Current Projects / Musgrove Park Hospital

Lead Artist Musgrove Park Hospital Surgical Centre

Title: Musgrove Park Hospital
Date: 2021
Dimensions: 500m x 4m
Material: Steel, programmed lighting

Over the last few years, Esther Rolinson has been developing an extensive body of artwork that will be incorporated into the heart of Musgrove Park Hospitals New Surgical Centre. It is a series of multimedia artworks that will play the role of public art and art installation, both inside and outside the building.

 

In Esther's artistic practice, she has created a conceptual system through drawing that can be built in many ways, from a drawing to 3D form and an evolving computer-generated animation. The artworks will spread right from the skin of the building through the interior design into a sculptural space, an extending 'family' of artworks.

  

In this project, Rolinson has been brought into the design team early in the building's development and works with Musgrove Park' Art for Life' project manager Lisa Harty.

  

This project is an exploration of our vital sensory connection to life and each other. 

"In the hospital the heart of the matter is trust, we have to trust in a way that no other place requires. It's an intimate exchange between strangers .. that's a very strong experience and it often stays with us our whole lives.

I hope to make an artwork that reminds you that even when nobody else can be with you or go for you that life itself has 'got your back'.

"It feels very purposeful to be making artwork for staff and patients in a hospital, particularly at this time. People need to 'reset' spaces, places and objects that acknowledge the emotional landscape. Of course, these things exist in galleries, but they also play a vital role in public areas.

There is a long history of art being embedded into care environments. I want to highlight the fantastic opportunity for people to feel the impact of the hospital spaces' artwork. I am carefully considering my role on the design team – what can an artist bring beyond the ability to trim and enhance the 'beauty' of an architecture project? What more could an artist propose? How to introduce a meaningful artwork where people have stopped their everyday routine to look after their health or care about others? It's a site for exchange, and as a lead artist of this grandiose project, it is my duty to be aware of the potential an artwork in a hospital can have."