Mapping of Initiatives on Culture, Health and Well-being

European Choral Association created the Benefits Of Singing, an online campaign aimed to showcase the different benefits collective singing has for individuals and the society, and people across Europe and beyond be reminded of / be encouraged to experience them through collective singing. Nowadays, it is needed to intentionally act together – organisations, choirs and individuals, as representatives from all over Europe and beyond and unify the voices and bring choral music in the attention of various communities, as well as on the agendas of the decision-making bodies, both at a national and European level. The Benefits Of Singing campaign was organised in the frame of the ‘Upgrade, Connect, Reach Out project’, co-funded by the Creative Europe Programme of the European Union.

Singing Europe is a European Pilot Study on the topic of collective singing (groups of people singing together, such as choirs, vocal ensembles, a cappella groups, etc.). It was organised in the frame of “VOICE, Vision on Innovation for Choral Music in Europe” a European Cooperation Project involving 15 partners in 11 countries, funded by the EU Culture Programme.

Culture does Good is the motto for Turku 2011, describing activities during the Capital of Culture year as well as the programme as a whole. The Turku 2011 Wellbeing Programme encapsulated the beneficial impacts of the Capital of Culture year’s productions for individuals and communities. The Programme described the way in which the Capital of Culture year was integrated into the daily lives of residents and visitors, so it has an impact even beyond the year 2011. The Turku 2011 Wellbeing Programme was implemented in extensive regional, national and international cooperation. The network of participants included public sector representatives, organisations of artists, volunteers and accessibility, universities, associations and companies.

Dance Well – movement research for Parkinson’s was born with the aim of including people with Parkinson’s disease through contemporary dance in the artistic and social life of their territories. It is an initiative promoted since 2013 by the Municipality of Bassano del Grappa with its CSC – Centro per la Scena Contemporanea, member of the European Dancehouse Network. The classes, free of charge and open to all, are held at the Museum of Bassano del Grappa. The Dance Well classes reached other locations in the province of Vicenza, and they are now held also at Teatro Civico in Schio, and at Villa Margherita in Arcugnano. The practice spread around Italy and around the world and nowadays, classes are held also in Turin, Rome, Florence, Verona (Italy) and in Tokyo, Kyoto and Kanazawa (Japan). The artistic spaces where they take place, and the source of inspirations that the context brings, distinguish the initiative from many others held in traditional dance studios, rehabilitation rooms or gyms. To underline with even more clarity that Dance Well is an artistic practice, participants are called Dance Well dancers. Several Dance Well teachers lead the classes throughout the year, bringing diverse approaches and styles with their artistic proposals and involving the Dance Well dancers into the summer festival programme of the city.
Every summer an intensive Dance Well teaching course is held in Bassano del Grappa, for people with a strong artistic background in dance that would like to become Dance Well teachers. The practice has been investigated and monitored by a team of researchers from Casa di Cura Villa Margherita in Arcugnano, a leader on Parkinson studies and part of the NYU Fresco Institute for Italy.

The Zest programme offers a range of creative activities and inspiring resources for people living with dementia and their families and their loved ones. All projects are shaped to suit individual needs, ensuring safety and accessibility. The programme is provided by Bright Shadow and has the mission to enable people living with dementia, and those affected by it, to live well and to thrive. Established in 2009, Bright Shadow are experts in creative activities that are fun, meaningful, accessible and challenging and they promote wellbeing for people living with dementia.

Musical vitamins - Is the live music program that started in 2016 at the request of the nurses of the Oncology Day Hospital of the S. Anna Hospital in Turin, the largest hospital dedicated to women in Europe. More than 400 events have been organized by the Medicina a Misura di Donna Foundation in collaboration with thirteen cultural institutions, over 225 artists, with a daily program. They are entertaining visitors while waiting, improving the waiting time, they accompany women during oncological therapies, such as chemotherapy and they welcome new-borns. Since 2017, thanks to the massive mobilization of the Turin jazz community, it has been enriched with a dedicated review. The program is part of the interdisciplinary platform “Art, Health and Social Change”. It is followed and evaluated with periodic qualitative analyzes - focus groups and wellbeing questionnaires - by researcher Sandy Ghirardi (prof. Pier Luigi Sacco - IULM University of Milan).

For years, Tuscan museums have offered programmes dedicated to people living with Alzheimer's disease. In the present, they have set up a formalised system, the Tuscan Museums System for Alzheimer's, to co-ordinate and intensify their action. All the programmes, in their variety and differences, consider themselves as part of an overall project, based on an idea of the museum as an inclusive cultural institution; and on an idea of dementia, rather than as a disease, as a condition, which involves not only the person with dementia, but also those who accompany and support them in this challenge.

In early 2017, the National Museum of Contemporary Art, Athens (EMST) in collaboration with the First Psychiatric Department of the University of Athens, Eginition Hospital carried out a three-month pilot art psychotherapy program on the museum’s premises. The program was held for a closed group of 10 participants, following an open call. During the long-lasting period of economic, political and social crisis that Greece was facing, the two institutions have been collaborating in order to offer participants a space for self-expression, creativity, critical thinking and for reducing anxiety through art making while simultaneously engaging participants with the museum collection.

During the autumn of 2020, the Cluj Cultural Centre implemented a pilot project consisting in a cultural initiative oriented towards reducing the symptoms of burnout in a group of 11 people, offering participation in a series of specially designed creative workshops to this group of people with burnout symptoms. Developed in co-design process and built on practical exercises using various artistic techniques, the workshops contributed to the development of imagination and emotional intelligence, stimulated the ability to express, reduced anxiety and cultivated self-esteem with the final purpose to help people overcome their burnout with time.