I had the immense privilege of sharing my experience of working on a Lived Experience Creative Research project at the NCACE Festival of Cultural Knowledge Exchange, held between 20–24 April 2026.
I worked alongside Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust (NSFT), the charity Hospital Rooms and Norwich University of the Arts (NUA). In my role as an Artist Co-Researcher, I worked collaboratively within a ‘Lived Experience Team’ (LET). We discussed the code of conduct that had been created, drawing parallels with Co-production and lived experience engagement principles used by organisations like NSFT, NUA and the University of East Anglia (UEA). I spoke alongside Holly Sandiford, Dr Nicola Simpson and Megan Thrift. Other Artist Co-Researchers involved in the project included Mark Jennings, who created an album called Empty spaces full of people and pianos with live performance and Fenn Harris, who created paintings and worked on animations reflecting her experiences with the project. The three of us were the driving force on the design and curation of the cyanotype work and subsequent workshops, with Nicola and Holly facilitating.
Our code of conduct was based on three principles: safety, equality and inclusion.
The project involved two exhibitions - in the Fitzrovia chapel in London, and at the Hungate Church in Norwich. Our cyanotype work was presented as part of both exhibitions alongside the established Hospital Rooms artist’s work. Maquettes of the works that are situated at the Hellesdon Hospital in Norwich were used. The originals of these works can only be seen by patients, carers, visitors and staff in the secure wards themselves and surrounding grounds. We then documented it all visually, sonically and with spoken word to make the cyanotypes. Objects were salvaged including a piano from the social club that is now archived at NUA. We wanted to reflect on who would have inhabited these spaces, embodying our own experience and that of others. I asserted a physical embodying of the project by literally embodying one of the cyanotypes. The project generated a lot of qualitative alongside quantitative research through conversations, with a publication in the making...so keep an eye out for that!
We all have lived experience of being a patient in a mental health setting or needing support from services. We used those experiences as a driving force for creating site-specific work. We were all given equal status as Co-Researchers to give us equal power in decision making. We developed workshops and even presented our work to a live audience. Yes, we also all happened to have an art school education, however this was certainly not a requirement for the project. We had pastoral support from Joseph Geoge at The Participation Team at NSFT. I personally became involved in the project after I was contacted by Dr Sophie Bagge, who offered me an opportunity to participate in some creative workshops with the team. It proved to be a point of transmogrification for my creative practice and identity. It also brought a new sense of credibility to all our experiences as artists with lived experience, enough so that we are putting some of that lived experience to one side as we engage more primarily as Artist Co-Researchers in our next endeavour. How exciting!
I spoke to this sense of validation we reciprocate at the NCACE Festival, the principles in which we operate (safety, equality, inclusion) as we made sense of what we were doing as we went along as a team, with no one being left behind and nothing being done about us, without us. This is the true spirit of Co-production after all. We also kept true to the code of conduct and Co-production principles whilst the NCACE talk was happening. There was a sense of mutual empowerment and equal power from everyone to everyone in the room.
I learned so much about what I am capable of just by doing the talk with NCACE. I was able to prove myself in a public space after several years of separation from the artistic and academic community. I have an expertise that can now be recognised precisely because of projects like this, with a blueprint in the making for others to follow. This is a golden opportunity that should be a norm for others.
The trust bestowed to me by this project has given me strength in other professional arts-based spaces. We don't just have to rely on the artmaking itself, we can talk about and reflect on what art could mean for us and other people. We did exactly this when we visited the old and new hospital sites at Hellesdon in Norwich and we used that to make the Cyanotypes. We deliberately operate in a way that addresses the ego and works with perceived hierarchy, transgressions and triggers to process them through connection and kindness. The NCACE Festival was a vital opportunity to showcase our group connection and dynamic.
Embedding lived experience into projects from start to finish, from initial idea to post project publication, is an essential way of informing this emerging field of study. My insight alongside others with lived experience can be used to help shape academia in the Humanities and Arts as well as in Psychology. The workshop I created, speeches I have made, panels I have hosted, the site visits I have been on, the people I have met, and exhibition of the art I have created as part of a group... and now the talk with NCACE… they have all taught me to feel the fear and do it all anyway.
You can listen to And All Our Lived Experiences: Creating Co-Production, held as part of the NCACE Festival of Cultural Knowledge Exchange here.
Image credit: Jodie Rowe