Shropshire Star

Nurse who painted dozens of NHS worker portraits ‘thrilled’ with medal

Wendy Kimberley, who normally paints landscapes, said she is ‘so proud’ to be part of the NHS.

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Ann Limb is a recipient on the Queen's Birthday Honours list 2022

A community nurse who painted more than 60 portraits of NHS workers during the pandemic said she is “absolutely amazed” to have been awarded a British Empire Medal.

Wendy Kimberley, 54, from Norwich, is named on the Queen’s Birthday Honour list after being recognised for her charitable services to the NHS through the Portraits for Heroes Initiative during the Covid-19 outbreak.

She spent late nights and weekends in her back garden art studio painting dozens of workers from photographs she was sent.

Ms Kimberley said she feared the letter about her award, marked with “On Her Majesty’s Service”, was a parking ticket and thought it was a joke when she opened it.

Wendy Kimberley who has been named on the Queen's Birthday Honours list
Wendy Kimberley (Joe Giddens/PA)

“When I did sort of finally realise it was official I was absolutely amazed. So, so thrilled at receiving it, really honoured and thrilled,” she told the PA news agency.

Ms Kimberley, who was a hairdresser and beautician before training as a nurse after being diagnosed with thyroid cancer, said she is “so proud” to be part of the NHS.

She said she is “super excited” about the award but feels a bit of a fraud as “it was such a pleasure” to paint the portraits.

“I feel it’s sort of, like, for all of the NHS really. I just love it,” she said.

The artistic nurse, who normally paints landscapes, said she wants to thank the NHS staff who allowed her to paint them.

“It was a privilege to be able to share their stories and raise the profile of (the) NHS and its amazing staff,” she said.

Ms Kimberley, a band six community nurse and caseload manager with the frail and elderly care team at the Norfolk Community and Health Care NHS Trust, added: “It was just incredibly humbling and very rewarding to do.”

Ms Kimberley said the first portrait she did was of her daughter, who was a doctor at a local hospital at the time.

(PA Graphics)

“She sent me a photo and she looked really fearful. It was her first Covid patient. And I thought ‘Oh my goodness’,” she said, adding that the image stuck in her head.

It was after this that she joined in with Tom Croft’s #portraitsfornhsheroes initiative and painted dozens more portraits of NHS workers from around the UK, including people who worked in catering, as well as GPs and nurses.

“All these really uplifting amazing stories and I got to paint them and highlight what people were doing and it was really lovely,” she said.

Ms Kimberley said that at one point she was painting a portrait every other day while working at the same time.

“But it really helped me, as well. It really helped me feel that I was doing something to help my colleagues in the hospital,” she said, adding that she felt she was helping raise people’s morale.

The portraits were all sent to the individual workers and Ms Kimberley found their reactions “really moving”.

She said she has had some “lovely feedback”, adding: “People loved them. A lot of people said they were like a memento… because you don’t realise you’re working through a big historic event at the time, do you?

“And I think people just appreciated having that memento of it almost to say, ‘Yes, I was here and I did this’.”

Reflecting on the award, Ms Kimberley said: “It’s lovely. I’m thrilled, I’m honoured. I’m very proud to work for the NHS because I started work in my 40s for the NHS.

“I retrained because I used to be a hairdresser and beautician and then I had cancer.

“And I was treated really well – I had thyroid cancer – treated really well by the NHS.

“So I retrained to be a nurse and I’m just… I know it’s really difficult, it’s really challenging at the moment, but I’m just so proud to be part of it.”

Ms Kimberley praised her “brilliant” colleagues and said everyone seems to “go the extra mile” and “do their best”.

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