Putting ‘memories to work’

The imagery, titled 'Memories at Work', was part of the South Australian Living Artists (SALA) Festival in August 2014 and recently won COTA's Every Generation Creative Arts Awards. It showcased the meaningful life experiences of a cross section of South Australia's Resthaven Community Respite Services clients.

Carole Matthews, Resthaven Community Respite Services manager, says the award is for the team's ‘Memories at Work’ photographs, that showcase older people in their previous work settings, with a short profile of each person to provide the context of their photograph.

“The images highlight the diversity, resilience and wisdom of their generation, and illustrate how those older members of our community laid solid foundations for future generations,” Ms Matthews says.

“Hearing the stories about people’s lives highlighted their strength of character and creativity. Participants enjoyed seeing their photographs and sharing their life journey during the public exhibition, which was held at our local Cafe Finniss, in August,” she says.

The exhibition was such a success, that Resthaven have continued to exhibit the photographs at Resthaven’s free information centre, Agedcare Alternatives, at 1/445 Fullarton Road, Highgate.

Richard Hearn, Resthaven chief executive, congraulates Ms Matthews, her team and clients for the exhibition depicting the life stories of clients with memory loss and their sharing of some most interesting contributions and experiences over the years.

“Congratulations also to Judy McKenzie, who was presented with the Every Generation Physical Activity Award by Resthaven deputy board president, Lee Sando,” Mr Hearn says.

“Ms McKenzie is a very worthy recipient of this award. She is a Master Chi Ball instructor for Active Ageing Australia and has run keep fit classes since retiring from teaching 14 years ago. She is inspirational,” he says.

Ms McKenzie was nominated as a consumer representative at the University of Adelaide’s Geriatrics Training and Research in Aged Care (G-TRAC) Centre, located at Resthaven’s Paradise campus.

G-TRAC received a certificate of High Commendation in the Every Generation Intergenerational Award, for its work in offering medical students real life experiences in working with older people.

G-TRAC Centre coordinator, Rosie Bonnin, accepted the certificate from South Australian Minister for Ageing, Zoe Bettison.