Hospital Rooms x Hauser & Wirth celebrate 3 year collaboration in support of mental health services across the UK with the announcement of the “Digital Art School” exhibition and two fundraising auctions hosted in partnership with Bonhams.
Hospital Rooms work to benefit people with Severe Mental Illness (SMI) diagnoses, commissioning leading artists such as Hurvin Anderson, Julian Opie, Sonia Boyce, Anish Kapoor and Chantal Joffe to transform in-patient units and secure wards, where opportunities to experience and participate in art are significantly reduced. The charity also works in mother and baby, out-patient and young people’s units, recognising both the broad range of people whose lives are touched by mental illness and the transformative potential of creative programmes and vibrant care environments – for patients, their loved ones, and staff.
This year marks the launch of Hospital Rooms’ latest and most wide-reaching initiative, the Digital Art School. The programme involves bringing artist-led digital workshops and free art materials to every NHS inpatient mental health site in England. All 58 Mental Health Trusts in England have participated in the scheme so far.
The Digital Art School exhibition is in partnership with Hauser & Wirth and Bonhams, and supported by Gallagher Re. With additional support from our Gallery Circle members Edel Assanti, Ginny on Frederick, Hauser & Wirth, and TJ Boulting.
Digital Art School is a programme that’s very close to our hearts, and we’re so excited to bring it to life as an immersive studio experience. The exhibition and accompanying events programme at Hauser & Wirth will interrogate modes of arts education and invite visitors to participate in accessible, inventive, and provocative sessions led by our extraordinary artist tutors. Digital Art School is designed to cultivate connectivity, collaboration and dreaming within mental health spaces and we hope wider audiences will be able to join in this summer.
– Niamh White, Co-Founder, Hospital Rooms
The Digital Art School exhibition:
This summer, the Hospital Rooms Digital Art School will manifest in a physical space at Hauser & Wirth London from 22nd August – 10th September 2024. The exhibition will recreate the Digital Art School format live in the gallery space, delivering live in-house creative sessions hosted by artists such as Abbas Zahedi, Shepherd Manyika and Eileen Cooper RA as well as beautifully shot art activities projected in cinematic style onto the walls of the gallery hosted by artists and designers including Giles Deacon, Sutapa Biswas and Sarah Dwyer.
Visitors will be invited to spend time making artwork of their own in the space, using free art materials provided in the gallery or participating through handheld digital devices and in print. The exhibition offers a chance for visitors to experience the various gatherings that are taking place in mental health hospitals across England and to contribute to the charity’s investigations and experimentations into new models and methods of humanising mental health spaces. Artworks created by visitors during the sessions will be installed on the walls throughout the exhibition.
The floor of the gallery space will be covered with an adaptation of Nengi Omuku’s artwork created for Hellesdon Hospital in Norfolk, depicting a clear blue sky that people will be able to walk, sit and create on. Hot air balloons featured in the Hellesdon artwork will be transformed into bean bags for the public to sit on and draw, and will later be installed in Hellesdon Hospital.
The partnership has helped to fund transformational creative projects to bring contemporary art and architecture to Springfield Hospital, Tooting; Hellesdon Hospital, Norwich; Sandwell Children and Adolescent Mental Health Services in the Midlands, and to launch the Digital Art School in 750 mental health sites across the country.
The Auction:
The Digital Art School exhibition will culminate in an auction at Hauser & Wirth hosted in partnership with Bonhams on 11 September, showcasing works donated by artists across the UK which will be shown in the gallery throughout the duration of the exhibition. The auction will feature works by Do Ho Suh, Rana Begum, Sutapa Biswas, Peter Liversidge and many more.
As long-time supporters of Hospital Rooms, we are inspired by the incredible difference that Niamh, Tim and their team make, cultivating joyful spaces for healing that offer patients hope and dignity within mental health services across the country. This third year of collaboration shines a light on the importance of arts education with the Digital Art School and we’re pleased to support them bringing this to a wider audience. We are also thrilled to welcome new Gallery Circle members, who have also committed to support Hospital Rooms.
– Neil Wenman, Global Creative Director & Partner, Hauser & Wirth
Hospital Rooms x Hauser & Wirth:
Over the past two years, Hospital Rooms x Hauser & Wirth has jointly raised over £725,000, helping the charity to deliver a series of ambitious new projects in NHS mental health hospitals across the UK. Over the course of this partnership, Hospital Rooms and Hauser & Wirth aims to reach a fundraising target of £1 million to transform the experiences of patients in mental health services across the UK. Proceeds from the auction will sustain the year ahead for the charity with plans to deliver inspiring new projects transforming mental health care units in cities from London to Bristol, Birmingham, Wakefield and beyond.
Hospital Rooms x Hauser & Wirth present the Digital Art School exhibition, 22nd August – 10th September 2024, Hauer & Wirth Saville Row
Private view: Wednesday 21st August, 6–8pm RSVP
About Hospital Rooms
The charity Hospital Rooms was founded when a friend of artist Tim A Shaw and curator Niamh White was sectioned and admitted to a NHS mental health hospital. On visiting her, they were shocked to find the hospital environment was cold and clinical at a time when she was so vulnerable. Having both worked in the arts for 10 years, Shaw and White felt they had the skills and community to be able to transform these spaces with unique and site specific artworks.
Hospital Rooms envisions a new world where abundant and meaningful creative opportunities are readily accessible to people with severe and enduring mental health diagnoses, and where mental health hospital environments are inventive cultural spaces offering solace, comfort and dignity. Since 2016, Hospital Rooms has undertaken a number of acclaimed projects, completed in some of the most challenging mental health settings. A roster of artists is carefully selected for each Hospital Rooms’ project according to the needs of each community.
