Talking Lines: Workshop, Screening and Panel Discussion

The drawing workshop will introduce and invite participants to make drawings which reflect on the Talking Lines research and collaborate on new ideas as to how line-making and drawing might enhance storytelling. The panel discussion will consider topics such as co-creation in the representation of illness, drawing in qualitative and clinical studies, tensions and opportunities for interdisciplinary working, as well as the function of ethics and aesthetics in drawing research.

Programme:

2 pm – 3 pm – Drawing workshop

3 .05 pm – 3.20 pm  – Screening of  short film Talking Lines

3.30 – 4.30 pm – Panel Discussion with Charlie Harrison, Dr Emma Harding, Sam Rossi-Harries and Jacquie Nunn

Visual artist Charlie Harrison lives and works between Lincolnshire and London. His artistic methods and conceptual understanding have been shaped through collaboration and interdisciplinary research alongside artists, curators, social scientists, neuropsychologists, motor-neuroscientists and people living with rare dementias. These collaborations have particularly focussed on the historical development, values and deficiencies of standardised testing methods and have led to novel social science and arts and health research funded by Wellcome Trust, University College London (UCL) and the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). Charlie also works as an arts and health consultant for UCL Dementia Research Centre (DRC), and for Rare Dementia Support (RDS), contributing to research, education, public and patient involvement and coordinating health and wellbeing projects alongside people living with rare dementias.

Dr Emma Harding is an Economic and Social Research Council-funded postdoctoral research fellow using qualitative, innovative and creative research methods to better understand the lived experiences and support needs of people affected by young onset, non-memory-led and inherited forms of dementia. Emma is also a trained counsellor and psychotherapist with interests in the therapeutic value of peer support groups and in the development and delivery of psychosocial interventions based on third-wave cognitive behavioural and narrative therapies to support people living with, at risk of, or caring for someone with these rarer forms of dementia.

Sam Rossi-Harries is a trainee systemic therapist and research assistant. His research primarily involves working alongside people affected by rare or younger-onset forms of dementia, while making use of qualitative and artistic methodologies. He is particularly interested in community psychology approaches and tries to bring this lens into all of his research practice. He also writes fiction in his spare time and this, alongside his interest in critical epistemologies, has led him towards an interest in applying narrative theory within a social science setting. He has an MSc in Psychology from the University of East London and is currently working towards completing an MA in Creative Writing at The University of Manchester. His research is funded by The National Brain Appeal (TNBA).

Jacqui Nunn’s professional background is in education. She was a teacher of English in Inner London Secondary schools before moving to the University of Roehampton where she trained new teachers on their PGCE course and finally spent time in the Department for Education advising on teacher education. In 2010 her husband Tony Wadling, a criminal barrister, was diagnosed with Young-onset Alzheimer’s disease and she became his full-time carer until his death in 2019. For both, being involved in art and making transformed the experience of living with dementia. Jacquie had always had an interest and making time for her own creativity which did wonders for her well-being in difficult times. As for Tony, who believed he ‘couldn’t draw’ drawing and painting became his means of self-expression and gave him confidence and self-esteem which added hugely to his quality of life. 

We would like to acknowledge the huge contribution of all the participants in this research as well as the wider Talking Lines team including Prof Mary Pat Sullivan, Nipissing University (Canada) and Prof Paul Camic, UCL.