The picture of health.
Art and wellness go together as tightly as that compact metaphor. The Community Arts Council (CAC) has made the connection an even sweeter pill to swallow with the launch of a new program that brings art - the noun and the verb - to those who need anything from a little pick-me-up to a profound emotional makeover. The inner smile that comes from a little creativity and a little friendship is now available in a Healing Art Kit.
Think of the kit as a meals-on-wheels delivery but instead of lunch, what you get is emotional nourishment. You even order off a menu especially invented by the CAC.
Maybe you want to try ceramic tiles, or acrylic painting or knitting. There is an array of artistic options, and when you order your desired choice, it comes with all the ingredients plus you get the artist who will sit with you and help you do it.
Healing Art Kits are for small groups (3-10 participants) and each costs $150 per group.
It comes with all the art supplies to create the kit's offering, and it comes with the attending artist to guide everyone along and take part in the fellowship of it all.
"This gets artists into direct contact with people who can really use some of that interaction, socialization, and an activity that touches on their overall well-being," said CAC executive director Sean Farrell. "Our organization has been witness and a catalyst to high-quality arts activities happening in the community, and we wanted to do more for those who might be difficult to reach, and might be well served by wellness of thought, wellness of mind, that comes from something tactile and creative. Healing Arts Kit don't just contain an activity, they are designed to help more broadly."
The kits were designed over a prolonged period of time, with the input of healthcare professionals as well as artists. They were tested on focus groups that approximated the likely audiences - seniors' centres, shelters, group homes, community associations, healthcare facilities.
"These kits are all designed to have an activity inside them that we can do together over a couple of hours and they have to be really portable," said Carol Johnson, a quilter/painter who helped create the Collage Fabric Art kit. Inside the box is an iron and small ironing board, plus simple baggies into which are tucked fabric abstract shapes, silhouettes of identifiable images like a bird or a flower, plus some background fabric.
All of it is on an adhesive backing, so the participants arrange the bits on the background to create a scene of their liking, that gets ironed into place, and then it is framed.
"It's using their fingers, using their imaginations, socializing, playing with colours and ideas, and then when they're done it's something they have to keep or give to a grandchild that was made with their own hands," said Johnson.
She's used the kit at a couple of practice sessions with seniors at Laurier Manor and she has seen resistant participants open up and become cheerful, enthusiastic participants grin from ear to ear and from start to finish, and she has developed relationships now to the point that she's searching for custom fabrics to address special requests from the participants.
"It brings art to people who might not otherwise be able to try it," said multi-disciplined artist Karen Heathman best known in the community for graphic designs and masterful pottery. She helped design the Jewellery kit supplied with polymer clay and an assortment of odds and bobs to fuse with the clay then hardened into a final small sculpture.
"It creates an opportunity for people to use their hands, make something original, develop a new skill-set, and have something they can keep for themselves or pass on to a loved one," Heathman said.
"You can even do something communal and meaningful like take that favourite sweater of grandma's that all the kids remember her loving, and taking all the buttons off, forming a jewellery shape that incorporates a button, and that way everyone gets a unique memento of grandma you can keep close to your heart."
For celebrated painter Andrea Fredeen, who is also a healthcare professional, this initiative strikes at the heart of what art does for the human condition. She was instrumental in the creation of the Journalling kit. Many associate that word with writing a diary, but this kit provides tools to keep a visual travel log, using sketches and little paintings as well as bits of found material and snatches of writing to make a little book full of stronger memories.
"It really imprints on the mind when you include images you make yourself," she said.
"This all actually ties into my thesis - using written narrative as well as visual narrative to tell a story, which can play a large part in health, yes, sure, but also in anthropology, gender studies, social work, anywhere in your life where you have thoughts and emotions but may not have words for it.
"Sometimes it's difficult to get out what you're feeling and thinking and doing, and working on a picture or an image of some kind can sometimes draw you closer to the words for whatever those impressions are, or just a better way of thinking about it. And it's fun. It gets both sides of your brain working. It can be as terrible or as lovely as you like, it's just for you so there's no one judging you on it, there's no such thing as screwing it up, it just helps with your thoughts and memories."
For shut-ins or those who get little outside contact, it's a different and more uniquely creative way to spend recreational time, instead of playing a board game, doing a puzzle or a hand of cards.
It is a craft but it is also a way for people to express themselves and share time together.
The creation of the CAC's Healing Art Kits - nine options so far and more being contemplated - were funded by the New Horizons For Seniors initiative of the Government of Canada.
