Kay Simpson (she/they) works with shared histories of art, medicine and the modern world. In 2026 she completed a PhD at the University of Cambridge titled ‘Prescribing Colour: Cure, Care and Control in British Design and Medicine, 1870-1939’. This thesis is the first book-length critical history of therapeutic colour.

Her historical work informs an interest in the therapeutic arts and her own creative practice.

Texts

‘Whitewashing the Wards? Colour, Health, and Victorian Hospital Interiors‘, in Colour Matters: Exploring Chromatic Materialities in the Long Nineteenth Century (1798-1914), edited by Stefano Evangelista, Charlotte Ribeyrol, and Matthew Winterbottom (2026)
Upcoming 2027 article on Edwardian designer and ‘colour doctor’ Howard Kemp Prossor
Upcoming 2027 article on gendered histories of sick space interior design and nursing care

Projects

‘Tree of Enoch’ (mixed media collage) in Decomposition, edited by Victor Rees and Damian Walsh (2026)
Staying with Trouble art collective. We organised a self-titled exhibition at hARTSlane, London (7-8 February 2026)
Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival volunteer collective

Ongoing research/areas of interest

History of occupational therapy & the folk arts
Heritage, hauntings & the afterlife of defunct hospitals
Zines & DIY archival practice
Community arts programming

Kay Simpson

writer researcher artist