Arts & Health Hub Members

My research draws inspiration from urban arts (parkour, art du déplacement, breakin’/breakdancing, skateboarding and graffiti) to develop a theory of negotiated living that I call Compassionate Mobilities. Over 25 workshops in London and Singapore, undertaken with young people between the ages of 15 and 25, I used urban art-inspired place practices to explore alternative ways of understanding and negotiating mobilities in a hypercompetitive environment that disadvantages young people from low-income families. Many of the young people I worked with were struggling with depression. My postdoctoral research explores the reimagining of the future of mental wellbeing in Hong Kong, Shanghai, Tokyo, Singapore and London.

My current research interests include: Chinese and Japanese philosophies on death, the employment of artificial intelligence (AI) in the field of telehealth and mental wellbeing, cosplay- and urban arts-inspired place practices.

Agnese Reginaldo is an art historian whose work focuses on the intersection between art and social sciences. Her practice focuses on public-engagement projects aiming to create a more effective connection between the public and contemporary art in museum and gallery settings.

Alexa Wright is a visual artist whose practice spans a range of media, including photography, video, sound, interactive installation and book works. She has worked at the intersection of art and medical science since the late-1990s, when she became known for her award-winning photographs of people with phantom limbs, ‘After Image’. Alexa often works with people with mental and physical differences to make works that address questions of human identity and otherness through qualities like vulnerability and empathy. She has been involved in several long term inter-disciplinary collaborations, for example with Alf Linney, Professor of Medical Physics and computer scientists at UCL (1999-2010) and Hybrid Bodies, a unique international, interdisciplinary project based in Toronto, Canada that brought together medics, visual artists, a philosopher and social scientists to explore the emotional and psychological effects of heart transplantation (2007-19). In 2015, funded by the Arts Council, she initiated ‘Piecing it Together’, a participatory project for people experiencing mental ill health at two NHS Mental Health Recovery Centres.

Alexa’s work has been widely shown internationally in festivals such as: FILE, SESI Art Gallery, Sao Paolo, Brazil; DaDaFest International, Liverpool, UK, International Women Artists’ Biennale, Incheon, Korea and Athens Photo Festival, Benaki Museum, Athens. Examples of solo exhibitions include: Toronto Photographers Workshop, Canada; Experimental Arts Foundation, Adelaide, Australia and the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh. Alexa has works in a number of public collections, including the Victoria and Albert Museum, London; The Wellcome Trust and various Universities. 

Fluid Motion is a mental health theatre company based in Basingstoke, Hampshire. We create performances on a wide range of mental health themes as well as delivering education and community work. 

The company was founded in 2010 by Leigh Johnstone and Ali Gill who wanted to use theatre to help express their own experiences of poor mental health. Their vision was to use the arts as a tool for helping open up the conversation around mental health, challenge the stigma and improve wellbeing.

We make theatre that puts human experience front and centre.

Using our distinctive autobiographical style our performances are playful, energetic and thought provoking. We shine a stage light on mental health. We work in communities to provide meaningful arts experiences that give local people a voice. We provide 

opportunities for children and young people to express themselves through the arts.

​

Ali specialises in Psychosocial approaches to Health, Arts Health and Wellbeing, Mind and Body connection, Arts and Patient storytelling, Health Inequalities and Arts in Medical Education.

 She is also a Visual Artist and Researcher on cross-disciplinary arts, health and medicine research projects at institutions such as King’s College London and UCL, exploring the use of the arts with patients with long term conditions and as a tool for developing interventions around child mental health and resilience. She has many years experience designing and facilitating arts and wellbeing interventions in day centres, care homes, schools and in the community, as well as in clinical settings in in-patient units at Great Ormond Street and Homerton Hospitals.

Ali also has experience of running workshops to develop creative thinking with researchers, data scientists and teaching staff at institutions such as Queen Mary’s University London and Wellcome Centre for Interventional and Surgical Sciences at UCL.

She has NHS clinical experience as a Health Engagement worker in General Practice at Wellsbourne CIC in Brighton and as an Assistant Psychologist in Dementia research at Royal Sussex County Hospital.

 Ali has a BA in Psychology and Philosophy from the University of Sheffield and in 2021 is embarking on training as a BACP accredited counsellor.

Alicia Gradon is a practising artist and art educator. Her work specialises in drawing and writing and exploring the stories within the natural world. Alicia endeavours to cultivate an understanding of the interconnected relationship between our wellbeing, nature and its preservation.

Amal Lad has made a career out of exploring the intersection between art and medicine. His ability to reveal the connection between music and well-being has been recognised by the BBC and TEDxNHS, as well as countless listeners around the globe. 

Amal released his debut EP ‘Complex Simplicities’ in 2012 and was featured by Bobby Friction on BBC Introducing. Praised for his impressive guitar performances, the EP showcased the emotionally compelling style that would come to define Amal’s sound. He followed this up by branching out into composing for film and spoken word, collaborating with award-winning artists from cultures around the world to celebrate a shared humanity.

“Fight or Flight” is an auditory journey through the human heart and a musical interpretation of the effect of adrenaline on the body.  The track was born out of a break between study sessions in medical school when Amal recorded his own heartbeat and tried to use it in his own music productions. Amal was invited to perform the track on the TEDxNHS stage in 2018 as part of his talk “If you have a heart, you’re making beats”.

His music is influenced by legends including Carlos Santana, Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page as well as Eastern sounds from AR Rahman, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and Ravi Shankar.

Currently, Amal is preparing the release of new experimental music, while continuing his work in medicine and exploring music as a tool for therapy. 

Amanda spent many years as a recording & performing artist, community music teacher, hospital performer, and private tutor for an adolescent with significant learning difficulties along side her career in marketing & communications.

Pursuing her interest in the clinical application of music and song writing, Amanda completed a music therapy masters course at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama, and has trained in Neurologic Music Therapy. She specialises in the areas of language and communications, socio/emotional support, and neuro-disability.

Broadly speaking a street-based fine art photographer.   For me, photography is a quiet, exploratory, instinctive, therapeutic and largely uplifting activity, it can remind me of what is beautiful, wonderful, funny, and interesting in the world.

With a practice that intersects performance, installation, healing & participation, I create works in a multitude of forms & contexts. At once playful & rigorous, I’m interested in the possibility of change & in providing space to creative actions that can help release & restore.

I have over 15yrs experience devising & facilitating process-led projects with diverse communities across ages & backgrounds in challenging research, process & presentation. E.g. in my work THE FUTURE OF DEATH, 40 people (4-93yrs) bury each-other with earth following a residency in Palliative care & workshops with performer-participants on ‘letting go’ https://vimeo.com/6107950

My work has been commissioned & presented at leading national & international venues including: Whitechapel Gallery, Royal Opera House, ICA, LIFT, The Place, Tate Modern, Lillian Bayliss (London), as well as in Spain, Italy, Israel, France, Germany, Slovenia, S.Africa & Austria. 

I have been visiting lecturer at University of the Arts (costume/design), mentor at Royal Central School of Speech & Drama (performance), workshop facilitator at Kingston & Coventry University (Architecture/Dance) & Drama Therapist at Saint Stephens School (Rome).  In April 2020 I devised & facilitated online creative workshops for clients at Coventry Refugee & Migrant Centre in partnership with Dancing Bodies in Coventry City.

\"London based contemporary artist, Ashley of the Sungai (b. 1996) explores the notion of colour and materials to express his emotional narrative. The methodology behind his chaotic practice is intertwined by subtle metaphors that reflect on humanity, often referring to observations and interactions. Crude compositions of textures and layers not only emulates one’s imperfectly perfect existence; but also defines the fragility of the human psyche.\"

Augusta Sparks Farnum founded Arts in Health: First Aid Art Kit in partnership with Providence St. Mary Hospital, and Providence St. Mary Foundation in response to COVID-19, in Walla Walla, Washington. She is currently attending the graduate Arts in Medicine program at the University of Florida. Augusta Sparks a multidisciplinary artist, and fifth generation photographer. She is represented by Studio Two Zero Two in Walla Walla, Washington.  Recent residency awards and invites include Lynda Benglis’s Boca De Chorro in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and Annex Arts in Castine, Maine