NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue Unveils New Community Mural
The Community Mural Project is believed to be the country's largest public hospital mural program since the 1930s This is one of 3 new murals being created this year
Jul 30, 2025
NYC Health + Hospitals today unveiled a new mural as part of the Community Mural Project run by the health system’s Arts in Medicine department. The mural, Light and Compassion at NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue, was developed by artist Josh Sarantitis through a series of focus groups with community members, staff and patients and brought to life at a workshop where the community created cyanotypes together. Light and Compassion is one of 3 new murals being created this year, for a total of 45 murals created at NYC Health + Hospitals since 2019. The first wave of the Community Mural Project is featured in a book, Healing Walls: New York City Health + Hospitals Community Mural Project 2019-2021. This and other murals at NYC Health + Hospitals can be viewed on Bloomberg Connects. The Community Mural Project is made possible through the support of the Laurie M. Tisch Illumination Fund.
Light and Compassion channels the search for hope through compassionate care of self and others. The mural is the physical culmination of focused printmaking workshops with NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue staff, administrators and the public who experimented with the cyanotype process. Cyanotypes are one of the earliest photographic processes from the 19th century which create dynamic and fantastic blue impressions using the power of iron salts and UV light. The printing process was perfected by the botanist Anna Atkins, who created over 10,000 prints of plant life in the 1840’s.
Over 50 cyanotypes were created in the lobby of Bellevue Hospital’s H building – activating a space generally reserved for waiting patients and families. Sarantitis connected these images with written meditations on compassionate care produced by hospital staff and administrators. The addition of color with oil pastels evokes the process introduced to the cyanotype workshop participants – encouraging them to enjoy the flow of color which enhances the natural blue resulting from the cyanotype process. Light and Compassion is a visual narrative of the mural’s creation through its design, which celebrates moments of color, fluidity, and music within the silhouetted cyanotype leaves. The poem in the mural is based on one of the group writing sessions prompted by Sarantitis.
“NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue cares for some of the most vulnerable patients in New York,” said Rick Luftglass, Executive Director of the Laurie M. Tisch Illumination Fund. “It is both an anchor in the community and a national leader in integrating the arts into healthcare. Light and Compassion, Josh Sarantitis’ new mural—and the collaborative process behind it— helps to deepen community engagement as well as enhance patients’ experiences, and bring beauty and inspiration to the frontline staff and healthcare workers who face immense pressures every day. We’re proud to have helped make it possible.”
“The Community Mural Project continues to grow and include new and interesting installations to engage patients, families and staff,” said NYC Health + Hospitals Assistant Vice President of Arts in Medicine Larissa Trinder. “Artist Josh Sarantitis’ Light and Compassion brings together different mediums to create a unique and beautiful mural in a very public space. We have learned a great deal about how large scale works impact hospital environments and contribute to a more trustful and warm experience, and we are delighted to share this work with the Bellevue community.”
“This mural, developed by artist Josh Sarantitis in collaboration with members of the Bellevue Hospital community, is a reflection of the compassion, creativity, and resilience that epitomize our hospital’s almost 300-year history of innovation and care for all New Yorkers,” said NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue Chief Executive Officer Eric Wei, MD, MBA. “Through these kinds of collaborative and impactful projects, we recognize the healing power of art and reaffirm our commitment to providing care that nurtures both body and spirit. We are grateful to the Arts in Medicine department for spearheading this collaboration, and the Laurie M. Tisch Illumination Fund, whose visionary support for the Community Mural Project continues to inspire beauty and joy at Bellevue and throughout our public hospital system.”
“With Light and Compassion, Arts in Medicine and Bellevue Hospital are showing that the spirit of WPA muralism lives on in 2025,” said artist Josh Sarantitis. “During our last day of installation, nurses and families kept thanking us for providing both beauty and uplifting energy – in a way that profoundly redefines the lobby area.”
Josh Sarantitis is a visual artist who works in public spaces, creating art installations centered around transformation, the physical environment, identity, and beauty. For over 35 years, Sarantitis has worked with dozens of community arts organizations, arts commissions, universities, airports, schools, restorative justice programs, homeless shelters, recreation centers, libraries and municipalities in the creation of over 70 projects in 7 countries.
The Community Mural Project is believed to be the country’s largest public hospital mural program since the 1930s, when the depression-era Works Progress Administration (WPA) commissioned murals in public buildings, including virtually every hospital in New York City’s public healthcare system. The WPA murals were the start of NYC Health + Hospitals art collection, which now is the city’s largest public art collection and includes more than 7,000 pieces of art of multiple disciplines. The art collection is used to enhance the healthcare environment, inspire creativity, promote wellness, increase access to the arts, and engage staff.
The Community Mural Project creates opportunities for hospital staff to collaborate with each other and with neighbors, relieve stress, and enhance the physical environment of the facilities. Healthcare worker burnout is a national health crisis, and the continuing COVID-19 pandemic has created mental health challenges across New York City, especially in low-income, immigrant and historically excluded communities, which are significant patient populations for NYC Health + Hospitals.
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About NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue
NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue is America’s oldest public hospital, established in 1736. Affiliated with the NYU Grossman School of Medicine, the 851-bed hospital is a major referral center for highly complex cases, with 6,000 employees including highly skilled, interdisciplinary clinical staff. The hospital is a Level 1 Trauma Center and annually it sees about 103,000 emergency room visits, and more than 520,000 outpatient visits. Clinical centers of excellence include: Emergency Medicine and Trauma Care; Cardiovascular Services; Bariatric Surgery; Designated Regional Perinatal Center and Neonatal Intensive Care Unit; Children’s Comprehensive Psychiatric Emergency Program; and Cancer Services. For more information, visit www.nychealthandhospitals.org/bellevue and follow us on Facebook and X (Twitter).
About NYC Health + Hospitals’ Arts in Medicine Department
The Arts in Medicine department at NYC Health + Hospitals seeks to foster the emotional well-being and promote healing and wellness for all patients and their families, employees, and the greater community by utilizing the arts, including literary, visual, and performing arts throughout the health care system. In addition to managing the system’s significant visual arts collection, the Arts in Medicine department encourages evidenced based practices and provides technical assistance to all of the system’s health care facilities and clinics. This is accomplished by combining artistic innovation and education into a comprehensive health care continuum that supports the healing benefits of the arts. For more information, visit www.nychealthandhospitals.org/artsinmedicine/.
About NYC Health + Hospitals
NYC Health + Hospitals is the largest public health care system in the nation serving more than a million New Yorkers annually in more than 70 patient care locations across the city’s five boroughs. A robust network of outpatient, neighborhood-based primary and specialty care centers anchors care coordination with the system’s trauma centers, nursing homes, post-acute care centers, home care agency, and MetroPlus health plan—all supported by 11 essential hospitals. Its diverse workforce of more than 43,000 employees is uniquely focused on empowering New Yorkers, without exception, to live the healthiest life possible. For more information, visit www.nychealthandhospitals.org and stay connected on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn.
About the Laurie M. Tisch Illumination Fund
The Laurie M. Tisch Illumination Fund is a New York City-based foundation that aims to improve access and opportunity for all New Yorkers and foster healthy and vibrant communities. In 2018, the Illumination Fund launched Arts in Health, a multi-year initiative to support organizations utilizing the arts as a tool for healing and building understanding in communities across New York City. The initiative’s areas of focus are stigma, trauma and aging-related diseases as well as supporting organizations addressing mental health in communities disproportionately affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. In 2019 the Illumination Fund supported the creation of NYC Health + Hospitals Arts in Medicine department, expanding programs serving health care staff, patients, and communities in sites across the City. For more information, visit www.lmtif.org or follow @LMTischFund on Twitter.
