Santa Clara Valley Medical Center

Like A Multivitamin

Artist Leah Rosenberg

Transforms Hospital Wing Through Color

Written by Nathan Zanon Photography by Airyka Rockefeller

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Apublic hospital may not be the first place one thinks of when considering spaces that need art, but when Santa Clara Valley Medical Center underwent a recent major construction project, administrators there found themselves in need of some creative touches. Originally built in the 1990s as a general hospital facility, the new construction and expansion of the hospital gave them an opportunity to repurpose the older building into the Women and Children’s Center, which houses departments such as pediatrics, labor and delivery, the mother and baby center, and the neonatal intensive care unit. But this required reimagining the look and feel of the space, from a more sterile environment to a welcoming one that would accommodate the needs of new parents, children, and families in need of care and support. In short, it required some art. Chief Operating Officer Michael Elliott at the Valley Medical Center (VMC) Foundation describes the origins of the plan: “Our role [at the VMC Foundation] is to partner with the hospital and raise funds in the community to do all kinds of projects. Sometimes it’s securing funding for a piece of medical equipment or technology, or to fund a research project or a clinical trial, or to innovate some new model of care. But a lot of what we also think about is the patient and the staff experience, and that’s really important to us as we think about what will keep our public hospital systems strong. And it turns out that the physical environment of a hospital is really important to the overall healing environment. You really want to put the patient at the center. You want to create a physical environment that is healing, that is welcoming, and that is appealing.” The courtyard on the third floor of the building was identified as an area in need of some help. “Its aesthetic was quite stark and severe,” says Elliott. “So we looked at that space [and we asked]... how do we make this space more alive? How do we transform it?” Enter artist Leah Rosenberg, whose work in color can be found at the San Francisco International Airport, at Ghirardelli Square, in the offices at Facebook, and in cafes, businesses, and public spaces around California and as far away as Hamburg, Germany. “I am a collector of color,” Rosenberg explains. “I use the medium to create a dialogue between viewer and artist, time and place.

Color is dynamic, subjective, and a vehicle for wild, alchemical imaginings.” Born in Michigan, Rosenberg grew up in Saskatoon,

Saskatchewan, “which is right in the middle of Canada (where we pronounce process PROH-cess),” she says. After studying art at the Emily Carr University of Art + Design in Vancouver, British

Columbia, she moved to San Francisco, where she earned an MFA at the California College of the Arts after writing her thesis on the artistic possibilities of cake.

In 2017 SVCreates received an NEA grant for an Artist Residency at the Santa Clara Valley Medical Center and partnered with the

Montalvo Arts Center and the VMC Foundation to select an artist who would embed themself in the hospital environs. Rosenberg was chosen for the project because of her past experience, including a fellowship at the Lucas Artists Residency Program at Montalvo Arts Center in 2012. Her relationship with Montalvo, along with a

partnership with SVCreates, helped secure the NEA grant for a new installation at Valley Medical that would deliver exactly what this stark-looking Women and Children’s Center needed. The piece she created is entitled Like a Multivitamin, a reference to the subtle but vital improvements in health that it is intended to deliver to those who encounter it. “I chose these colors for this installation for their healing properties and their connection to the surrounding landscape. Together, the palette can be considered a multivitamin: when encountered daily, it might make one feel better over time.” The work consists of various differently colored panels covering previously blank spaces, windows, and walls. Each color has been carefully considered by Rosenberg, with the intention of generating a range of positive emotional reactions. “You walk out [into the courtyard] and it’s just a breath of fresh air, and I think it really surprised and delighted everyone that’s seen it thus far,” says Elliott. “We think about the people that are in this building in a holistic sense and creating environments where people can find calm and joy—and a little bit of magic.” Just looking at the transformations the installation has brought speaks to the projects that that the VMC Foundation hopes to bring to the building in the future. “I learned that over one hundred languages are spoken by staff at Valley Medical Center,” recalls Rosenberg. “Experiences of the installation are bound to vary, but color is a universal language that welcomes multiple interpretations.” Relief is offered through a vibrant dose of color in a space where people are working, healing, and grieving—a multivitamin for their senses.

Also incorporated into the work are a series of haikus, printed as accompaniments to some of the color blocks. Rosenberg created these original poems as an alternative way to elicit what she describes as provocative, colorful images, images that offer a sense of a specific moment in time: a special event, a change of season, something that encourages one to pause, take notice and come to attention. “The courtyard, once grey and now imbued with color,

elicits emotions within us, helping to lift burden and stress, whether visiting once or returning daily.” Executive Director of Inpatient Nursing Sue Kehl sees the impact of Like A Multivitamin daily—not just on patients, but on the hospital staff. “The pop of color, the haikus, the beauty of the language... [it] has really added inspiration, respite, and a place for both our staff and our patients to heal, to have a moment of quiet, to have a moment of silence to eat their lunch in peace and beauty...and this has really brought that sense of beauty and inspiration in the middle of a big and busy hospital.” The color panels aren’t exclusively visible in the outdoor courtyard space: they shine through the angled windows to the interior of the building, so that those on the fourth and fifth floors can gaze down from above and those entering the lobby can look up from below. Those in the courtyard space can walk around the installation, sit in its glow, meditate on a single color at a time, or take the whole spectrum in at once. While the idea of the healing power of color might sound to some like New Age pseudoscience, the value for patients of a space that is comfortable is well-documented, and that extends to the placement of art that feels calming and relaxing. “This is not an interior decorating project,” Elliott stresses.

“There’s a lot of thought and care that goes into wanting to create an environment that is as positive and as healing as possible.

There’s real clinical value to that.” Patients that feel more at ease and more comfortable during their hospital stay get better faster, according to Elliott.

Rosenberg’s vision is a vivid one, filled with joy about the transformational beauty that will surround people who come into the space. “While people take a phone call or eat their lunch or have their weekly meetings or simply get outside to look up at the sky... the colors will be there playing off of one another, constantly in flux as the sun rises and sets, causing them to glow in the light and deepen in the shadows.” Maybe it will even make one’s lunch take on new flavor. C