In the Valley, Flowers Remain

In the Valley, Flowers Remain is a long term documentation of De Vallei ("The Valley"), a long-term psychiatric ward in the countryside in Belgium. De Vallei is home to 39 residents living with chronic psychosis, some of whom have spent most of their adult lives within psychiatric care. De Vallei is one of the few remaining long-term psychiatric wards in Belgium for people whose suffering cannot always be solved, cured, accelerated or optimised.

As the world is growing more complex, so is the need for complex care. Yet this form of long term care is dissapearing. Psychiatric reforms are focusing on more specialized, shorter and more "efficient" care. But we risk losing the ability to hold what is most complex. It raises the question how do we remain present for those who live with suffering that does not disappear.

De Vallei was looking for someone who could be a presence where absence was often felt. I entered the ward as myself: not from my background as a psychologist, not as a photographer. For almost two years, I tried to participate in daily life as fully as possible, moving from room to room, sharing coffee in the smoking room, walking to the nearest pond, picking flowers in the garden, singing in the hallway. Free from a strict clinical framework, connections could develop on their own terms. Over time, a shared reality emerged, from which images grew: sharing grief, shadows, light and flowers.

When I arrived, Patrick was the first person to welcome me. He has lived in De Vallei for more than thirthy-five years and, since 2024, I have walked alongside him through the woods behind the institution, following the paths he knows by heart.

The story of Patrick and so many others living in long-term psychiatric care reminds us that we need time and space to hold the most difficult questions together. At a moment when such spaces are increasingly disappearing, In the Valley, Flowers Remain shows another light: one where gentleness holds more than knowledge, and where vulnerability and resilience can live side by side.