Two Brighton University Students Explore Art for Connection & Care

The artist was inspired by Hisako Sekijima who is one of Japan’s leading basket makers and who uses baskets to make sculptures. Norie made this by weaving and plaiting together recycled paper strips to create an interwoven pattern with air holes. 

In this piece of artwork, I see lots of people forming different shapes but connected by body parts. This is demonstrated by the pattern that this piece creates. 

This connection symbolises our role in healthcare to work as part of a team and how we must develop close relationships with one another to provide the best possible care for our patients.  

This artwork created by Alex Oliver is of a slightly dishevelled woman wearing a mask and blue uniform, with what appears to be clear goggles, not glasses, due to the wide bridge in the centre of the goggles and the overall shape. The piece has been created with graphite pencil and watercolour, the emotion displayed in the woman’s eyes is the artists declared focus.

The loose hair, intense gaze and requirement of personal protective equipment suggests to me that the artwork is meant to invoke the spectator to feel empathy and sorrow for the woman who is presumably working in COVID-19 times.

My interpretation, influenced by working in the hospital, is that healthcare professionals are resilient people which can mean that whilst they may struggle internally their outer appearance is often neat, well put together, with a convincing joyful expression.