‘Stilled Lives’, Kay Walsh

HS Projects commissioned ‘Stilled Lives’, a collaborative project between Kay Walsh and Core Arts. ‘Stilled Lives’ investigated the making of contemporary still life studies focussing on significant elements within daily life. Through this exploration of the unseen or unnoticed elements of individual lives of people dealing with mental illness, the image making became a ‘site’ for the expressions of human existence.

The participants were asked to make a series of images that pictured their environment, home, possessions, obsessions or interests to tell us who they are. This could be an object, a place, a glance or a gesture. The images selected for the exhibition included those by both volunteers and members of the Core Arts community and opened up a dialogue between the viewer and image maker and in doing so questioned some of the common preconceptions that surround mental health issues and the lives of the people that it affects.

‘Stilled Lives’ was funded by the Insight Community Arts Programme (2002 – 2015). The project ran from July to December 2008.