Welcome to Lucy J Turner, the newest member of the CG team who is our artist in residence on the Healthy Communities Together Co-Lab programme.

Image alt-text: Co-lab participants Alan, Kia and Sophie in a lively discussion.

Create Health, DataCaroline Fedash7 November 2024glosdataday

Introducing new CG board members this Summer

Welcome to our new board members bringing a wealth of experience to the team. Anne has worked in broadcasting and journalism and led the University of Gloucestershire School of Creative Industries. Jacqueline is a coach and writer and will be our voice for nature, supporting innovative approaches designed to engage creative practitioners, community groups to address the intertwined ecological and climate crises that we are grappling with.

Creative Health: UK State of the Sector Survey

The UK State of the Sector Survey was conducted between February and April 2023, to help understand more about the creative health sector in the UK. It was conducted as a collaboration between CHWA; the Wales Arts, Health & Wellbeing Network; Arts Health & Wellbeing Scotland; and Arts Care (Northern Ireland).

Create HealthCaroline Fedash20 February 2024Creative health, arts on prescription

'Not a Single Tree but an Ecosystem: Building Cooperation, Communication and support’

Pippa Jones, CG’s founder and director was speaking at the Culture, Health & Wellbeing (CHWP) Alliance Conference in Barnsley as part of a panel convened to discuss how arts organisations and the health sector can work better together.

How did the Off We Go project go?

Find out more about the Off we Go project and the impact joining in with the activities had on those taking part.

Thinking differently about creative health

Research shows that participation in creative activity and art can reduce stress, improve self-esteem, and promote recovery.

But the therapeutic value of participatory arts extends far beyond benefits to individual health: in facilitating and amplifying authentic creative and cultural expression by and for marginalised communities, it also has the potential to reduce health inequalities on a much broader scale.

Create Health, Equality&InclusionCaroline Fedash25 May 2023

What if health funding followed wellness not illness?

This is the question that sits behind our Create Health strand - a series of test projects to develop and understand how to live well. Our experience in Gloucestershire and evidence drawn from practice across the UK and internationally, confirms that arts, creativity and culture are a fundamental part of living well.

Create Health, Create Local, FundingGuest User19 January 2023Blog

Providing Creative Health in Gloucestershire during Lockdown: read the paper here

Gloucestershire Creative Health Consortium’s composed a paper documenting their responses to the Covid-19 pandemic, and subsequent lockdown periods from 23rd March 2020 to 19th July 2021. This paper includes observations and experiences from consortium partner organisations, delivering artist facilitators and individuals who accessed Creative Health over this time and is available to download now.

Create HealthCaroline Fedash9 December 2022Create health, arts and health, arts on prescription

Creative Age Programme in Gloucestershire

Creative Age is an arts-based, social community project for people living with dementia and their carers who still live independently. Participants take part in focused creative group sessions facilitated by experienced artists, exploring imaginatively with collective story-making, seated movement, dance, music, visual stimuli and poetry, with content driven by the participants’ interests. Before the pandemic, creative sessions were followed by socialising over tea and cake, hosted and coordinated by Bethesda Church and committed volunteers (who also support the artist-led sessions).

Create HealthCaroline Fedash10 March 2021

How Mindful Photography Can Improve Mental Health

Over the last year (both pre and post covid!) Ruth Davey has been running mindful photography courses across Gloucestershire to improve the mental health of the participants. This mindful approach to photography uses a blend of photography, mindfulness and being in nature to slow down, reduce stress and relieve anxiety and depression.

Create HealthCaroline Fedash21 January 2021Create health, mindfulness, photography

Arts & Health South West - Stories from the Annual Conference

We were delighted to be part of the Arts & Health South West Conference in November 2020 and to be part of this podcast series of stories recorded on the day. The stories speak of the incredible challenges experienced during the last year from the Hospital, Medical School, & Care Home, as well as amazing examples of how artists & the cultural sector rose to those challenges

Create HealthCaroline Fedash11 January 2021Create health, Cam & Dursley Creatives

Creative Trade Route partners collaborate to make scrubs for Gloucestershire medics

Collaborating with the University of Gloucestershire fashion design course, ex students, lecturers and course leaders, ACP, Create Gloucestershire, Dressing for Medics, and Emma Willis we quickly mobilised an efficient and skilled set of volunteers who could cut, sew, pack and deliver garments to approved NHS standards and fit.

Create HealthCaroline Fedash2 September 2020Creative Trade Route, university of gloucestershire

What’s happening in Create Health…

Back in July, I attended the Culture, Health and Wellbeing Alliance Meeting with 30 people from across the UK. Each of the organisations attending provided an update on their current projects from AHSW’s Art’s and Health mapping to social prescribing and the latest research into loneliness and social isolation. This blog provides a snapshot of the event with links to further reading and networks if you’d like to find out more about any of the organisations or projects discussed.

Create HealthCaroline Fedash20 August 2020Create health, arts & health, arts on prescription

How co-production underpins the Gloucestershire Arts on Prescription consortia

Hi I am Lucy Garrett and I manage the lead consortia partner Art Shape. I wanted to just briefly talk about how the Gloucestershire Co-production consortia model works.

Create HealthGuest User4 June 2020

Connection and creativity in a time of crisis- what might the arts and cultural sector learn from the food sector?

I am watching with admiration as the food sector responds to the Covid-19 crisis. Top notch chefs, take away restaurants, food banks, community kitchens, street based teams of neighbours, van drivers all now working together in radical and innovative ways.

Create HealthCaroline Fedash20 April 2020Corona, social prescribing, arts & health

Catch up with CG's Sector Support Manager for Arts on Prescription

We caught up with Carrie Creamer to find out more about her role as Project Manager for arts on prescription - working alongside arts organisations delivering programmes in Glos - as well as her own chance encounter in a hospital setting which delivered a moment of joy amongst the worry and waiting.

Create HealthGuest User4 September 2019arts on prescription, arts & health, carrie creamer

Arts & Health Creative Lab

This Arts & Health Creative Lab will explore Arts and Health and Arts on Prescription* with a focus on Gloucestershire’s delivery. We will share experiences from a number of different arts and health providers from the perspectives of practice and evidence.

Create HealthGuest User16 July 2019arts on prescription, arts & health