A couple of months ago, I popped into one of the venues for the Leytonstone Arts Trail, a visual arts festival held annually in Leytonstone, East London. A friend of mine ( techiebabe of this parish) was exhibiting there, and I wanted to see her photos of the North Circular, but I also enjoyed looking at the collections exhibited by the other photographers sharing the venue.
One of those photographers was Imogen May, who had two collections on show, Slow Down & Breathe, and Front Doors. (The top photo on this post is from the former collection, and the bottom one is from her front doors set on Flickr, both used by permission.)
Imogen has a progressive illness similar to muscular dystrophy, and due to recent emergency surgery has now lost the ability to speak. Although she's completed all but the final year of a photography degree, without a usable and effective communication aid she can neither continue her studies nor safely leave her house.
Thanks to a trial loan, she's managed to identify a suitable piece of equipment to help her communicate, but there is no NHS funding for this, and so she's asking for donations to help her buy one. She needs to raise £7000, and at the time of writing she has £628. I've just sent her a bit more — if you can spare anything, even if it's only a fiver, could you send something too? You can donate via Paypal or direct bank transfer, and details are at imogenmay.com.
Even if you can't spare the money, if you can think of somewhere suitable to publicise Imogen's website, or to link to this post or techiebabe's post, I'd really appreciate it. Communication is so important, and so easy to take for granted. |
