A photography exhibition to mark the 75th anniversary of the NHS, of photos taken by NHS staff and volunteers has opened at the Fujifilm shop in Covent Garden.
The display is a shortlist of 75 photos from a competition run by NHS England and Fujifilm to capture moments from the NHS over the past few years, and there’s also highlighted the winners from each of the categories.
The winners include a portrait of a nurse at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital who has been looking after patients for 47 years. Nurse Emmanuel Espiritu took the image, entitled ‘Dedication’, to take the prize for the Our People category and depicts a nurse named ‘Mother Obe’ who is renowned for sharing nearly half a century of expertise as a mentor to new nurses.
The winner of the Our Innovations category, ‘The Solution’ by senior pharmacist Wasim Baqir, was taken on Christmas Eve 2020 during one of his shifts at an NHS COVID-19 vaccination clinic in Northumbria and shows hundreds of used vaccine vials in an orange sharps bin.
It’s a photo that’s both medical, but thanks to the lighting and contents almost looks abstract.
Paramedic Joe Cartwright’s photograph of an ambulance battling snowy conditions as the Beast from the East hit the UK won the Our Environment category, and the contrast between the colours of the ambulance and the monochrome landscape caused by the snowfall is striking.
As a collection, there’s a lot of human emotion in many of the photos, even the ones focusing on the pandemic. I particularly liked the gallows humour in the red-zone photo of nurses trying to escape as if in a horror movie.
There’s also a section where you can take your own photo and add it to a wall of messages for the NHS.
The exhibition, Our NHS at 75 is in the Fujifilm House of Photography on Long Acre until 31st August 2023.
It’s free to visit and open Mon-Wed 11am-7pm, Thurs-Sat 11am -8pm, Sun 12-6pm.
You can find it in the first floor gallery, just up the stairs as you go into the shop.
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