Alzheimer's as a gift

An hour of short films about dementia might not sound like a great evening out, but about 250 people thought otherwise. They packed into the Great Hall at the University of Bristol last night to watch seven films collected by local filmmaker James Murray-White. We then had a half hour panel discussion which could easily have gone on for much longer had time allowed.

The films were powerful and sometimes startling. The one that stayed with me most was a rough cut of a film called Thinking Outside the Box by Christeen Winford. Christeen had come all the way from Edinburgh for our films evening, which gave me a rare opportunity to compliment a director about her work. She had also provided a powerful drama called Darkness in the Afternoon, but Thinking Outside the Box was quite different.

In this film, an artist called Edward McLaughlin talks about the art he produced before he developed dementia and what he is producing now. The contrast is striking. He regards his earlier work as “engineering drawings”, though I saw plenty of life in the eyes of his subjects. Since his diagnosis, his art has become bolder and more abstract, filled with powerful colours and startling images. It seems that dementia has changed his perceptions of the world.

Edward is quoted as saying, “The thing I like about Alzheimer’s – and I do say like – is that if you have it, it’s normal to think outside the box. You can look at it as a gift or a curse. I choose to see it as a gift.”