with a kiosk frontage. The building opened in the mid-sixties as a day clinic, so there were many people coming and going along the corridor.

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Maggie Keppie
Our Planets

Looking out of the window of the Link Corridor you can see Maggies work painted on a drainpipe by a set of small steps. This was where Maggie, taking a break from duties at the Patients Council, would smoke and talk with her friend Allison. The work was made in remembrance of Allison, who died recently. The text around the owers reads: We met when our planets aligned, I hate that yours fell before mine. The corridor, linking Mackinnon House with the Jordanburn Clinic, has been used as a gallery area for the past twenty years, after it was refurbished with a lottery grant. It was also the location of the Patients Councils former ofce, where Maggie served as chairwoman.

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D. C.

Landscape in a Gale

The creator of this landscape was a regular attender at art sessions held in the hut to the right, once Artlinks workshop. He died at a tragically young age, but during his time at the hospital liked to spend time in this small outdoor space as a break from the wards. His paintings reected a love of landscape, often featuring churches and usually with this strong element of wind blowing through them his marks energetically directional, everything in movement. These wooden huts were built around the time of World War II, and are a common feature of Scottish hospitals, built as makeshift wards in anticipation of an inux of military casualties. They have since been repurposed for many uses, for storage of medical records, as workshops and ofces. The hut with the painting on it was previously the gardeners houf or bothy. In the carpark behind, there was once a skittle alley. Also, note the monument to Phillipe Pinel, and other pioneers of the humane treatment of mental illness, at the entrance to the car park.

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Anna Redpath
Hair Spectrum

This painting, spanning the doorway of the WRVS shop, is a vibrant composition by an artist fascinated by pattern and colour. The womans hair takes on an imaginative life, radiating in circles, lled with a harlequin pattern of colour. Anna chose this spot for her work because she comes here every Wednesday to buy milk for the art group, and will enjoy seeing it, as will the many shop customers. The shop is situated beside the original entrance to Mackinnon House, and the staircase beside it was once the main staircase of the hospital, though it seems too narrow for that purpose. But Mackinnon House, then known as West House, was built in back in 1840 to house poor patients, and so the decoration and proportions were deliberately modest and plain.

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Donald Begbie
Portrait of Visconti

Above the library door is this portrait of the celebrated Italian lm, opera and theatre director Luciano Visconti. Originally a pencil drawing taken from a photograph, Donald chose this subject because of his interest in the arts, particularly literature, music and opera. This painting is appropriately situated above the door of the hospitals library. Like most of the older hospital, this room has had many former lives. Originally it was the male bathroom, that is, a room lined on either side with baths where wards of patients would wash communally, with little, if any, privacy. It has since been a staff tearoom and bistro, and is now a lending library stocked with books from the former Royal Inrmary library, which closed when the old hospital did.

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Serenity

John Robertson

Landscapes are Johns chief subject, reecting his longing for wide open spaces. These three works are based on Scottish landscapes and have been reproduced on a row of doorknobs to reect a connection between the inside and the outside. The artist, who has been painting for twenty-ve years, enjoys the Verandah Caf as a break from life on the ward. The paintings have been installed here in one of his favourite places, with light spilling in through wide windows and a homely atmosphere. The space was opened as The Verandah Club in the 1970s by Magnus Magnusson. It is staffed by volunteers from the local community, and any prots are put at the disposal of the hospitals charge nurses for any small extras they may need for their wards.

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Aileen Corbett
Highland Town

Aileens landscape of a northern shing town has been reproduced on an oval surface in the bark of this oak tree. The site was chosen because of the smoking shelter nearby. The artist, a smoker herself, might therefore spend time here and enjoy her painting in the outdoors. I just hope the picture will be viewed by people and they will feel better from having seen it, says Aileen. I hope that everyone round about is going to feel able to paint as well. You might notice that the tree has a number attached to it. This is because, along with other parts of the hospital, many of the large older trees are listed, and there are even two Scottish Champions in the grounds, that is, trees that are considered the nest specimens of their kind. When the grounds were laid out, in the mid-19th century, many new species were being brought into the country by plant hunters. Behind the tree is the original boundary wall, also listed. There would have been locked gates across the gap to the right.

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10

Kingsher

Joan Templeton

Joan attends art sessions at the Glasshouses when she comes to visit her son in the hospital. She is interested in drawing nature, especially birds and owers. This bright kingsher on the greenhouse door was a detail taken from a larger design for a banner. The Glasshouses are currently used as the centre of Artlinks activities at the Royal Edinburgh. They house a range of creative workshops in addition to gardening activities. They were built to house a previous Horticulture Project which involved many of the patients, but dwindled as Occupational Therapy moved to more modern job-related activities such as ofce work and trade skills. It is likely that there were greenhouses on this site before these ones, when the hospital was home to resident gardeners and their families, along with a pigman and another family who ran the chicken house.

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11

Gareth Constanza
Portraits of Two Staff

Up on the peak of the gables of the Islay Centre are positioned two portraits of nurses from original watercolours by Gareth. They were part of a series taken from photographs of contemporary carers, and these two individuals worked in this building when Gareth, who has since moved in to the community, lived here. They reference older portraits in the grounds of the hospital, such as the medallions of pioneers of humane psychiatry found near the entrance of Mackinnon House Before these residential units were built, the site was part of the hospital gardens. Up until the 1940s, the hospital was self-sufcient in vegetables, and patients with gardening skills were encouraged to work here. This strong tradition of growing at the Royal Edinburgh is continued today in the Glasshouses nearby.

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Acknowledgements
Anne Elliot Anne Elliot graduated from the painting department of Glasgow School of Art in 1985. On leaving art school she practised as a painter and then as a photographer, creating artwork for both the gallery and site specic projects. In 1990, Glasgows Year of Culture, she started working on art projects in the community with groups of people from many different backgrounds. Over the years she has developed this work into her main artistic practice, working on projects in Luxembourg and New York. Since 1999, she has worked in hospitals as Artlinks Artist Team Leader, including major collaborative projects Fusion and Functionsuite. Currently her workshops in the Glasshouses at the Royal Edinburgh are regularly attended by people with an interest in visual arts, music or gardening resulting in exhibitions, site specic artwork and events. Vanessa Lawrence Vanessa studied at Lorenzo De Medici, School of Art, Florence, Italy and The New York Studio School of Drawing Painting and Sculpture. After graduating from the Studio School in Spring 2001, she was accepted as one of the 9 artists to take part in the Studioscape Residency Program run by the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council on the 91st Floor of the North Tower of the Twin Towers. The residency was tragically ended on September 11th, which then forced Vanessa to return to Scotland where she continues to work near Glasgow.

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Special thanks to:

Tom Arnott, George Todd and the staff who support the artists in the workshops. Volunteers: Ilaria Tercelli , Maria Roberio, Fiona Kennedy, Valerie Gordon, Erica Robb Staff at the hospital: Gareth Shaw, Gavin Knox, Janet McSherry, Angela Farr, Julie Sutherland.

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Credits
Guide published by Artlink in an edition of 300, November 2013 Copyright 2013 the artist, authors and publisher. 16th November 2013 to 15th February 2014.

The Ever / Present / Past project has been co-curated by Trevor Cromie and Artlinks Projects Director Alison Stirling, the exhibition has been realised in collaboration with the Talbot Rice Gallery. Design by Nicky Regan, Submarine Design Text by Nicola White Edited by Alison Stirling and Trevor Cromie Ever/Present/Past logo designed by Vic MacRae All photographs Anne Elliot. Artlink promotes diversity, drawing on lived experiences to inform creative responses which are both relevant and enduring.

Artlink Edinburgh and the Lothians 13a Spittal Street Edinburgh EH3 9DY Tel: 0131 229 3555 Website: www.artlinkedinburgh.co.uk Blog: www.artlinkeverpresentpast.wordpress.com Artlink is a company registered in Scotland No. 87845 with charitable status. Scottish Charity No. SC006845.

ISBN 978-0955188282

9 780955 188282