The Waiting Room

The Waiting Room as an installation emerged from a year-long ‘Arts in Health and Wellbeing’ (Betsi Cadwaladr University Board) artist residency working with patients, carers and staff on the Alaw Ward (Cancer & Palliative Care Unit) in Ysbyty Gwynedd and the Rheumatology Clinics at Ysbyty Gwynedd and Ysbyty Llandudno, North Wales (2010-11). The artist Nichola Goff had a parallel artist residency working with patients affected by Renal conditions. During the course of the residency, McMillan spent his professional and personal time in hospitals; working with patients, and caring for his parents as patients, who would eventually die from heart related diseases in 2010 and 2011 respectively. He wondered whether this was a cruel coincidence or fate, and if he should continue with the residency.

After establishing relationships based on trust with patients on hospital wards incuding the chemotheraphy suite, McMillan visted them in their homes. There, he interviewed them in their living rooms, where the focus was not about their illness, but how they survived it, coping mechanisms, and their sense of mortality in some cases. Each patient was also asked to share a story about their most cherished living room object, which were then photographed.

The interviews were edited into short anonymous sound-bites, and along with images of their living room objects, were presented in photo albums and listened via headphones attached to CD players all placed within an antique mobile wooden sewing box, and located in respective Alaw Ward and Rheumatology Clinic waiting rooms. Whilst waiting for their appointments, patients could listen to the audio material whilst looking at corresponding images, which together served as metaphors for identities and lived experiences they could hopefully relate to. Some interviewees passed away towards the end of the residency, and their families were gifted audio-visual material related to their stories and cherished living room objects.

This material was eventually displayed in a living room installation as part the Stories and Journey exhibition with Nichola Goff at Gwynedd Museum & Art Gallery, Bangor, January – Februrary, 2012. McMillan subsequently produced two books, Yr Ystafell Aros (The Waiting Room): An audio-visual tale of an artist in residence at the Rheumatology Clinics at Ysbyty Gwynedd and Ysbyty Llandudno and …at the Alaw Ward (Cancer & Palliative Care Unit) in Ysbyty Gwynedd, which were were gifted to each of these hospital wards. He wrote in them that the residency was a carthartic experience that enabled me reflect on and celebrate my parent’s lives, their illnesses, deaths and funeral rites, which provided a means of healing during my bereavement.