Bradford Teaching Hospitals has unveiled its contribution to Positive Bradford’s celebration of everything good about the city.

The Foundation Trust commissioned nationally-acclaimed photographer, Ian Beesley, to capture Bradford free-runner Dwain Clarke around the city.

The artwork, entitled Upwards and Onwards also incorporates words of positivity by Yorkshire poet Ian McMillan and was unveiled by Foundation Trust chairman, David Richardson in the Horton Wing of St Luke’s Hospital.

Trust chief executive Miles Scott said: “We wanted to celebrate and support the work of Positive Bradford and as Ian is one of the area’s leading artists we thought he would be perfect in helping to capture the city’s positivity, vibrancy and people.”

Free-running is a form of acrobatics in which participants use landscapes to perform movements through its structures.

Mr Beesley came across the subject of his installation by chance.

He said: “I wanted to produce a series of images that reflected a different side of the city, its vibrancy, and its optimism whilst referencing its splendid heritage.

“Not the easiest thing to achieve, I struggled to develop a strong concept at first, until by sheer chance, one beautiful afternoon, I was walking past the Alhambra Theatre, when I noticed out of the corner of my eye a young man hurtling through the air, twisting, turning landing on his two feet and somersaulting away. He was followed by two other leaping somersaulting young men, who smiled as I looked on in admiration.”

He asked if he could capture the group’s leader, Dwain Clarke, and the pair arranged a day when he could return with his camera to capture him against Bradford’s iconic buildings.

After creating a sequence of seven images, which Mr Beesley called Upwards and Onwards, he asked his friend and poet Ian McMillan, to write a short poem to accompany his shots.

Mr McMillan’s poem is captured with a sentence to each of the images and has been printed on a banner 28 feet long and three feet high which installed in a waiting area in St Luke’s Hospital.

Co-founder of Positive Bradford, Jane Vincent, said: “When Bradford Teaching Hospitals said they would commission some art work for Positive Bradford day we were absolutely delighted, however when we saw the sheer brilliance of the work done by Ian Beesley we were astounded.”