Dartmouth Health’s Geriatric Center of Excellence Aging Resource Center celebrated the opening of Portraits of Joy on July 28, bringing together health system leaders, community members, and participants featured in the exhibit.
The exhibit, a collaboration between the Aging Resource Center and Dartmouth College’s Department of Studio Art, features portraits of nine community members captured by five Dartmouth students. Each participant selected a meaningful object representing what brings them joy and shared its significance during one-on-one conversations with the student photographers. Those conversations helped shape portraits designed to reflect each person’s unique story.
The project was conceived by Jason Page, a program specialist at the Aging Resource Center, who drew inspiration from previous intergenerational programming he developed.
“The interview process gave the students an opportunity to get to know the older adult participants on a personal level, something that often does not occur during a typical photography session,” said Page. “Those conversations helped guide the artistic direction of each portrait, allowing the students to create photographs that reflected the stories, personalities, and experiences shared during the interviews.”
The Aging Resource Center has increasingly emphasized arts programming and intergenerational engagement as part of its mission to support healthy aging.
“The first principle of an age-friendly health system is understanding what matters most to each older adult. That, in part, is what really sparked this exhibit. Students engaging with older adults about what matters most,” said Ellen Flaherty, PhD, AGSF, APRN, vice president of the Dartmouth Health Geriatric Center of Excellence. “We come with such gratitude for the participation of the older adults, the Department of Studio Art and the students that participated.”
While it was an opportunity for engagement with older adults, the project also served as a learning experience for the Dartmouth students.
“I find these days that students have a fear of leaving their inner circle and approaching someone they might not know,” said Dillon Roberts, photography and digital imaging specialist at Dartmouth. “It also takes a lot of courage for a participant to trust a photographer to interpret a sitting with one photograph. So, we really appreciate it.”
The exhibit will remain on display at the Aging Resource Center, located at 444 Mt. Support Road in Lebanon until September 14. Dartmouth Health and Dartmouth College are exploring opportunities to continue and expand the collaboration in the future.
About Dartmouth Health
Dartmouth Health, New Hampshire’s only academic health system and largest private employer, serves patients across New England. Dartmouth Health provides access to more than 2,300 providers in nearly every area of medicine, delivering care at its flagship hospital, Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center (DHMC) in Lebanon, NH. Its network of hospitals, outpatient centers, clinics and home care facilities, spans a broad geographical area. Year after year, DHMC is named the #1 hospital in New Hampshire by U.S. News & World Report, and is consistently recognized for high performance in numerous clinical specialties and procedures. Dartmouth Health includes Dartmouth Cancer Center, northern New England’s only National Cancer Institute-designated Comprehensive Cancer Centers and one of less than than 60 total nationally; Dartmouth Health Children’s, which includes the state’s only children’s hospital (Children’s Hospital at DHMC/CHaD) and more than 20 locations around the region; eight member hospitals in Lebanon, Keene, Claremont, Hampstead, and New London, NH, and Windsor and Bennington, VT; Dartmouth Health Home Care; Dartmouth Health Connected Care Center for Telehealth, serving patients as far away as Texas; and more than 30 primary and multi-specialty clinics across New Hampshire and Vermont. Through its partnership with Dartmouth College, Dartmouth’s Geisel School of Medicine and the White River Junction VA Medical Center, Dartmouth Health trains nearly 400 medical residents and fellows annually and performs cutting-edge research and clinical trials with international impact. Dartmouth Health and its more than 16,000 employees are committed to serving the healthcare needs of everyone in the communities it serves and to providing every patient with exceptional, state-of-the-art, personalized care. Learn more at dartmouth-health.org.