Arts in Health

The paper will draw on a key case study, GROVE, the art and architecture strategy recently completed in NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde’s multi-award winning New Stobhill Hospital.  GROVE was developed by poet and artist Thomas A Clark and Andy Law, architect, Reiach & Hall, Edinburgh.  In GROVE Clark and Law focused on the experience of 'waiting' in hospital.  Their aim was to make waiting a reflective experience and to counteract the anxiety associated with hospitals. 
Clark and Law argue that the New Stobhill Hospital is a single work of art, and this is demonstrated by the 'composing' of spaces within the unifying theme of 'A grove of birch in a forest of larch'.  The artworks within the architecture that make up GROVE all represent or relate to nature, including short poems installed on walls and windows by Clark, as well as visual artworks (paintings, installations, video) by collaborating artists.  For example, across the outpatient clinic waiting areas a poem, a series of videos and installations contribute elements within the architecture to create a sequence of distinctive spaces.

It can often be difficult for those people living with chronic pain to communicate the experience because of the condition’s subjective and invisible nature. I propose that an alternative form of communication is both possible and appropriate for some individuals with chronic pain. Using creative methods to communicate can aid the articulation of the pain experience visually, providing objectification of it. Such techniques enable insight into the individuals’ lived world for both professionals and informal support networks while empowering the individual, potentially enabling greater ability to manage their chronic pain.

This chapter will explore what art therapists have said about art therapy across cultures. To fully represent this diversity of practice and opinion in one short chapter is not possible, but this chapter will attempt to provide a view of some of the debates taking place within art therapy on the subject of cultural diversity and intercultural exchange.

How to reference this chapter:
Hogan, S. 2015. Lost in Translation? Inter-Cultural Exchange in Art Therapy  in C. E. Myers & S. L. Brooke (eds.)  Therapists Creating a Cultural Tapestry. Using the Creative Therapies Across Cultures. Springfield, Il: Charles C. Thomas. pp.11-25.

There is increasing recognition of the role that participating in the arts can have on improved mental wellbeing and increased confidence and self-esteem, however participatory (community)
arts programmes are not yet fully valued by health professionals. This paper explores the evaluation methods of visual arts programmes in the UK and highlights the emphasis traditionally placed on outcomes and impacts and the lack of arts-based methodologies being adopted within arts and health research. The use of an arts-based research approach, called participatory mapping, combined with semi-structured interviews, was adopted as an innovative and creative approach to qualitative enquiry. Learners on an arts and wellbeing course were invited to create a visual map of their experiences on the course and the impact that being creative had on their personal wellbeing.
The mapping session was observed, and then followed by individual interviews with each learner, using their map as a prompt for discussion. Four main themes emerged: place/space, involvement with others, learning and achievement. The most revealing of these themes was the importance placed by learners on the creation of a safe place to be with other people with experience of mental health issues and come together to be creative. The research demonstrates the potential of using an innovative arts-based methodology as a means of enhancing the quality and depth of data production and analysis within arts-based research and evaluation. Used in combination with more traditional interviewing techniques, the adoption of an arts-based approach to the evaluation of participatory arts programmes could provide a paradigmatic shift in the way in which such initiatives are monitored and as such offer a more creative way of evidencing the impact of
participatory arts on improved mental wellbeing.

In my last paper for Inscape, ‘Ways in Which Photographic and Other Images are Used in Research: An Introductory
Overview’ (July, 2012), I summarised the ways in which the arts are being used by social scientists. In this paper I look at
less mainstream developments which are nevertheless of interest. In particular, I outline Iain Edgar’s idea of ‘imagework’,
which is the use of creative visualisation within research processes (although much of what he does is rather akin to some
forms of art therapy). Probably less well documented and explored is the interesting borderline between social science
research and personal therapy represented by both social art therapy and phototherapy, both of which will be explored in
further detail. This paper is then contextualised with reference to other recent papers discussing the potential contribution of
art therapy to social science, psychological and ethnographic research projects.

Η άνοια και οι διάφορες μορφές της, με κύρια τη Νόσο Alzheimer, θεωρούνται ως η επιδημία του 21ου αιώνα. Ο κύριος λόγος που οι άνθρωποι, οι οποίοι ζουν με άνοια έχουν αυξηθεί αριθμητικά είναι η αύξηση του προσδόκιμου ζωής, καθώς ο μεγαλύτερος παράγοντας κίνδυνου για την άνοια είναι η ηλικία. Οι επιστήμονες μέσω διαφόρων ερευνών έχουν εστιάσει τις προσπάθειές τους στην εύρεση θεραπείας, όμως αυτό δεν έχει καταστεί ακόμη εφικτό. Για το λόγο αυτό η επιστήμη της ιατρικής έχει προ-σεγγίσει και άλλους κλάδους, όπως ο κλάδος της τέχνης, του πολιτισμού και των μουσείων, ώστε να βρεθούν τρόποι για να βελτιωθεί η ποιότητα ζωής των ανθρώπων που ζουν με άνοια και των συνοδών τους.
Σκοπός της παρούσας εργασίας είναι να εξετάσει και να αναδείξει τους τρόπους, με τους οποίους οι φορείς πολιτισμού μπορούν να προσεγγίσουν και να βοηθήσουν τους ανθρώπους που ζουν με άνοια αλλά και τους συνοδούς τους. Για το λόγο αυτό αρχικά παρουσιάζονται τόσο η άνοια, ένα σύνδρομο το οποίο πλήττει τις νοητικές λειτουργίες του ανθρώπου και οι διάφορες μορφές της (συμπτώματα, τύποι, στάδια, φαρμακευτική και μη φαρμακευτική θεραπεία), όσο και δράσεις μουσείων και πολιτιστικών φορέων που απευθύνονται σε ανθρώπους που ζουν με αυτό το σύνδρομο και τους συνοδούς τους, όπως είναι τα εκπαιδευτικά προγράμματα και οι εκθέσεις. Εν συνεχεία, αναλύεται ως μελέτη περίπτωσης, η ανάπτυξη (σχεδιασμός, εφαρμογή, αξιολόγηση) εκπαιδευτικού προγράμματος που απευθύνεται σε αυτή την ομάδα κοινού, στην Οικία Άγγελου και Λητώς Κατακουζηνού, ένα σπίτι-μουσείο στο κέντρο της Αθήνας. Τα τελικά συμπεράσματα βασίζονται στη θεωρητική προσέγγιση του θέματος, αλλά και στο πρακτικό κομμάτι της εργασίας και την ανάπτυξη του προγράμματος.

To cite this work:

Hogan, S. 2019. Gender Representation, Power and Identity in Mental Health & Art Therapy in  Bree Hadley & Donna McDonald (eds.) Routledge Handbook of Disability Arts, Culture and Media. Abingdon Oxon: Routledge
pp. 137-147.

We are amidst a global mental health crisis, states a recent review by the Lancet medical journal, and our ‘collective failure’ to respond to this results in ‘monumental loss of human capabilities and avoidable suffering’. To bring about policy and culture change, we must think outside the pillbox. The 2017 All-Party Parliamentary Group on Arts, Health and Wellbeing inquiry report puts forward a robust argument for how the arts can ‘stimulate imagination and reflection’ and ‘change perspectives’. Yet the report rejects art that is ‘lofty activity which requires some sort of superior cultural intelligence to access’.

Why should art of the ‘lofty’ variety be excluded from this conversation? Surely different types of art and different efforts should also chip in to help rectify our collective failure. As well as the quality of the artistic activity, the quality of the artistic output should also be a salient part of transforming how we see mental health, so that it is not shameful and not negative. Art stimulates and changes perspectives because it engages and develops cultural intelligence.

Through an Arts Council England funded Unlimited commission, this article puts forward a case for 'lofty arts’ to play a role in effecting cultural and policy change in mental health. Entitled We Sat On A Mat and Had A Chat and Made Maps!, this was a 15-month art-science practice-led research project on mind wandering with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder as a case study. Artist-curator Dr Kai Syng Tan’s collaborator is Professor of Psychiatry Philip Asherson. Both are based at King's College London’s world-leading Social, Genetic and Developmental Psychiatry Centre.

This article was published on 31 October 2018, the last day of ADHD Awareness Month. Within 3 days, more than 2000 people had read it. https://theconversation.com/how-lofty-art-can-help-the-medical-world-reimagine-mental-health-105689

Arts and health are international fields of practice with stakeholders from various disciplines. It is known that the UK has an established practice of collaboration in the form of interdisciplinary partnerships in arts and health (Clift et al., 2009, White, 2009), whereas in Denmark initiatives exist ad-hoc and there is no such established field (Jensen and Wille, 2015). This thesis is a qualitative study investigating the interdisciplinary relationships between stakeholders engaged in arts and health practice in the UK and in Denmark. The identified stakeholders in the study are: health professionals, museum educators and mental health service users. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 36 participants including health professionals, museum educators and service users. Data were collected in Denmark and in the UK. A thematic approach was used to analyse the data and theoretical lenses of sociological theories of professions and institutional logics were employed to explo...

Connected Communities Fortnight. Creative Practice as Mutual Recovery: Connecting Communities for Mental Health and Well-Being. Mini-Symposium at the QUAD, Derby Monday 22nd June 2015.
Creative Practice as Mutual Recovery Impact Key Aims:
➢ To shape and draw attention to new approaches to policy formulation and service delivery.
➢ To bring about a radical shift in how communities of people with mental health difficulties, informal carers and health, social care and adult education personnel can connect more creatively to advance mutual recovery.
➢ To play a significant role in addressing the problem of mental health and well-being issues and so help restore the humanity to healthcare.
Further Information About Participating Projects.
The Birth Project acknowledges that births can be traumatic for all involved; obstetricians and midwives are subject to very different stresses to the women they serve. Obstetricians, midwives, doulas, birth-partners and new mothers have been given the opportunity to explore their experiences of compassion fatigue, stress, birth suffering and post-natal readjustments using the arts: phototherapy, photo-diaries and art elicitation in groups, which then joined together in ‘mutual recovery’ events in which perspectives have been shared, primarily through elucidation of the art works produced. Clay Transformations has been conducting research in order to further explore the therapeutic potential of working with clay and its role in promoting mutual recovery, mental health and well-being.  Part of the project is a web-platform acting as a homing point for practitioners, artists and other stakeholders, who can share information about their work and experiences. Community and Capoeira explores this Afro-Brazilian martial art, involving elements of play, dance, music and fight. Here Capoeira well be used to explore mental health, well-being, and connectedness in a mutual sense through the delivery of a six-month Capoeira course in Birmingham. A mixed-methods approach has been employed. Digital Dialogues is a digital storytelling programme bringing together service professionals, service users and carers into small groups to create a new form of dialogue between them – the sharing of personal stories, initially in a co-presenting environment and then in the online space, where storytelling can act as a catalyst for further stories and conversations. These groups will then be linked with other groups online to share their stories in a wider forum. The project aims to explore the benefit of personal storytelling, aided by digital technology, to the process of mutual recovery and the reimagining of relationships between participants. The Genealogy of Mutual Recovery is a project which aims to enable us to gain some critical purchase on the notion of mutual recovery. The idea of genealogy in the humanities and social sciences is that in order to understand concepts and practices one needs to understand their history, how they were devised and for what purpose, and understand the struggles and debates which led to them taking their present form. Making Music for Mental Health, led by the Centre for Performance Science at the Royal College of Music, explores musical creative practice in relation to mental health and wellbeing. In particular, it investigates the hypothesis that mental health service users and their carers, music students and professional musicians can - through the creative act of music learning and performing - mutually enhance wellbeing and development more meaningful and resilient lives. The project seeks to explore three interconnected issues: (i) the extent to which music learning and performing provides a forum for 'mutual recovery' among adult mental health service users, their formal/informal carers, and musicians, (ii) the characteristic features of 'mutual recovery' through music learning and performing, and (iii) the underlying mechanisms of such 'mutual recovery'. Mutual Recovery through Communities of Creative Connection: The Roles of Adult Community Learning and Community Arts Initiatives is concerned with creative practices and mental health and well-being. Its focus is how these practices can help create shared spaces for learning, creativity and social support in order to promote people’s well-being and recovery for those who have experienced mental health difficulties.

Arts in Health projects are growing in number in the UK. One such project, Singing Medicine (SM), is offered to children with short and long-term health care needs at a Children's Hospital in England as part of the Hospital's Play Department. In an environment where children can experience loss of control over decisions and restricted play experiences, musical games and activities offer children affordances for choice and agency. They can also benefit parents and wider family members. In contrast to previous quantitative studies that explored the transferrable benefits of music participation for children, this paper reports on a qualitative study involving semi-structured interviews with families of children with long-term health care needs (ages 3-14 years old). A new concept of 'The Hospital Family' is introduced from analysis of data. Family members valued relational aspects of the musical games and suggested that benefits lasted beyond the life of the child. These findings are explored in the context of ecological systems theory and Froebelian principles.

Research on Arts on Prescription (AoP) programmes are on the increase and the participants’ positive mental health outcomes are well-documented. However, there is insufficient research that considers the participating cultural institutions’ perspectives. A qualitative focus group interview was conducted with the participating culture institutions in an AoP project in Denmark. Representatives from seven cultural institutions participated in the interview. The data was transcribed and analysed using Braun and Clark’s (Qual Res Psychol 3(77):77–101. https ://doi.org/10.1191/14780 88706 qp063 oa, 2006) thematic approach. The cultural institutions were positive about the interdisciplinary collaboration with the Center for Mental Health and benefited from working with groups of people with mental health problems. They considered the collaboration to have encouraged skills development by working with groups that they did not regularly engaged with. If cultural institutions are to engage with the mental health wellbeing agenda then policy-driven initiatives can support collaborations that involve groups of people with mental health problems.

The collaboration between arts and medical treatment in improving well-being has been long known, thus the emerging number of art therapies and community-based art projects. Several studies have been able to explain the positive correlation between community-based art projects and improvement of well-being. Specifically as a result of community-based art projects, the benefit related to personal (body, mind and soul), and increased quality of the interaction with social environment have been mentioned along with the success stories.

Based on the involvement of participants in community-based art projects, it was argued that the process of art making outweighed the concern of product or art-work quality. This paper will discuss about the positive impacts of community-based art projects, focusing on how the process of arts-making helps people improving their well-being, and whether its product is just as valuable as the process of the making.