PATIENTS, visitors and staff at Colchester General Hospital will have a chance to influence an artwork being created to celebrate organ donation.

They will have an opportunity to say what they feel might be important in the artwork, which has been commissioned by the Organ Donation Committee of Colchester Hospital University NHS Foundation Trust.

It will consist of a wall mosaic about 20ft long created by artist Anne Schwegmann-Fielding and incorporate a short poem by Martin Newell, the Wivenhoe pop musician, singer, guitarist, songwriter, recording artist, poet and author.

On Friday Anne will in the corridor outside the restaurant at Colchester General Hospital between 11am and 2pm to talk informally with staff and the public about the project.

“It’s really important that this is not just an artwork because it really needs to convey a message about organ donation,” she said.

“That’s why I’m so keen for staff and members of the public to get input into both the design of the mosaic and the poem.

“For example, I want to open up a discussion with staff who might be involved in the transplant process, to see if there are particular words or phrases that may help spread the message.

“What would be the icing on the cake for me would be to meet the families of people who have donated organs or tissue.”

Anne, who has a garden studio in north Colchester, has seen letters from people who have been given donated organs or tissue to donor families, all of which begin with “Dear family”, which she believes would be a good starting-point for Martin Newell’s poem.

She is appealing for members of the public to donate items such as crockery, button, crystals, costume jewellery, coins and beach glass to be used in the mosaic. She will be collecting materials on Friday and have some samples of the type of items she needs.

People stopping to meet Anne will also have an opportunity to pick up information about how to join the NHS Organ Donor Register.

Her mosaic will celebrate coastal Essex, its rivers and estuaries and incorporate some of the features and wildlife of north east Essex. She is particularly looking for more blue material as well as souvenir plates and ornaments of the Essex Coast.

The finished piece will be installed on a corridor wall on the ground floor of the main building at Colchester General Hospital.

Members of the public have until May 13 to donate materials for the mosaic. They can be left at Firstsite, Colchester General Hospital (main reception), Essex County Hospital, Colchester (outpatient department), Clacton Hospital (outpatient reception), Harwich Hospital (main reception), Colchester Primary Care Centre (main reception), Tiptree Medical Centre (reception) and St Helena Hospice (Retail offices reception, Donation Centre, Angora Business Park, Peartree Road, Stanway).

Anne expects to start creating the mosaic later this month and will undertake some of the work as an “artist in residence” in a courtyard at Colchester General Hospital where members of the public and hospital staff can come along and see her in action.

It is anticipated that the finished artwork will be installed in the autumn.