This series of workshops developed out of the taster tester workshops we did earlier in the year.

Ward 14 is a male only dementia ward and James Mclardy has been working on the ward with their activities coordinator Vanessa Campbell. To engage the men on this ward James had to devise a practical workshop that somehow related back to the patients working past. The idea he came up with was to paint and wood grain long strips of wood. It was an immediate success with the patients, so much so that James had to keep prepping more pieces of wood for the next workshop as the men went into production overdrive. The results are individual while maintaining a familiar aesthetic across all the pieces produced.

James then took the grained pieces of wood and cut notches out of them so they could fit together in a modular system – this was also a great success with the patients enabling them to put together new and different constructions in the workshop.

The workshop is ongoing and it has been agreed that the outcome from these workshops will be:

• A ‘grained’ artwork which will hang in the activities room.
• A ‘grained’ modular system that allows the patients to continue to build constructions with Vanessa once the Artlink programme of workshops is finished.
• A large scale sign which has been ‘grained’ by the patients which says ‘Welcome to our ward’.

I’ll post more images as things progress.