Art remains a vital part of Fox Chase Cancer Center’s culture. From the symbolic sculpture, The Diamond, greeting visitors outside the main entrance to the shiny little noses of the groundhogs standing at the summit of the cafeteria, Fox Chase is awash in artwork. On nearly every wall and along every corridor is a mix of paintings, sculptures, and historic pieces, some dating back to the early days of the American Oncologic Hospital.
In recent months, Fox Chase has begun implementing the Healing Visual Arts Program, a new strategy for displaying artwork across the Cancer Center. The goal is to use the best of Fox Chase’s art collection in a way that will both inspire and soothe those who experience it. The plan, developed by members of Campus Planning and Design in collaboration with the Art Committee, has entered its first phase, focusing on “The Loop,” the primary path staff and patients follow through the main campus.
“Fox Chase has a huge, somewhat incongruous collection of artwork, so we have worked for the last year to develop goals and objectives for how we should manage it,” said Allison Arnone, LEED AP, EDAC, Director of Campus Planning and Design for Temple University Health System. “Our approach is informed by current research that shows how art can have a healing impact upon visitors.”
The recently unveiled redesign of the Center Building’s main corridor, part of the first phase of the project, ought to lift the spirits of any Philadelphian, as it celebrates the architecture, art, and culture of the city and its citizens.
According to Arnone, the new artwork strategy is part of her team’s larger efforts in refurbishing and harmonizing the look and feel of Fox Chase’s campus and other facilities. Their overall work has sought to standardize office spaces, providing safer, more equitably distributed resources, while modernizing workspaces. Subsequent phases of the artwork project will extend first to patient spaces in Fox Chase waiting rooms and clinics, and then to staff and research areas. New and existing art, curated to delight and calm, Arnone says, will be displayed according to a deliberate strategy throughout Fox Chase.
The “Gallery” outside of the mezzanine of the Women’s Cancer Center will provide a space for rotating thematic displays from the Fox Chase archive as well as donor art that must remain onsite. In addition, the courtyard could, one day, be the home of a memorial display.
“The idea is to bring a cohesive look and feel across the campus and to network locations, which includes both signage and how artwork will be presented; you should be able to step into any of our buildings and say ‘this is Fox Chase,’” Arnone said. “This is one of our favorite projects, and our intent is to make our campus sing.”
Understanding the Fox Chase Collection
Over the last century, Fox Chase, the American Oncologic Hospital, and the Institute for Cancer Research, have amassed an impressive array of paintings, posters, historic artifacts, and sculptures. While some have been donated by employees and former patients, the origins of some pieces have been long forgotten.
Fox Chase’s Art Committee has worked with little to no resources over the years to curate and display the Center’s art collection. The Committee has been – and will remain – the voice of Fox Chase employees, consisting of volunteer staff, donors, patients, and senior leaders. Under the new strategy, the Art Committee will continue to serve in an important decision-making capacity, evaluating purchases, existing art, and donations.
“We have a sense of stewardship of our artwork and the value it brings to Fox Chase, which I believe carries through to this new strategy,” said Helen Gordon, CAVS, CPXP, Director of Volunteer Services at Fox Chase and Chair of the Art Committee. “However, we are now more empowered to dictate the terms of how we will accept art and how it will be displayed.”
It is no coincidence that the need for a new art strategy happened alongside the work of Campus Planning and Design in revitalizing spaces within Fox Chase facilities, says Gordon.
“There are simply no more places to hide artwork that we cannot display or that has fallen into disrepair,” Gordon explained, “so in many cases, we will seek to return some pieces back to the donors or their families, with our gratitude, or offer it for sale, providing employees the first opportunities to own a small part of our history.”
“We will have to be upfront with donors to let them know that we may not be able to display a piece in perpetuity, and provide an option for returning pieces to past donors,” Arnone explained.
In the future, the Art Committee will work with Institutional Advancement to develop agreements with donors that will provide a limited term for art to be displayed before it is returned or sold for the benefit of the Cancer Center. It can be a fine balance, Gordon says, as many pieces of art are of a memorial nature, reflecting the loss of someone who may have been a Fox Chase patient.
“We certainly want to be respectful of memorial art that comes to Fox Chase,” Gordon said, “but art can be subjective, so we want to balance that with the wellbeing of our patients.”
As Fox Chase President and CEO, Robert Uzzo, MD, MBA, FACS, discussed in the October Fox Chase Cancer Center Town Hall, patients entering the Center for the first time are often apprehensive of the uncertainty that comes with a cancer diagnosis. The new strategy will include space for more somber pieces of art but will emphasize art that celebrates life and joy.
Guidelines for Healing Art
As Arnone’s team explained in their strategy guidelines, there is real data to support the notion that art can have a calming, healing effect on viewers, particularly in a hospital setting. The Campus Planning and Design team have created a master vision of the “key aesthetics” that will vary depending on the situation.
“Through the Healing Visual Arts Program, we will use our artwork for an even greater purpose, namely creating positive distractions while avoiding imagery that might trigger negative responses,” said Kaitlyn Deberas, a project coordinator in Campus Planning and Design and lead designer of the art strategy. “We want to be deliberate in what we present to patients and their families, so we will avoid art that might, even symbolically, focus on death or feelings of isolation and loneliness.”
Entrances, for example, will display pieces that offer a colorful, welcoming feel to promote confidence. Waiting rooms, however, will focus on soothing landscapes, while clinical spaces will provide more abstract images that will engage the eyes of patients and perhaps allow their minds to drift to more comforting places. Meanwhile, staff areas will exhibit complex images and patterns, mostly derived from science and nature, to inspire.
Not only can art soothe and relax, it can also provide a sense of flow – or even guide traffic – says Deberas.
“The Center Building is a major highway and circulation path, so we have divided parts of ‘The Loop’ into lanes, so that people who want to look at certain pieces of art or history on the wall can stop without slowing traffic,” said Deberas. “Overall, the artwork along public corridors is designed to be pleasantly unengaging, encouraging people to continue moving through the space to their destination.”
Cutting Out Noise While Increasing the Signal
As much as cancer may be a confusing and dismaying diagnosis, a cancer center should be welcoming and easy to navigate.
In parallel with the new art strategy, Arnone and her team are working to develop new signage and digital wayfinding. Broadly, new digital signage could replace much of the framed, important notices that unfortunately tend to deliver more visual clutter than information. Items such as greetings, speaker or event announcements, educational opportunities, and a host of safety information will increasingly be designated to digital screens rather than taped to walls or hung up within frames. Accordingly, work is underway to draft a policy and a means of reviewing items for display.
“We want to help employees get the word out on items of importance, and digital signage will help keep everyone up to date while maintaining a welcoming space,” Arnone said.
A Vision for the Future
The Healing Visual Arts Program is designed to promote a sense of hope and healing. It also offers a viable solution to the main challenges of Fox Chase’s art collection, which includes an aging array of pieces with disparate purposes.
“We have a long history that demands respect, as it is part of who we are as Fox Chase,” Arnone said. “And the Healing Visual Arts Program will help us find a way to curate important pieces of art while refreshing both our collection and the overall look of the Cancer Center.”