First of all, we want to acknowledge the amazing work that NHS staff have been doing over the last 5 months in what are incredibly challenging times. THANK YOU.

Although Anne and Trevor have not been able to work on the wards during lockdown, they have been busy. Anne has kept in touch with various workshop participants setting different art tasks for them to try out, from still life to painting flowers to views from their windows. As time passed, participants began setting each other tasks. Other activities have included the Edinburgh Landmarks exhibition at the Royal Edinburgh Hospital which features artwork by workshop participants and staff members.

In addition, The Glasshouses Garden Group; has been sharing tips and images from their own gardening projects during lockdown. The REH Creative Hub is hoping to return to some kind of normality soon. Joan and Maggie have been busy with their own projects from home, Crafting with Joan and Maggie’s Marvellous Moments offering a glimpse into their own creative processes whilst we can’t be together.

Just getting off the ground is Lost for Words, a creative writing project that pairs author Laura Marney with budding writers across the hospitals to create stories together. We are currently talking to the Scottish Book Trust on how to reach more people and involve exciting writers.

Finally, Art Games is a drawing exchange between St John’s and Liberton Hospital. Based upon a surrealist art game that allows a drawing to develop as it goes back and forth between participants, in due course we’ll be working in partnership with the Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop to create a larger scale sculptural project.

We will try and post as regularly as we can so there is something new to look at.

Please feel free to give us any feedback, or ask about participating in future projects. Artlink Hospital Arts Team contacts: anne@artlinkedinburgh.co.uk (normal working week is Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday) trevor@artlinkedinburgh.co.uk (normal working week varies depending on projects, currently mostly Wednesday and Thursday).

Over the last months we have been working in partnership with The Scottish Book Trust and The Reading Agency to bring Reading Friends to care for the elderly wards. Reading Friends is a UK wide scheme that uses books and reading as a way of fostering friendship and creating meaningful moments that have long term effects.

We are one of just two projects in Scotland and the first to be bring this project onto hospital wards. Fifteen new volunteers with varied and interesting backgrounds are ready to deliver this brilliant programme after some first class training from our partners at Volunteer Edinburgh. More training is to come as we continue to recruit but we already have a few of our wonderful volunteers visiting Prospect Bank and St. Johns Hospital. Simon Jay, Artlink’s volunteer coordinator for Reading Friends, has been bringing an exciting energy to the scheme:

“Since our first volunteer meeting mid-January, we’ve had new volunteers join us and we’ve begun to get out onto the wards. The volunteers themselves will be able to share their personal experience at one of our regular volunteer meet ups. Personally I have observed how the act of companionship, through sitting alongside someone and reading, can make a difference in unquantifiable ways. For instance, one patient a volunteer was reading to became much more engaged during an hour together looking at photo-books of Edinburgh. Relatives who visited after a Reading Friend had been to visit mentioned that everyone found it easier to talk and engage with each other. On another occasion, visiting a particularly distressed patient in their room calmed them down immediately and they found the companionship very soothing.” Simon Jay, Reading Friends Volunteer Coordinator