Margaret Ambridge

Under the radar

Early in my career I meet a man who, following an operation, had not long to live. Professionally there was no more I could do for him; as a young physiotherapist I had nothing left to offer. When he understood this he asked if I would peel him an orange; each day for his final few days, that’s what I did.

Reflecting on my experience I approached friends and colleagues interviewing ten of them about the patients they will never forget.  What made those people and those experiences so powerfully memorable?

I hope their responses open a little window into the world of those who work in palliative care. While we must remain professional, we are human too, and cannot help but be affected by the people we meet and the work that we do.

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Memento mori

This is the final image drawn for Under the radar.

The idea was to document the life of the drawing from start to finish, and simultaneously to follow the slow decay of a bunch of roses such as we commonly see at a bedside.

The life history of the drawing sits archaeologically below the layer you see having at one point been the ‘perfect bunch of flowers’.

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Memento mori - life span

Whilst drawing Menento mori I also photographed it 1,225 times.

These 210 frames are snap shots of the life span of the drawing. It’s a family album if you will, beginning with birth, the endless opportunity of the blank page, to the final accretion of a life etched into the very substance of that which lived it.

But like any family album, it is just one small view of a life. The endless array of other moments, had they been seen, had they been recorded, may have looked similar, but they were unique, and without them the final image wouldn’t be what it is.