Communicating Health and Healing through Art (original) (raw)
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Art can humanize a clinical healthcare system and encourage us to see people as whole. The social and therapeutic benefits of art programmes in healthcare settings have been well documented, and evidence now exists to justify public spending. Such programmes, increasingly multi-disciplined collaborations, rely on effective partnerships that value mutual understanding and respect for the unique strengths of all partners. To date, the perspective of patients, health care staff, arts organizations and policy-makers is widely reported in the literature. But the artist's 'voice' is missing from the conversation. Countering health's predominantly instrumental relationship with art, where projects are discussed solely in terms of health or social outcomes, I document my experience of facilitating art sessions with staff and inpatients at the Maudsley Hospital. Keywords participatory arts and health partnerships socially engaged elders museums and galleries Terminology In this report I interchangeably use the terms socially engaged, dialogic and participatory to describe an approach to art that is interactive, emphasizing processes and relationships. Such projects are situated and reflexive, unfolding through a process of performative interaction and replacing the conventional 'banking' (Freire 1968) approach to art in which the artist deposits expressive content into a physical object, to be withdrawn later by the viewer.
THIS IS NOT ART THERAPY THIS IS GROUP WORK
This Is Not Art Therapy is a studio residency program template designed to actively—and re/productively—situate artists in community-based AIDS service organizations (CBAO). This goal of re/productivity explores the healing possibilities in making and responding to art without reliance on the pathologizing tendencies of "art therapy," and also seeks to address the increasingly pressured issue of available workspace for artists in inner city environments. This Is Not Art Therapy tests this design at the Toronto People With AIDS Foundation (PWA), one of Canada’s oldest and largest direct service organizations for people living with HIV/AIDS. The program evolves from and responds to three threads: 1) the rich and influential history of arts-based activism that first emerged in the battle with HIV/AIDS during the initial decade of the pandemic (a critical phase for recognizing and naming the virus, and the timely development and dissemination of treatment); 2) PWA strategic planning in response to urgent client-based requests for arts programming free of therapeutic attachments; and 3) my master’s research project, titled Disco Hospital, an interrogation of the impact that queer perspectives can have on healing processes and spaces.
Art and health field contains several distinct areas of practice: Arts in social or healthcare settings; Community arts and participatory art education; and, Arts therapy. The cross disciplined work in promoting well-being with arts based methods has been growing for the last 10 years in grass root practices, and it has recently become recognized also politically in Finland. There is over 50 years history of art educators and artists making art with patient groups in hospitals, outpatient care or social care institutions, as well as professional art therapy training and practice. In spite of this long history, there are still notable tensions between professionals working within the field. Professionals trained in art therapy are concerned with ethical issues and patient safety, whereas artists oppose limited ways of defining and using art. These border zones are places for both restrictive and enriching encounters. In this paper I aim to address the contemporary situation of these areas in the light of historical development. I will discuss ethical issues of arts based practices, where knowledge and skills are needed in both art and human sciences including social, psychological and physical aspects. I will also consider the research of efficacy in enhancing well-being and preventing or curing illness.
Journal of Patient Experience
A positive diagnosis for COVID-19 is a threat not only to the health of an individual but also to the community where the disease manifests. Rather than being the discreet experience of a few or some, many people now appreciate our shared vulnerability with the threat of uncontained and incurable illness in our midst. “In this era of unspecified isolation, contagious disease, and with no sign of returning to normal life soon, coronavirus is putting an adverse effect on people’s mental health” (1). While managing the spread of COVID-19 has necessitated the use of social distancing and isolation a means of expressing care, equating care with the experience of fear and isolation can place unseen mental health burdens on inner resources for supporting the well-being of patients and those who care for them. Art can offer a remedy for this experience, lending the quality of durability to our fragile human experience and inviting us to extend the ways in which we see, think, and make sense...