A GIFT OF HOPE

In collaboration with Hospital Rooms and the NHS, A Gift of Hope is a site-specific mural created by Ken Nwadiogbu for the family room at Hellesdon Hospital, a mental health facility in Norwich, UK. Part of a wider initiative to transform clinical environments into spaces of beauty, healing, and connection, this work embodies the quiet, powerful belief that art can offer comfort where it’s needed most.

The mural features a radiant yellow hand offering an orange lotus flower. The gesture is both simple and profound: a symbol of care extended, of new beginnings unfolding. Rendered in acrylic, the hand glows against the room’s walls, offering a moment of brightness to patients, visitors, and families navigating complex emotional journeys.

As part of the project, Nwadiogbu also led therapeutic art workshops at Hellesdon Hospital and the Sainsbury Centre in Norwich. Working with patients, he invited them to paint on cardboard, each panel a reflection of personal memory, favorite patterns, or everyday objects of comfort. These painted cardboards, when folded, formed a box, echoing Nwadiogbu’s recurring motif of containers filled with stories, dreams, and survival.

Through shared creativity, the workshops offered more than art-making, they opened space for expression and joy. They reinforced the idea that even in settings often marked by silence or struggle, art can make room for hope.

Created in partnership with Hospital Rooms and the NHS.
With heartfelt thanks to the Hellesdon Hospital staff for their support and care throughout the project.