1 Nov 2017 Art Gallery of Nsw, Sydney
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Mental Health and Resilience through the Arts Mikala Dwyer ‘The letterbox Marys’ 2017 (detail) installation of various artworks, mixed media. On exhibition at AGNSW, A shape of thought. Until 4 February 2018. Courtesy of the artist © Mikala Dwyer Photo: AGNSW, Mim Stirling 9TH ANNUAL INTERNATIONAL ARTS AND HEALTH CONFERENCE 30 OCT - 1 NOV 2017 ART GALLERY OF NSW, SYDNEY @ArtsHealthAu ausartsandhealth artshealth17 www.artsandhealth.org.au Patron: Professor The Hon Dame Marie Bashir AD, CVO 30 October 2017 Dear Delegates It is a pleasure to welcome you to the Art Gallery of NSW for our 9th Art of Good Health and Wellbeing International Arts and Health Conference. When I founded this conference in 2009, I did not envisage the raft of outcomes that would follow, simply by bringing people together with a shared interest, passion and commitment to the fi eld of arts and health, and a desire to explore innovative ways to improve people’s health and wellbeing. The fi rst conference was held at the Glasshouse Arts Centre in Port Macquarie, and thereafter it was held at Asialink, University of Melbourne (2010); National Gallery of Australia, Canberra (2011); Notre Dame University, Fremantle (2012); College of Fine Arts, Sydney (2013); National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne (2014); and the Art Gallery of NSW (2015 & 2016). We are privileged to have a partnership with the Art Gallery of NSW, which is our conference host venue. It is a magnifi cent institution and one that has had a singular commitment to arts and health, arts and disability and creative ageing in recent years, as evidenced by our feature on the following pages. I am particularly proud to have been instrumental in AGNSW developing its creative ageing focus since 2011. Congratulations to Heather Whitely Robertson and Danielle Gullotta for their unstinting focus on making arts, health and creative ageing central to the Gallery’s public programs, and taking a leadership role in Australia. One of the pivotal people who worked with me to establish the Art of Good Health and Wellbeing conference was the eminent arts and health fi gure, Mike White, an international leader from the UK and author of the seminal work Arts Development in Community Health: A Social Tonic (Radcli e Publishing 2009). Following Mike’s untimely death in 2015, we decided to recognise this singularly brave, empathetic and intelligent man by presenting the Mike White Memorial Lecture as an annual event which, this year, will be presented by respected commentator, writer and researcher, Francois Matarasso. Francois was a great friend of Mike’s and we are honoured that he is attending our conference to deliver his presentation A Restless Art: Community Art and Empowerment. Francois’ visit to Australia has been sponsored by the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra. It was at our fi rst conference in 2009 that Adriane Boag, from the NGA, conceived the idea of an outreach program for the NGA’s Art and Dementia program, which she had established in 2007. That landmark program has now delivered training to over 25 museums and galleries around the country, and the Glasshouse Regional Gallery in Port Macquarie was the fi rst. I am proud to see the Art and Dementia program continue in my region as one of the early legacies of our annual conference and its ability to bring like-minded people together to explore ideas and collaborate on projects. This is the third year that the Baring Foundation, the largest funder of creative ageing practice in the world, has supported the attendance at the conference of the next generation of leaders in the UK. We are most appreciative that the Baring Foundation has enabled expert presentations by Emma Robinson, Age Cymru and Gwanwyn Creative Ageing Festival, Wales (UK); Ed Watts, Whitworth Museum, Manchester; Evan Dawson, Live Music Now, London; Kate Duncan, City Arts, Nottingham; and this year Emma Lazenby, ForMed Bristol, and Michelle Weiner, Dulwich Picture Gallery, London. 9th Art of Good Health and Wellbeing International Arts and Health Conference Art Gallery of NSW Sydney, 30 October – 1 November 2017 PAGE 1. Australian Centre for Arts and Health www.artsandhealth.org.au email: [email protected] phone: 0416 641 482 Each speaker has brought to Australia new ideas, innovative practice and valuable research that has been shared were a drug, people would be outraged that it wasn’t available to everyone”. and exchanged, helping to shape creative ageing programming here. The Inquiry Report presents the fi ndings of two years of research, evidence-gathering and discussions I fi rst conceived the idea of introducing creative ageing to Australia in 2006, when I met the founder of this with patients, health and social care professionals, artists and arts administrators, academics, people in local movement, Dr Gene Cohen, at an arts and health conference in Chicago. His catchcry “Art is like chocolate for the government, ministers, other policy-makers and parliamentarians from both Houses of Parliament. brain” has been a motivating force in my work ever since. Our annual conference encompasses the breadth of the arts and health fi eld with a special focus on both mental Dr Gene Cohen (1944-2009) was an American psychiatrist who pioneered research into geriatric mental health. He health and creative ageing, and has been designed to embrace people working in diverse situations, cultures was the fi rst head of the Center on Aging at the National Institute of Mental Health, the fi rst government-supported and socio-economic demographics. We would like to thank Professor Michael Balfour and Gri th University for center on mental health and aging in the world. He was later the fi rst director of the Center on Aging, Health, and sponsoring the conference attendance of Dr Andrea Creech, Faculty of Music, Laval, Canada and David Savill the Humanities at the George Washington University and also served as President of the Gerontological Society of from Age Exchange UK. America. His books included The Creative Age (2000) and The Mature Mind (2006). At our conference this week we bring together international guests and prominent Australian practitioners and Importantly, Gene Cohen, with his close friend and colleague Susan Perlstein, founded the National Center for researchers to bring further clarity to the concept of creative ageing. Creative Aging (NCCA), Washington DC (www.creativeaging.org). I was privileged to be a speaker at the NCCA’s Creative Ageing Conference in 2016, along with Adriane Boag from the NGA. This is important because our population is ageing exponentially and it is our responsibility to explore and evaluate the best ways to ensure quality of life as our citizens age. But we must also bear in mind that ageing is a lifelong Gene led the fi rst multi-site longitudinal study on the impact of professionally conducted, participatory cultural process, and ensuring young people access to the arts is equally important. programs on older adults, supported by the National Endowment for the Arts’ O ce for AccessAbility (www.nea. gov) In 2015, following seven years of advocacy on the part of myself and others, NSW Health established a Health and Arts Taskforce to strategically drive the arts agenda in public health. I was commissioned by NSW Health to write Entitled Creativity and Aging Study: the Impact of Professionally Conducted Cultural Programs on Older Adults guidelines for arts and health practice in hospitals and community health services. (2001-2005), this landmark study was conducted in Washington DC, New York City and San Francisco, with 300 participants. The average age of participants was 80, with an age range of 65–103 years. The NSW Health and Arts Framework was announced in October 2016, with funding to enable Local Health Districts to commission arts and health programs, utilising professional artists and program co-ordinators. Participants in the intervention group maintained greater independence, evidenced higher morale, experienced less loneliness and relied on less medication than the control group. They developed an expanded outlook in The infographic on the back cover of this conference program was designed by the Australian Centre for Arts and interests and activities, had a greater sense of control and enjoyed higher social engagement. Health for the Taskforce report as an overview of the arts and health fi eld, illustrating how profound the impact of the arts can be on key social issues, health conditions, positive ageing and aged care. According to Dr. Walter Reich, a colleague of Gene Cohen’s at George Washington University, “Single-handedly he changed the image of aging from one of senescence to a period of creativity”. This remains a signifi cant On a fi nal note, since 2011, I have been a proud member of the NSW Ministerial Advisory Council on Ageing achievement and one we still proclaim as we tackle the challenges of ageism and the prejudices which encourage (MACA) which is the o cial advisory body to the NSW Government on matters of interest to older people. a view of older people as a burden on society. Chaired by Kathryn Greiner AO, MACA is committed to the development of creative ageing policy and practice as a part of the NSW whole of government ageing strategy. NCCA co-founder Susan Perlstein came to Australia in 2009 for our inaugural conference to represent Gene Cohen’s legacy. We have become lifelong friends and she returned to our 2016 conference to add force to the I would especially like to welcome my MACA colleagues Abby Bloom, Valerie Pratt and Rod Young who are growing momentum of creative ageing practice in Australia. attending the conference this week. They are looking forward to meeting many delegates and sharing ideas around healthy ageing and creativity.