‘Pandemic, and now what? Challenges in mental health and responses from the arts’
National Art Museum of Catalonia (MNAC) · 12/2/2021
Sessions framed within the #ArtsAgainstCovid initiative started by the Foundation with its international awards, with the aim of highlighting the potential of arts and culture as innovative tools in the prevention and treatment of mental illnesses and disorders caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Watch the videos of the 10 inspiring talks (each 10 minutes) and the 2 round tables that allow us to learn and reflect with key figures in the field of Arts in Health.
- TALK 1: “Mental Health: challenges and responses from the arts”.,Mercè Torrentallé (Federació de Salut Mental de Catalunya); Anna Descalzi (Unitat de Salut Mental de L’Hospitalet de Llobregat); Sara Guila Fidel Kinori (Hospital de la Vall d’Hebron); Anna Berenguera (IDIAP Jordi Gol); Cristina Molina (Sant Joan de Déu); Taula rodona.
- TALK 2: “Pandemic, and now what? Arts as an opportunity”, Carmen Cabezas (Agència de Salut Pública de Catalunya); Pepe Serra (Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya); Marta Esteve (Fundació Carulla); Guillem d’Efak Fullana-Ferré (institut Català de la Salut); Toni Casares (Sala Beckett); Taula rodona
The global crisis of COVID-19 has underscored the need for tools to reduce the impact of this pandemic and effectively improve collective health and well-being during and after this health, economic, and social crisis.
The Arts in Health International Foundation (AiHIF), in line with its mission to “promote cooperation between the cultural, social, and health sectors to effectively improve society’s health and well-being,” and with the aim of highlighting the potential of the arts in improving the health of individuals and societies, announces the #ArtsAgainstCOVID Awards.
The awards aim to publicly recognize initiatives that explore the positive effects of the arts on health, emerging as responses to the health impacts caused by COVID-19 and the current pandemic context.
Deadline: Out of deadline
WATCH THE AWARD CEREMONY OF 27/04/2021 @ Ideal Barcelona – Digital Arts Center
> RecuperART-19: Museums and art centers to improve the mental health of healthcare professionals after COVID-19
The consequences of an unprecedented health crisis generated by COVID-19 have affected multiple groups. Effects that have inevitably left a mark on healthcare professionals, whose emotional health has been affected to varying degrees, with unpredictable consequences if not effectively addressed.
The Catalan Health Institute (ICS), in collaboration with the Department of Culture, proposes to healthcare professionals a proposal based on the use of museums as environments for reflection and improvement of emotional well-being.
It is an initiative, pioneering internationally, designed considering the particular characteristics of the healthcare professional group regarding self-perception of health and the need for self-care. Participation in Recuperart-19 will be completely anonymous, free, and easily accessible, as museums from all over Catalonia have been participating in the program since its inception. In this sense, 16 museums are initially participating, and it is expected that this number will increase after the first phase is evaluated.
The program is designed to be carried out individually and autonomously, focusing on the prevention and management of possible anxiety, depression, or even mild manifestations of post-traumatic stress associated with their professional activity during the new coronavirus crisis.
To participate, healthcare professionals only need to authenticate by showing their professional identification at any of the participating museums, which will offer them free entry. They will then be provided with a specially prepared booklet for the activity and a sheet with a list of museum works around which the intervention will pivot. This booklet will be the guide to follow the activity, which will be self-guided, and it details instructions and guidelines for the participant. The proposed activities focus on mindfulness exercises, concentration, focus, cognitive association, creativity, writing, drawing, and reflection.
From a clinical perspective, it has been designed by the Psychiatry, Mental Health, and Addictions Service and Research Group del Campus Vall d’Hebron, led by Dr. Josep Antoni Ramos-Quiroga one of the two directors of the program along with Guillem d’Efak Fullana Ferré, coordinator of the Arts in Health Strategy of the ICS. Ramos-Quiroga and Guila Fidel, co-PI of the intervention, emphasized that “We understand the museum as a therapeutic, community, and inclusive space, and this activity seeks to activate personal resources to favor positive effects on mood.” In the case of Recuperat-19, however, the recipients of the intervention will be the healthcare professionals themselves, one of the innovative elements of the project that places it at the forefront of the internationally known discipline as Arts in Health. In fact, a secondary objective of the project is to comprehensively evaluate the results of the intervention “to expand the evidence base of Arts in Health strategies.”
The program has the economic and material support of the Arts in Health International Foundation.
Project page: www.recuperart-19.org (Institut Català de la Salut)
PRIOR ACTIVITIES
> Introduction to Arts in Health Course (1st Edition)
The IAiHF and the National Art Museum of Catalonia (MNAC) organized the “Introduction to Arts in Health. Creation and management of programs in mental health: anxiety and depression disorders” in the fall of 2018.
The course aimed at museum professionals and the health sector aimed to understand the contributions that the arts can have in the field of health.
Spread over five weekly sessions of four hours each, it featured the presence of prominent international experts in arts in health, technicians and responsible for the national health system of Catalonia, doctors and healthcare professionals, patient and family associations in the field of mental health, museum professionals, and other cultural managers.
The course was attended by 50 people, and the sessions alternated conceptual presentations with the exhibition of international experiences of artistic interventions in the health field, testimonials from patients who have participated in related programs, or practical workshops related to one of the concepts presented.
The program had the collaboration of the Catalan Health Institute and the support of Lündbeck.
> Projecte MNAC – Hospital Universitari Vall d’Hebron
As a result of the Introduction to Arts in Health course organized by the IAiHF, the National Art Museum of Catalonia signed an agreement with the Vall d’Hebron Hospital to carry out different actions aimed at exploring the potential of art as a tool for patients and families to enjoy its therapeutic and emotional benefits.
Both institutions have been working together for over a year to promote cultural heritage, make the stay at Vall d’Hebron more humane and pleasant, and ensure that hospital users obtain therapeutic benefits through the values and well-being that art can provide.
This collaboration agreement will begin with a project aimed at studying new art therapies in the field of psychology. The initiative will start with women who present post-traumatic stress disorder, of diverse cultural origin (immigrants or refugees), and who suffer situations of social vulnerability. The psychological treatment will combine new didactic strategies of the National Museum and therapeutic intervention principles for emotional support in situations of fragility of women established by the team led by Dr. Josep Antoni Ramos-Quiroga, Head of the Psychiatry Service of Vall d’Hebron Hospital and Campus.