A new RCN exhibition, Moved to Care: Stories of Nursing and Migration, highlights the long and often overlooked history of migrant nurses who have shaped UK health care.

Migration has always been central to nursing. From 19th-century military nurses deployed overseas to the international workforce that helped build the NHS, countless people have crossed borders to care for others.

The exhibition opens on 5 March at the RCN Library and Museum in London. It will run there for six months, before moving to Edinburgh.

Among the items on display is a doll and lunchbox carried by Jewish children who arrived in Britain during the Second World War. Many of these young refugees went on to train as nurses, strengthening the profession at a time of profound upheaval.

Another highlight is a large fabric banner created by artist Seleena Laverne Daye, The Journey We Made Across Land and Sea, To Build a Country Not Made For Me, which reflects on the often unseen labour of migrant workers in health care and other industries.

The exhibition also explores the role of nurses from the Windrush generation.

“These stories show the extraordinary resilience and creativity of nurses who have travelled across the world to care for others,” said Sarah Chaney, RCN Museum and Events Manager.

“By bringing together personal objects, artwork and lived experience, we hope visitors gain a deeper understanding of how migration continues to shape the profession.”

A new Arts Council England grant has also enabled us to expand the exhibition through the project A Balikbayan Box for Nursing.

Inspired by the Filipino custom of migrant workers sending boxes home as symbols of care and connection – known as Balikbayan boxes – the project brings together three writers and an artist in residence. Their work, created with migrant and refugee nurses, will happen over the exhibition’s six-month run and includes workshops for schoolchildren, young adults and refugee communities.

As part of the project, visitors will see Inside Home, a collaborative, large-scale textile installation created with migrant nurses by artist Haleema Aziz. Shaped like a Balikbayan Box packing crate, it invites audiences to consider what it means to build a sense of home while working far from where you began.

Writers in residence Romalyn Ante, Jennifer Wong and Christie Watson will be on site in April, May and June, engaging with the exhibition and visitors, and creating new work. They will lead three writing workshops engaging with the exhibition themes. One is for refugees and asylum seekers in London with the charity Fences and Frontiers; one for schoolchildren; and one for young adults.

A panel event in July will present the poetry and prose from their residencies and workshops to a public audience.

Across its objects, artwork and voices, Moved to Care shows how migration has shaped nursing, and how nursing staff, in turn, have shaped the country. The exhibition is on at RCN’s London headquarters and online, free of charge, until 2 September 2026, before its move to Edinburgh.

Image at top: Artist Haleema Aziz installing her Balikbayan box artwork