Mid-shift
By Thomas Leveritt
© Thomas Leveritt
Thomas Leveritt gained an MA (Hons) in history from Cambridge University. His literary work won the Betty Trask Award for a first novel (2007) and the Somerset Maugham Award for literature (2008). Leveritt’s paintings have been seen in exhibitions including those of the Royal Society of Portrait Painters, winning the Carroll Medal in 2000 and was previously selected for the BP Portrait Award in 1999, 2000, 2007.
The portrait is of the artist’s friend Emily, a midwife at James Paget University Hospital, and her colleague, Funmi. At the time of painting, during winter 2019-20, the artist wanted to capture the effect of stress on individual health workers that was routine for a hospital within the National Health Service. Since the global Covid-19 pandemic, that pressure has increased exponentially.
