ART THOU WELL?
I am very excited to recommend to you, the full report of Churchill Fellow, Dr Katherine Taylor. Thanks to the generous and insightful investment of the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust, Kat has spent time in Finland and the USA exploring the potential more of moving towards the creative devolution of mental health across Greater Manchester. Kat is a charismatic public speaker and an emerging leader in the filed of arts and mental health. With her knowledge as a clinical psychologist, her close connection to the cultural sector, and her lived experience she presents us with a rich and forensic work comprising a comparative study of practices in Finland and the USA, using a psychological perspective. Written in the context of the Devolution deal of 2014, she explores the myriad roles the arts could, and do, play in the service of mental health in Greater Manchester. Click on the report cover at the top of this page.
Art & Well-Being: Toward A Culture of Health
The second report this week comes is the U.S.Department of Arts and Culture’s latest publication: Art & Well-Being: Toward A Culture of Health. The U.S. Department of Arts and Culture is a people-powered department — a grassroots action network inciting creativity to shape a culture of empathy, equity, and belonging. It is a network of artists, activists, and allies inciting creativity and social imagination to shape a culture of equity, empathy, and belonging. The report offers a road-map and conjoins some important global ideas and practice:
'CLOSING THE GAP IN UNDERSTANDING between a “prevailing world view” that privileges what can be quantified and discounts or dismisses evidence conveyed in other ways.'
'ENLARGING UNDERSTANDING FROM ART AS AN EXTRA FLOURISH FOR INDIVIDUAL TREATMENT— an accompaniment to allopathic medicine—for those suffering from health challenges, instead encompassing art as a means of illuminating and engaging collective risks and opportunities, touching the larger community.'
'BROADENING THE DEFINITION OF HEALTH CHALLENGES to include not only individual susceptibilities to infectious and autoimmune diseases, but also environmental hazards and the differential ways they affect people depending on economic status, race and ethnicity, gender and orientation, geographic location and other such factors. Simple, but not necessarily easy.'
Superb work from kindred spirits in the US.
To communicate directly with USDAC and the reports author Arlene Goldbard, or the wider team, email hello@usdac.us
Creativity & Wellbeing Week
2nd - 10th June
This week sees Creativity & Wellbeing Week burst out across London with some amazing opportunities for wider participation in arts and health and the opportunities for knowledge exchange. Good luck to all of those involved and particularly LAHF. To find out what's on this week. Click HERE.
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The statistics of mental health and mental well being are continuously changing and this brings with it the need to have a proper system of ensuring mental wellness.
ReplyDeleteThe state of your mind and brain that leads to you acting or behaving in a certain way which may or may not be suited to your surroundings is called ‘mental health’ or in more common terms ‘emotional well-being’.
It is important to know that the term mental health is neutral and one can have both- a good or a bad mental health status.