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Archive for the ‘art’ Category

Days with My Father

Posted in art, tagged , , on March 9, 2010 |

I revisited this site when a friend from college emailed it to me (“thinking of you”).  I love that about Facebook/internet, that these things that move people so much find their way to you again after their initial flurry.   The bad jokes and shocking warning emails tend only to make it around once (thankfully).

Photographer Phillip Toledano’s collection of photos and comments about his intense love of his father (both parents really) and his time with him after his mother’s death is a moving account of the potential beauty of the end of life.  Not beauty as his father saw it – as a young Hollywood actor.  But beauty in the depth of human compassion and connection and the growth/learning that is possible only when we face the end of a long, love-filled life.

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A Penelope Update 3.2.2010

Posted in art, tagged , , , , , , on March 4, 2010 |

Sitting in a new, fully wired conference room in the new, fully wired (with caffeine and technology) Soref Learning Commons in the UWM library, with 3 really smart students and a really smart colleague – in a heated discussion about discovering themes/images/iterations of the Penelope story that will inform our discussions with family, staff, and residents in long term care this fall.  This project is a thrill…

By way of update, we’ve received a Wisconsin Humanities Grant and a Wisconsin Arts Board grant to support the project (via Luther Manor).  We’ve received funding from the Office of Undergraduate Research to support two of our hearty team of students (paying them to do research!).  The Brookdale Foundation and Helen Bader Foundation has granted us $16,000 and $20,000 respectively to support this project.  The budget is large – so we have a ways to go – but we’re on the way.

The next steps for the student team are to create a presentation on the project for the National Association of Activity Professionals conference here in Milwaukee on April 16th.  Three members of the Sojourn Theatre ensemble are coming into town (from all three coasts – New York, LA, and Chicago!) to participate in that presentation and in a training the next day at Luther Manor for staff, volunteers, students and ensemble members.  The training is an introduction to person-centered care (or person-directed care, or relational care…) and creative engagement.  We see this project as a way to demonstrate the core skills needed to get staff/family/residents on the road to more holistic care – which emphasizes the quality of life, not just physical maintenance.

Fore more on this project, see The Center on Age & Community website, and click on Creativity.

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My Hearty Research Team!

Posted in art, cultural phenom, long term care, public education, theatre, tagged , , , , on January 22, 2010 | 1 Comment »

Classes start up on Monday, and on Tuesday, we have our first scheduled meeting of the “Penelope Research Team,” 5 students and my colleague Robin Mello.  We are entering the research stage of the Penelope Project, which will facilitate discussions with family, staff, and residents at Luther Manor Health Center’s nursing home (among other local settings), about the myth of Penelope from Homer’s Odyssey.

In the fall of 2010, UWM students will help facilitate these discussions, and creatively present their substance back to the groups.  Then in the spring of 2011, family, staff, residents, and students collaborate with professional theatre company Sojourn Theatre to create a site-specific performance in the Health Center, inspired by the myth and by the discussions.

This semester, we gather information to fuel this exciting project -
What are interesting themes/images in the myth of Penelope?
What models of arts programs are there of this scale in long term care?
What other artistic iterations of Penelope have been created?
What myths from other cultures might resonate on a similar level to the Penelope story?
What is the current state of long term care for family? for staff? for residents?
How are issues of aging taught (most effectively) to children K-12?  to students in higher education?  LTC professionals?  The general public?

Our hearty research team will tackle these questions to inform the creation of our educational guide to the project, and to inform the project (discussions and play creation) itself.

Stay tuned for more installments as this amazing project rev’s up!

We received our first grant to support the project in December – from the Wisconsin Arts Board’s Creative Communities program – and hope to share news of more with you soon!

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Seeing the “AHA” in Their Eyes

Posted in art, cultural phenom, long term care, public education, tagged , , , , , , , on September 28, 2009 |

In September I had the great fortune to two training workshops. The first was a TimeSlips creative storytelling training organized by a dedicated group of volunteers who are part of the Minnesota Dementia Care Professionals network.  130 people squeezed themselves around long tables in the chapel of a nursing home in St. Paul, MN. Joyce Konczyk, the organizer of the training, used her webinar savvy to enable me to do a live demonstration on the 3rd floor of the nursing home that was live fed to the computer/screen down in the chapel.

The second training, held at Cedar Villages in Mason, Ohio, was part of ASA’s/Metlife’s MindAlert program.  “Imagine That: Creative Engagment in Dementia Care, is a day-long workshop that invites participants of all backgrounds and work responsibilities to feel the excitement and freedom of creative expression, and then imagine ways to use it to engage with the older adults in their lives.  We play with words through stories and poetry as well as simple movement exercises.

In both workshops, toward the end of what is a long, but exilarating day, you could see the excitement in people’s eyes.  In Ohio, the teams around each table created multi-tiered projects around a traditional “activity” for people with dementia.  “Sorting poker chips” became an opportunity for creating playful sculptures; for becoming a make believe monetary system that could buy you your dreams;  and a pleasurable sensory experience as you ran your hands through an enormous bin of chips.  And this was from the table with the CEO, who shared the day with us.

With two small children at home, and a husband who travels for work, the travel for trainings is a tough juggle for me.  But seeing the “aha’s” in their eyes at these two fabulous trainings gives me the sense that there is a longing for change that might just use creative engagement as its starting point.

The October training line-up:

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Community, Cultural Development

Posted in art, cultural phenom, long term care, public education, tagged on September 28, 2009 | 2 Comments »

There is a growing number of programs in the United States (and across the world), that link community activists and social justice workers with the arts and humanities – often by involving students through service learning programs.

This is a potential and powerful mechanism for transforming long term care.  Imagining America, a consortium of colleges and universities that seek to deepen and support this kind of engaged scholarship, studied theses growing programs. Culture and Community Development in Higher Education is a rich resource for anyone interested in learning more about these  programs.

The Center on Age & Community, which I direct, broached this topic at our 2009 think tank – “How Can We Radically Transform Activities in Long Term Care” – to which we invited artists, culture workers, caregivers, and leaders/changemakers in long term care.   The white paper is now available on CAC’s website – free/downloadable.

CAC is now at work on three collaborations in this vein, our ongoing TimeSlips creative storytelling project; The Penelope Project; and the Communal Table, in which two adult day centers (one in Wisconsin and one in Michigan) will create communal meals and then share the experience with each other virtually.

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Hope and Health

Posted in art, cultural phenom, public education, tagged , , , , on August 31, 2009 | 1 Comment »

It’s all one system.  The way we think is of course, linked to what is happening in the rest of our bodies.  “I think therefore I am” doesn’t separate the mind from the body, it announces that the two are linked.

A new study out of the University of Minnesota finds that hopelessness leads to increased risk of stroke among women.  Among 559 women tested, those who answered questions about the future and their personal goals and revealed a sense of hopelessness were more likely to have thickening of the neck arteries, a sign for stroke.

The question remains whether it is possible to change attitude and in turn change the women’s risk of stroke.  But I would suggest that the role of the arts in public health to simultaneously build a sense of self and community has not fully been explored.

Check out Mike White’s new book, Arts Development and Community Health – it’s a little dense at the start (tracing the linkages between arts and health through the British govt/health system), but the framework is enormously helpful to Americans who continue to see the power of the arts through either a medical lens (therapy) or social justice (community development) lens, but not both.

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Inspiring meeting of Wisco museums

Posted in art, cultural phenom, tagged , on August 25, 2009 |

Not many meetings are inspiring…that’s for sure.  But today, I attended a gathering of the 5 museums in Wisconsin planning programs for families with dementia.  5 museums, normally in competition for funds and members, agreed on a common name, looked for economies of scale in trainings of staff on the basics of dementia, shared plans for developing a common flyer to describe all 5 programs, shaped plans for a common evaluation of their programs when they emerge from the planning stage into the implementation stage.

Wisconsinites will soon be the richer for the collaborative spirit of the John Michael Kohler Art Center, the Museum of Wisconsin Art, the Racine Art Museum, the Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum, and the Milwaukee Public Museum.   What an amazing project!

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Facility Focused on Creativity

Posted in art, long term care on August 4, 2009 |

I just read about this facility in the UK that has infused creativity and sensory stimulation into its design and mission.  Can the US be too far behind? And can we do it in a meaningful way, not just a marketing way?

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Wisconsin Museums Visit NYC

Posted in art, cultural phenom, disability, tagged , , , , on August 4, 2009 |

In July, I accompanied museum educators from 5 Wisconsin museums to NYC to learn about developing programs for families with dementia.  The John Michael Kohler Art Center (Sheboygan); the Museum of Wisconsin Art (West Bend); the Racine Art Museum (Racine…); the Milwaukee Public Museum; and the Leigh Yawkey Woodson Museum (Wausau) were all awarded planning grants from the Helen Bader Foundation to support the development of such programs.

Over the course of two days, we visited MOMA, The Museum of Folk Art, and theMetropolitan Museum of Art to learn and observe (I actually presented a session on arts/creative engagement programs across the country).

The buzz was tremendous.  The museum educators (and one community partner) had some amazing ideas of how to work together in coalition – to share trainings, promotion, etc.  to let families know about all their programs.  This is truly a new wave…

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Museum in a nursing home

Posted in art, cultural phenom, disability, public education, tagged , , , , on June 12, 2009 | 1 Comment »

It’s really amazing what MOMA and other museums are doing now – offering educational programs in art to people with dementia and their families.  But a NYT’s article today explores an even more radical step – bringing the museum to the nursing home.  At the Hebrew Home in Riverdale, they have opened a Judaica museum.  Residents can tour on a daily basis.  Outside guests have a chance to see not just the images and objects, but living examples of American Jewish history – the residents.

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