Tag Archives: psychiatry

Mr A moves in mysterious ways

L0075005 The Foetus / Rebirth. RIC23, Adamson Coll

Helen Grieg, The Foetus / Rebirth. Credit: Adamson Collection/Wellcome

Dr Fiona Johnstone, Associate Research Fellow in Art History writes on the new exhibition, which will showcase early art therapy from psychiatric patients. The exhibition will be shown from 15 May – 25 July 2017, at the Peltz Gallery, Birkbeck School of Arts. 

This summer the Peltz Gallery will host a historically significant exhibition of works from the remarkable Adamson Collection, one of the world’s largest collections of artworks made by psychiatric patients. Titled Mr A Moves in Mysterious Ways: Selected Artists from the Adamson Collection, this exhibition will be the first time that the Collection has been displayed since its recent acquisition by the Wellcome Trust.

For almost three decades, Edward Adamson was engaged as ‘art master’ at the long-stay British mental hospital Netherne, in Surrey. His initial role was to facilitate patient involvement in a scientific study investigating the relationship between mental illness and creativity, published by Netherne’s Medical Superintendent Eric Cunningham Dax as Experimental Studies in Psychiatric Art in 1953. When research ended, Adamson chose to remain at the hospital, establishing an open studio where residents could come and paint freely. A pioneer of British art therapy, Adamson was deeply committed to the healing possibilities of creativity, and often remarked that simply making the short journey from the ward to the studio could have a beneficial effect on patients.

Over the years Adamson amassed a vast collection of patient artworks, including drawings, paintings and sculptures. After he retired in 1981, some 6,000 objects were relocated to a temporary exhibition space on the Rothschild family’s estate at Ashton Wold, and then moved to storage in Lambeth Hospital following Adamson’s death in 1986. Most of the Collection was physically transferred to the Wellcome Library in 2013, and formal custodianship agreed in 2016.

Mr A Moves in Mysterious Ways has developed out of a series of events hosted by Birkbeck’s Centre for Medical Humanities: two reading group sessions, which included a meeting led by David O’Flynn, chair of the Adamson Collection Trust, and a discussion of Framing Marginalized Art (Karen Jones, Eugen Koh, Nurin Veis and Anthony White, 2010), a text which explores the ethical and curatorial complexities of exhibiting art therapeutic materials; and a screening of the award-winning essay film Abandoned Goods (dirs. Pia Borg and Edward Lawrenson, Fly Film, 2015) which traces the evolution of the Adamson Collection from clinical materials to revered art objects.

Thea Hart, Child and Doctor. Credit: Adamson Collection/ Wellcome

Thea Hart, Child and Doctor. Credit: Adamson Collection/ Wellcome

My co-curator, Dr Heather Tilley and I were fascinated by the potential challenges involved in exhibiting these works: should they be ‘framed’ as art works, historical documents, clinical artefacts, or all three simultaneously? We were also intrigued as to how we might settle on a unifying theme. The Adamson Collection interweaves a number of narratives, including the history of the post-war mental institution, the development of psychiatric practice in the UK, and the origins of art therapy as a profession. It also tells a range of individual stories, including that of Adamson himself, and of the people who produced work under his guidance. How would we be able to do justice to all these perspectives, especially within the relatively small space of the Peltz Gallery?

Ultimately we decided to ‘frame’ the Collection by focusing on the work of eight selected individuals, chosen for their distinctive visual styles and particular histories. By presenting these makers as artists, rather than as un-named and undifferentiated psychiatric patients, and framing their objects as artworks, we have aimed to highlight the aesthetic, personal and historical dimensions of the collection, whilst remaining sensitive to its medical and therapeutic contexts.

We hope that this exhibition will be the beginning of a continuing conversation about the ethical and legal complexities of exhibiting the Adamson Collection (and indeed art therapeutic materials more generally). This summer the Wellcome Trust will host a series of public workshops examining these very issues, focusing on topics such as the naming of patient-artists, accessibility, and the efficacy of the label ‘Outsider Art.’ (N.B. at time of writing dates and details of these workshops are still to be confirmed – keep an eye on our exhibition website for further information).

The exhibition will be also accompanied by an exciting programme of contextual events at Birkbeck, including:

  • A launch event and private view will be held on Thursday 18th May as part of Birkbeck Arts Week.
  • Curator’s tours will as part of London Creativity and Wellbeing Week.
  • A legacy event titled ‘Curating the Medical Humanities’ will be held at Birkbeck in the summer of 2018.

For more information about the exhibition, please visit the Peltz Gallery website.

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