UCI Health’s New Medical Complex Promotes Healing Through Art and Nature

Lauren Harvey
2 hours ago
5 min read

UCI Health’s newest campus features 1,600 artworks that reflect the beauty of Southern California.

Detail of Santa Barbara artist Michele Janee’s “Uplifting” on display in the Irvine Chao Family Cancer Center at UCI Health in Irvine. Photo by Lauren Harvey, Culture OC

Orange County’s newest art gallery isn’t your typical exhibition space. In fact, it’s not a place where you’d typically look for art at all.

UCI Health’s new medical complex on Jamboree Road – which includes an all-electric acute care hospital that opened Dec. 10 – features 1,600 pieces of art, including 243 commissioned originals, by more than 200 mostly local artists across its three buildings. The county’s only academic health system aims to make patients, visitors and staff feel at home, with artwork depicting scenes that span from the Pacific Coast to Arizona and from Santa Barbara to the southern border.

The Joe C. Wen & Family Center for Advanced Care is the outpatient facility at the new UCI Health – Irvine medical complex. Photo courtesy of UCI Health

“If you can show people something that they’re familiar with, that they’re accustomed to, that is a vibe that they can understand, the connection for them helps them to stay calm,” senior project manager Ellen Khoudari told Culture OC. “It not only helps the patient. It’s tremendously important for our coworkers and our staff, because the stress level that they have these days is unfathomable.”

James Irvine Swinden, president of the former Irvine Museum (now the UCI Langson Orange County Museum of Art), chaired the committee tasked with overseeing the art initiative. Working with healthcare art consultant Aesthetics, Inc., the committee looked at about 3,000 artworks over the three-year process, Khoudari said.

Brea artist Jason Li’s “Marshland Symphony” greets visitors in the lobby of the Joe C. Wen & Family Center for Advanced Care at UCI Health in Irvine. Photo by Lauren Harvey, Culture OC

“There's not a program in the world that doesn't get what we call value engineered at some point in time, meaning when they start to crunch down the numbers and they have to save some money somewhere, it's the artwork that gets cut. (UCI Health president and CEO Chad Lefteris) never once asked me to cut the art,” Khoudari said. “Chad decided this was so important to be sure that our staff was taken care of all along the way.”

The central philosophy of the initiative is “nature and nurture,” Khoudari said. UCI Health encourages people to connect with nature, while also promoting healing through the power of art.

The art collection leans heavily into California Impressionism with its emphasis on capturing natural light and painting outdoors, or en plein air.

Costa Mesa artist Jeff Horn’s “Dawn of a New Day” on display in the acute care hospital at UCI Health in Irvine. Photo courtesy of UCI Health

Jeff Horn of Costa Mesa, whose painting “Dawn of a New Day” hangs in the acute care hospital, taught drawing and painting at Irvine Valley College for almost 30 years. During his last decade there, he started an outdoor painting class, which eventually grew into the Southern California Plein Air Painters Association, he said. In “Dawn of a New Day,” Horn depicts Crystal Cove State Park in Newport Beach.

“When I was first a high school student, (Crystal Cove) was called the Horse Ranch …. This entire area was denuded of plant life and animal life, other than the horses, and it was just a dust bowl when the Santa Anas would come through,” Horn said about his painting. “Through the state of California and the Park Service and the Irvine Foundation, this was all designated a state park, which is wonderful.”

Artists in the UCI Health collection celebrate Southern California’s beauty through a variety of media and subjects. In “Wave of Reflections,” Aliso Viejo artist Marcus A. Thesing portrays a shimmery rolling wave crafted from hand-blown glass. And in “Uplifting,” Santa Barbara’s Michele Janee makes use of abalone, mother of pearl and metal leaf to capture the ambient light of the ocean. And in “Marshland Symphony,” Brea’s Jason Li vividly captures the San Joaquin Marsh – located just outside the medical complex – on a late summer afternoon with just watercolor and paper.

Aliso Viejo artist Marcus A. Thesing’s “Wave of Reflections” on display in the Irvine Chao Family Cancer Center at UCI Health in Irvine. Photo by Lauren Harvey, Culture OC

Infection control remains a top priority of UCI Health, and this extends to the artwork on patient floors. Replicas of some paintings are printed on metal and displayed in plastic laminate frames sealed on all sides. That way, the paintings can withstand the hospital’s strict cleaning protocols.

As many of the floors in the acute care hospital are reserved for patients, staff and visitors, much of the artwork isn’t widely available to the public, but Khoudari wants to change that. She plans to eventually host two curated gallery shows a year for the local community to come observe the art. The events would also work as fundraisers to put money back into the art program. Additionally, UCI Health is planning to commission sculptures for the complex’s gardens.

“We’re really looking forward to doing something different on this property than most hospitals bring to the public,” Khoudari said. “Let us understand it’s a piece of our community as well. You can come here and enjoy yourself. You can come here and relax.”