Protest Update #1

After our feedback, we really stripped back the idea to focus on one main issue: face down restraint. As we all agreed after our showcasing of the protest that abstract work is less impressive and more confusing in a protest that will have viewers coming and going regularly, we first talked about how we could create our protest in the simplest, yet most interesting ways. As we were inspired by another group’s drumming on objects like bins to make an attention catching rhythm, we took from this to create a visual rhythm; one where the restraint, pulling up of a patient, and resetting of the cycle clearly follows an imaginary beat so that it reflects something clinical and robotic. Our idea was then fleshed out by having three doctors standing with their backs to three patients, both in horizontal rows with at least a 5 foot distance.

One of the people in our group discussed how her relative works in the mental health sector, and she herself has to use face down restraint; not because she wants to, but because the system set out in mental health care facilities leaves the staff with no other choice when a patient is threatening. Therefore, to show that we were sympathetic to workers who do not use the face down restraint inappropriately,  and that the fault lies in the system, which can be abused by some to restrain when it is clearly not the last solution, we decided that this clinical, fast paced beat of restrain, pull up, reset, would be carried out by the two doctors either side of the doctor in the middle. The doctor in the middle would have ‘A Doctor’ in black on the back of their medical coat, whilst the doctors either side would have the words ‘The System’ inscribed on their backs. Whilst the two doctors would be robotic and harsh in their restraining whilst their patients were clearly not causing any trouble, we contrasted this by having the doctor in the middle only go to restrain their patient when they begin to push and shove the other two patients. The patient would then push the doctor, and then be restrained, but afterwards be calmly helped to their feet and guided back to the ‘starting line’. This ‘Starting line’ would be present in relation to us securing a big banner saying ‘Coping’ to the tree behind the doctors - the idea being that these patients are trying to get to a place where they are able to cope with their mental health issues, and the inappropriate use of face down restraint isn’t cohesive with this plight. Therefore, these patients are set back in their treatment, or sent to the ‘starting line’. At the end of our session, however, we discovered that another group were planning to use the tree in question, and so our challenge for the next time we would devise was how to work around the lack of a big piece of ‘set’ in our piece, and how to convey the message without the use of a banner that would take a lot of time and funding to make. Additionally, how could we make our piece more attention grabbing? How could we enforce the idea that our protest is about the ‘inappropriate’ use of face down restraint, and the system, not the NHS staff?