Latest news

Kyunghee Kwon, program coordinator of the educational community development team at the South Korean Arts and Culture Education Service (KACES), met the Health and Wellbeing team at the Beaney House of Art & Knowledge this September to learn more about their work.

We're summarising here some of the discussions that took place during our first twitter chat – especially for those of you who are not on twitter (or you can find the chat on twitter here).

The Culture, Health & Wellbeing Alliance's official response to the final draft of Arts Council England's strategy is attached here.

Power and Privilege in the 21st Century Museum was devloped through the Museums Association Transformers: Diversify programme. The report aims to provide practical tools for transforming museums.

How do urban noises affect our physical, mental and emotional wellbeing? From 6-8 September a new participatory art project ‘KIMA: Noise’ will explore the effects of noise on well-being through an interactive installation at Maxilla Space, North Kensington.

Produced in response to the growth of the youth climate strikes in the UK, this new guide from Kids in Museums is designed to help museums support youth climate activism and collaborate with young people on events, exhibitions and debates. It was produced in partnership with Climate Museum UK, the Happy Museum Project and Julie's Bicycle.

The APPG for Arts, Health & Wellbeing, Culture, Health & Wellbeing Alliance and Kent Surrey Sussex Academic Health Science Network have partnered to publish a briefing for Integrated Care System planning.

The Directors of Age of Creativity and the Culture, Health & Wellbeing Alliance have co-written a new article for Age UK's magazine, EngAGE. Read the article here (p.16)

The Slow GIF Movement seeks to make online space more inclusive with gently looping GIFs. Rhiannon Armstrong, supported by The Space and Unlimited, is pleased to announce the launch of The Slow GIF Movement on 15 August 2019, to coincide with National Relaxation Day.

The National Criminal Justice Arts Alliance has published new guidance for artists and arts organisations interested in working in criminal justice settings, Enhancing arts and culture in criminal justice settings – a partnership approach.

The Health Foundation has published an assessment of the Prevention Green Paper by David Finch.

The final regional dissemination events for Creative Health were held in Reading on 2nd May and in Ipswich on 16th May. You can watch the Reading event on YouTube and find out more about both in the APPG Annual Report (see below).

"Fullscope" brings together seven organisations who support mental wellbeing in children and/or young people in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough. Fullscope is a 3-year programme to improve provision, establish clearer opportunity pathways, and have national significance in influencing the sector as a whole. The Fullscope consortium is:

The APPG for Arts, Health & Wellbeing and Culture, Health & Wellbeing Alliance have produced new guidance for for STP and ICS Planning, available here.

We envisage a country transformed by its culture and at the same time, constantly transforming it: a truly creative nation in which we all can play our part. (Shaping the Next Ten Years: Draft strategy for consultation, p.6)

We invite members' comments on our draft declaration and resources. Read more here

Over 500 events later and Creativity & Wellbeing Week is officially a national festival...

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'Look at Paintings', a free website which innovatively partners techniques of Mindful meditation with Art Appreciation, with the aim of producing immediate benefits to the viewer, has now gone live.

The Creative Industries Federation and Arts Council England have together launched a new report, Public Investment, Public Gain. The report makes case for the central role that public investment in arts and culture plays generating commercial returns across the economy.  

Wednesday 26 June is National Writing Day, led by First Story - a national literacy charity, working with 55 partner organisations. #nationalwritingday

The Art Fund's new Calm and Collected report has set out the ways in which museums could - and already do - impact our wellbeing. The report is based on a survey of over 2,500 adults in the UK, as well as a small number of in-depth interviews. It assesses rising levels of stress and anxiety across the UK, and the difficulties we have in creating space for ourselves.

A new £62 million fund has been announced by Culture Secretary Jeremy Wright. The fund will support heritage in high streets. The funding includes:

Friday 17 May, Newcastle Centre for Life

In January 2018, Perspectivesin Public Health published a Special Issue on Arts, Health & Wellbeing focusing on the content of presentations from the Culture, Health & Wellbeing International Conference held in Bristol in June, 2017.

Te Ora Auaha: Creative Wellbeing Alliance was launched launched in April 2019 by Carmel Sepuloni, New Zealand Minister of Social Development and Associate Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage. Te Ora Auaha: Creative Wellbeing Alliance Aotearoa is made up of individuals, groups and organisations across the arts, health, youth, social and education sectors.

Creative Freedom has published a Manifesto for Mental Health in Arts Professional to address the difficulties of maintaining mental health in creative and cultural careers. Colin Beesting, founder of Creative Freedom, says

A sincere thank you to everyone who filled out the Alliance's annual survey. You can find a summary report here. In total 99 people filled out the annual survey. We do not have permission to share comments publicly, so we have just included statistics here.

Responses to Arts Council England’s strategic proposals for 2020-2030 have been published by the Culture, Health and Wellbeing Alliance, the National Criminal Justice Arts Alliance, and the All Party Parliamentary Group for Arts, Health and Wellbeing. A number of the Culture, Health and Wellbeing Alliance’s partners are also signatories on its response.

What is the past, present and future role of arts in health? As part of Paintings in Hospitals' 60th anniversary celebrations, the organisation is convening a panel to consider the past pioneers and future innovations of visual arts in health and social care.

A new national network has been set up for anyone who takes responsibility for arts, heritage and design in hospitals. The group is being hosted by the NHS national performance advisory group and letters will be sent to all hospital arts managers in the UK and all NHS trusts for people to sign up.

We are thrilled that over 3,600 of you have signed up to be members of the Alliance and receive this monthly bulletin. This is our first annual survey. To help us support you, please fill out this short survey, which covers general questions about the Alliance, its new website and the bulletin.

The Culture, Health & Wellbeing Alliance's first annual conference ended with a bang - a whole load of bangs in fact - on 21 and 22nd March at Great North Museum: Hancock, with a performance from The Lawnmowers Beat This!

Alex Coulter, Director of Arts & Health South West, continues to provide the secretariat and project management for the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Arts, Health and Wellbeing (APPG), on behalf of the Culture, Health and Wellbeing Alliance.

The Alliance ‘s first annual conference, Cultures of Health and Wellbeing was held at Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums in Newcastle on the 21st and 22nd March 2019.

London Arts in Health Forum and the Culture, Health and Wellbeing Alliance are working together to expand Creativity and Wellbeing Week into a national event, building on its enormous success across London. Creativity and Wellbeing Week 2019 will run from 10-16 June 2019.