Alongside James Thomson, I was Filmmaker in Residence at the Royal Edinburgh Hospital for 2024-25, funded by NHS Lothian Charity: Tonic Arts and Screen Scotland. During the 18-month residency we ran filmmaking workshops with patients, staff, and volunteers, with the aim of embedding filmmaking practices into the hospital. As a collection, the films from this residency highlight the complex issue of visibility in such a setting, and the many different ways that care is enacted by and for the hospital community.
The project concluded with a screening in the REH canteen in July 2025 for participants and the hospital community. A selection of work from the project was presented in October 2025 as part of the Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival at Civic House, Glasgow.
As part of this project I also developed a collaboration with the hospital’s Grounds and Gardens Team, please see this page for more information.
Stills shown above are from one of our projects, cameraless films made by participants from the REH Community Garden, the Orchard Clinic, and Eden and Harlaw Wards between May and July 2024. The images are made by attaching small cuttings of plant matter from green spaces around the hospital onto a blank 16mm reel. Once the film is scanned, the incredible details of the plants become visible, representing the place and time in which they were made. Film supplied and scanned by On8mil.
