What is care? And what does it look like?
Co-creating the Images of Care exhibition.
by Nichole Fernández
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Nichole Fernández is a Research Fellow at the Advanced Care Research Centre
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When you hear the word “care,” what images come to mind? Perhaps you think of hospital rooms, care homes, or the clearly defined roles of caregivers and care recipients.
Our research, conducted on images of care and later life in the news media during COVID found that the media portray care and aging in conventional, often limiting, ways. Media representations were found to focus on care as transactional, formal, and medical. At the same time, familial care, and the care provided by older adults, was overlooked. Those receiving care are shown alone with little acknowledgment of their personhood beyond their care needs.
Two important insights emerged from our media analysis. First, we recognised the need to include older adults in research to gain a greater understanding of how older adults themselves visualise care in their lives. Second, we felt it was necessary to produce a response to the overwhelmingly negative media representation of care. From this, the Images of Care exhibition was born, developed out of extensive participatory research with the desire to show a more balanced view of care in later life. The exhibition challenges media stereotypes by inviting viewers to see care through the eyes of older adults.
Developing an Exhibition Through Research
Following our initial media analysis, we began a participatory photography project with 15 older adults with a range of both care needs and responsibilities. These participants were asked to capture moments of care in their daily lives for 7-10 days. Using a research method called photo elicitation, participants were then interviewed to discuss the meaning behind their images and to reflect on their personal definitions of care.
The images participants produced sit in contrast to our media analysis. Rather than clinical settings or traditional caregiving roles, they depicted personal, often mundane moments —chores, inanimate objects, and everyday spaces. These images of care offered profound insight into the realities of care, emphasising the relational and emotional aspects often overlooked by media portrayals.
One participant, Mary, is an informal carer for both her partner and her parents. In this project she took photographs of the things she did while caring for others and for herself (Figure 1). She describes how care resides not in the large care events that occur in hospitals or care homes but in mundane, everyday tasks:
“Some of the stuff that you need to do when you’re supporting somebody as a carer is a bit boring and routine or frustrating or time-consuming or repetitive, like washing dishes, waiting on the phone, queuing at the pharmacy, you know?”
The mundane and challenging aspects of giving and receiving care were simultaneously discussed by participants. Care was rewarding, it built relationships, but it remained deeply emotional. As Mary commented on her images of care:
“I guess when you think about how care might be depicted on the news, […], a very obviously cared for person and a caregiver. I think that’s maybe what I expected in a way images of care to look like. […] my images probably feel more impersonal or some of them certainly maybe feel a bit uninteresting or mundane, you know? Certainly, buses and dishes and boilers are not very exciting or emotive at all. But some of the images for me are emotive”
Figure 1. All the photos Mary took during the photography project.
After our initial analysis we used the development of an exhibition as a way to co-analyse the images and stories with participants. In collaboration with six of the participants, we co-created an exhibition that became a meaningful way to analyse and interpret the experiences of older adults, ensuring that their voices were central to the narrative being created.
The Exhibition
The Images of Care exhibition showcases all 170 images captured during the participatory photography project. The images are paired with text written by the participants and excerpts from their interviews which offer a nuanced view of care that is often missing from mainstream media.
Participants wanted the exhibition to show their perspective, to “represent real people and situations”. This was not just in reaction to reductive media representations, but it came from reflecting on all the images together and how they felt these images were very personal to each participant. When preparing for our first exhibition planning meeting with participants, we naively assumed they might want their personal stories more removed from such a public platform. But we quickly understood how wrong we were when being told directly that “Telling personal stories would make us proud”. In our media research we found that not only do participants feel like the media does not represent them fairly but they that they often feel invisible. It was therefore important to participants that this exhibition act as an opportunity to be seen.
Figure 2. Exhibition panel showcasing Robert’s story.
As a result of these conversations on visibility, we decided that the exhibition would focus on telling the stories of 4 participants (Figure 2). The text was written by the participant whose story was being told alongside quotes from their interview. Participants also wanted to make sure that every participant and their images were represented. So along with the 4 personal stories the exhibition also includes a collage of all the photographs taken in the project and quotes from various participants. At the end of the exhibition there is an interactive panel where visitors have added drawings of what care looks like in their lives (Figure 3).
Figure 3. Interactive exhibition panel.
The exhibition challenges us to reconsider our assumptions about care and broaden our definition of what care is. It invites the viewer to see care through the eyes of older adults, offering a fresh perspective that breaks away from the media images we are used to seeing. The images blur the lines between caregiver and care receiver, revealing care as a reciprocal, ongoing process that involves everyone. By placing ourselves within these images, we are encouraged to think about the role care plays in our own lives, and in the lives of those around us.
Why Broaden Our Definition of Care?
The exhibition raises important questions about how we define care. Participants in the project grappled with these questions themselves, expanding their definitions to include the everyday, often mundane acts of care. This expanded definition challenges the stereotypes that care is unidirectional, largely formal, and only related to health.
Mundane does not mean meaningless. On the contrary, as seen in the example of Mary’s images, the images evoke meaningful stories of care. They show that care is complex and emotionally layered, and that it gives value to the lives of older adults, reflecting the diversity and richness of their experiences. By broadening our definition of care, we acknowledge the full spectrum of care activities in our lives and the numerous informal and formal relationships that are necessary, maintained, and sustained through care.
This broader definition of care also aligns with theories of the feminist ethic of care, which emphasize this relational nature of care and its importance for full participation in society. It challenges power imbalances in care relationships and argues that care is not just a personal responsibility, but a social one. The exhibition gives voice to the often-ignored daily care work that is crucial to people’s lives, work that is both rewarding and difficult, personal and universal.
Visit the Images of Care Exhibition
The exhibition continues to be shown throughout Edinburgh and beyond. You can see it on Doors Open Day on September 28th from 10.00-16.00 at the Usher Building. We will also be showing the exhibition as part of the event ‘Can AI Represent Care?’ at the Festival of Social Sciences and the Being Human Festival in November. You can find more information on those events and future exhibitions on the Images of Care webpage.
Images of Care research project is part of University of Edinburgh’s Advanced Care Research Centre (ACRC). This research was funded by the Legal & General Group (research grant to establish the independent Advanced Care Research Centre at University of Edinburgh). The funder had no role in conduct of the study, interpretation or the decision to submit the blog for publication. The views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily those of Legal & General.