The power of art as a communication tool

Dolly Sen — who was interviewed by DiMHN CEO, Hannah Chamberlain, for an article that appeared in May's The Network, was introduced by session Chair, DiMHN director, and Professor of Health and Organisational Psychology at Nottingham Business School, Nottingham Trent University, Steve Brown. His research interests are around service-user experiences of secure mental healthcare, and 'social remembering' within marginalised and excluded groups. He said of the speaker, whose presentation was titled 'Art insists the walls be kind': "Dolly is an activist and a fantastic artist. Her work has been exhibited internationally. She works in a variety of media, involving writing, performance, film, and visual art. Her films have been shown internationally, and her art has taken her up a tree in Regent's Park, to California's Death Row, to the Barbican, Tower Bridge, the Royal Academy, the Department for Work and Pensions, Trafalgar Square, and up a ladder to screw a light bulb into the sky. Her work is subversive, radical, and extremely funny. She is interested in debate and social experiment around the themes of madness, sanity, 'the other', and acceptable behaviours, often from an unusual and unconventional position of power. Dolly is interested in 'disability and the madness that is given to us by the world', and I'm thrilled she's able to talk to us today."

Opening her address, Dolly Sen told the audience: "The gist of my talk is that I want more kindness, and to give my thoughts on what you guys are doing." She continued: "My introduction to creating art came as a response to the environment of an inpatient ward at St Thomas' Hospital in London before they demolished the psychiatric unit. One of the first things I noticed was that the table beside my bed was ringed with tea and coffee stains. I took lots of pictures of these stains on my mobile phone — because that was the only pattern in the room. The walls exhibited the insane combination of being both grubby and sterile. I also took photographs of light coming through the window. My brother — who works in computers — gifted me a computer, equipped with Photoshop, which I used to manipulate the coffee and tea 'ring' photos by making a 'negative', and using blurring tools to turn the tea stains into stars."

"I've done a lot of films, mostly themed around mental health," she explained, "and want to have conversations with ordinary people on the subject. I feel art is a great way to do that. For example, I took a bed, covered it in cuddly sheet, called it 'Bedlamb', visited a few places around the country, put it on the street, and invited people into bed with me to talk about mental health. I hadn't seen that done before, but I made a film about it — and you'll be quite surprised about the ordinary person's responses to the question of: 'What is mental distress madness?', 'What causes it?', and 'What can we do to help people?' The response was certainly interesting."