FROM:

Falk Associates 847.675.2580 contact@falkpr.com

Glenview

Wilmette

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

PIONEERING PAIRING OF TECHNOLOGY, IMAGERY BOLSTERS HEALING IN PSYCH UNIT

NMH Partners with H. Marion Art Consultants to Install Artworks as Therapeutic Tool

Theres much talk about healing art these days: Healthcare facilities are finding that certain colors and imagery have a positive effect on a patients overall well being, reducing stress and providing a welcome distraction as a first step in the healing process. But can art actually heal? Art consultants Jan Marion and Pam Rosenberg of Chicago area-based H. Marion Art Consultants teamed up with world-renowned psychiatrist Dr. John Csernansky and his team at Northwestern Memorial Hospital [NMH] to explore this possibility. As part of the recent multimillion-dollar renovation of NMH, the locked psychiatric unit in the Galter Pavilion was completely re-envisioned. Now, the new Stone Institute of Psychiatry includes artworks that the team believes could potentially have a therapeutic effect on the units patients. Sometimes psychiatric patients dont even know the time of day, let alone have a sense of place. Dr. Csernansky believes that by adjusting the circadian rhythms within the patient, the enhanced sense of time can provide an additional therapeutic layer to the treatment protocol. Working together, the psychiatric team and H. Marion came up with a stunning, interactive art installation combining landscape imagery with technology in this instance, light boxes which can be controlled to imitate the light at different times of day that actively employs art as part of the healing process. -MORE-

NORTHWESTERN HOSPITAL PSYCHIATRIC UNIT/Add One The physicians felt that the ability to adjust the light from day to night and back again using these images would be a useful tool in adjusting the circadian rhythms of many psychiatric patients, explains H. Marion President Marion. So now you have art actually being used as a therapeutic tool. Marion and Rosenberg, who is also a licensed ASID, IIDA interior designer, selected photographs of landscapes that were conducive to being blown up to huge proportions: panels in the corridors and common rooms are 6 feet tall and 20 feet long, and in the patient rooms are 4 feet high by 6 feet long. The images were printed on large-scale polycarbonate panels (bullet proof) and then illuminated from behind using a dimmable light source: light boxes recessed into the wall, so that the face of the acrylic panels are flush with the dry wall, creating a safe installation and living environment for the patients. Rosenberg explains that the landscapes were chosen for their sense of depth, along with having a horizon line. There had to be the ability to bring you into the vista and at the same time keep a sense of perspective, she says, and adds, Nature is also about recycling itself, and this can resonate with the patients, who have a beginning, middle and end for their treatments. The psychiatric team of doctors and nurses carefully vetted all of the artworks on the floor. Vetting was facilitated by the propriety online art portal developed by H. Marion, which enables the download of hundreds of images made accessible to the client online. This facilitated the participants ability to review and comment on each potential image in relation to the selection criteria. The criteria for artwork selected for the psychiatric unit were somewhat different from other units at the hospital, which had previously employed the expertise of H. Marion. They could be gorgeous images but still be disqualified, Rosenberg says. Artworks would be eliminated if the colors were too gray or misty because depressed patients need vibrant colors and warmth. For the same reason, landscapes that are arid or without signs of life were considered too desolate. Manic patients can be hyper-sexual, so some images, such as close ups of flowers, were considered overly suggestive. Psychotic patients can see images in the most benign piece and be hyper-religious, so any image that could feed into a delusion even sunlight streaming strongly through trees was rejected.

NORTHWESTERN HOSPITAL PSYCHIATRIC UNIT/Add Two Another challenge was ensuring that the mounting and installations of artworks in addition to the inset acrylic panels were entirely safe for patients of the locked unit. The consultants had to design a unique installation protocol that permanently mounted the art to the wall with absolutely no gap between the art and the wall. The system they came up with consists of two different types of adhesives which, when dried, make it impossible to pull the art off the wall without taking the wall with it. This was so that nothing can be slipped behind the art so that it can be pried off the wall, explains Marion. Likewise, we made sure there were no severe edges on the frame, eliminating the possibility a patient could lasso something around the frame in an attempt to hurt one self. Some of the specified art are original oils; others are framed and matted photos or photographs of Chicago. Our goal was to make the unit homelike, so we chose photography for the hallways that included images specific to Chicago and the Midwest, says Marion. What says home more than Chicago? He adds that H. Marion Art Consulting also used local imagery on the two other floors of NMH for which they consulted. He points to the 8 foot wide, commissioned oil painting A Day at the Beach, which hangs in the ninth floor waiting room, as paying homage to both local natural resources and the branding of the hospital itself. The hospitals only a couple blocks from Lake Michigan, says Marion. Heres a scene thats an uplifting Midwestern beachscape, with people of diverse ethnicities doing all the activities of 21st century Chicago. He smiles, Theres even a guy talking on a cell phone. According to Marion and Rosenberg, the experience of working on the NMH psychiatric unit installation confirms their companys philosophy that every project starts with an entirely fresh approach. Theres no such thing as reaching into your file and pulling out something that will work in any facility, avers Rosenberg. Each project demands a clean slate, and this one brought home how art is following new technology. There are endless capabilities to art and how to express it. -MORE-

NORTHWESTERN HOSPITAL PSYCHIATRIC UNIT/Add Three She continues, Because we were lucky enough to have this project, where we studied and learned in depth about the effect of art on the psyche, we can now look at things from another perspective. It makes you stop and question, and dig deeper, when you ask, Is this really the right thing to do? While H. Marion and the physicians in the unit eagerly await the outcome of the pairing of art with technology on circadian rhythms, the reaction of the client is already clear: According to Lisa Fuller, liaison for the NMH psych unit, I do know that countless patients have commented on the pictures in general, even if we dont dim them through all four settings as consistently as we should. They all love them! During the year 2011, H. Marion Art Consulting installed artworks in over two million square feet of space in Chicago area healthcare facilities. In addition to approximately 120,000 square feet at NMH, they recently completed consulting and installing the art for the brand new, 14-floor million-square-foot Rush University Medical Center, which opened in January. # # #
For further information on H. Marion Art Consulting www.hmarionframing.com/contract/healthcare/ Or contact Amy Goodson: amy@hmarionframing.com