Arts in Health

Supervisors:

• Adriana Mattos
• Ferdinand Lewis

Arts in health focuses on illness prevention and support for wellbeing: In acute care and long-term care facilities; for medical and support staff; and as illness prevention in our communities. Trained professionals use the arts to bring imagination, creativity, and social connection into the lives of people across the wellness-illness spectrum.

Talking about art

Students will learn about––and practice––leading structured conversations about visual art (painting, photography, etc.). One student team will deliver research on their experience of this practice.

Writing about illness

Students will learn––and practice––creative writing for health. Writing helps make meaning out of illness, and offers relief from chronic symptoms; for society, reading about illness can shift how we think about health. One student team will develop a research-based proposal for a high-quality, non-academic journal of creative writing about illness.

Developing a new arts-based health intervention

Students will learn how the arts can fulfill actual public health goals. The deliverable will be a proposal for a program in a local community and/or community organisation.

This year’s guest instructor will be Washington DC-based arts in health journalist Dylan Klempner.