Dad with Martin Parr at Dorchester Hospital
Watercolour on Paper
14x19cm
2025
I find hospitals disorientating and time bending. Whether we are a patient or a visitor, it doesn’t take long before our connection with the outside world fades and we start to feel a bit institutionalised. Coming across art in a hospital can be a pleasant distraction; a jolt to our senses; vitamin D for our eyes, as my friend Estelle Lovett once said. By spending time connecting with an artist’s vision and ideas, we can be transported away from the hospital, to somewhere else entirely.
Making the watercolour above reconnected me to what was a rather bizarre moment at Dorchester Hospital in 2014. As we were getting ready to leave, I noticed my Dad, who was getting frustrated with the zip of his jacket (he had Alzheimers), was standing in front of a row of quirky photographs by one of my favourite photographers, Martin Parr. The juxtaposition between the photographs and my Dad, seemed to mirror the anthropological scenes that Parr had captured, which compelled me to quickly photograph the scene myself.
The whole Dorset Art In Hospitals collection is available to see online. You can donate there too.
I Am Martin Parr film 2025