Project Summary

The Arts, Health and Seniors Project explores how involvement in the arts can improve the health and wellbeing of vulnerable seniors. This initiative also supports the development of new knowledge and expertise in the fields of seniors' wellness, chronic disease management, and community-engaged arts.

The Arts & Health Project was initiated in 2006 as a three year pilot project, and due to its popularity is now completed its 5th year of programming. The project aims to facilitate senior's creative contributions to their communities and at the same time to aid the ability to "age in place", to improve the participants health and strengthen their sense of well-being. It also aims to build new expertise amongst seniors workers and artists in Vancouver and on the North Shore working with elders in professionally led arts programs. A research report that reviews the inputs and outcomes of the project in its first three years is forthcoming. Look for updates coming this fall.

Context

The Arts, Health and Seniors Project addresses many current issues for seniors and artists:

• Health practitioners across North America are recognizing the need for new models of care.
• Our population is aging and marginalization is increasing amongst the elderly.
• Current approaches to recreation are being expanded and enriched to support seniors' wellness.
• Community-engaged artists and those working with seniors seek support for their work in community partnership towards wellness through the arts.
• Research is needed to demonstrate the link between participation in the arts and health in the Canadian context.

Goals

• To maintain and/or improve the health and wellbeing of vulnerable seniors through their participation in community engaged arts practices;
• To create a supportive environment for community engaged arts practices and increase their use within health environments and centres for community programming;
• To demonstrate the positive impact of participation in arts-based activities on the health and well-being of seniors in Vancouver and the North Shore.

Activities

• Regular participatory arts workshops to groups of vulnerable seniors from a wide range of demographic clusters (health status, cultural, economic, etc.);
• Engage participants in "Arts Experiences", opportunities for seniors to attend presentations of work by professional artists in their discipline and peer group;
• Support a strong research component to demonstrate real health outcomes for seniors and increase the programming capacity of health, arts and recreation services.

Artists from a variety of disciplines are currently working with the seniors in the development of work in the visual arts, the written word, multidisciplinary performance and digital storytelling.

View a short video on the Arts & Health Project .

For more information about this project please contact:

Margaret Naylor
Arts and Health Project: Healthy Aging Through the Arts
Arts & Culture Office, Vancouver Board of Parks and Recreation
181 Roundhouse Mews,
Vancouver, BC V6Z 2W3
604-713-1861
margaret.naylor@vancouver.ca

FUNDERS Vancouver Coastal Health – SMART Fund – Integrated Health Network | BC Arts Council | Vancouver Foundation | Vancouver Board of Parks and Recreation | Society for Arts in Health Care – Johnson & Johnson | United Way | North Vancouver Recreation Commission | Canada Council Council for the Arts

PARTNERS The Centre | Britannia Community Services Centre | Renfrew Park Community Centre | Silver Harbor | Strathcona Community Centre