Helium

Mission / Aims

Helium is an arts and health company for children, operating nationwide. Helium is committed to nurturing and honouring creativity as a natural resource for a child’s wellbeing.

Helium:

• supports a dynamic, child-friendly, family centred, holistic approach to children’s medical provision, within community, primary, and acute healthcare contexts.
• produces creative arts interventions for, with, and by young people which respond appropriately and adequately to their needs. Helium’s services are participatory and collaborative.
• works with highly skilled artists in residence to develop meaningful, arts engagements at a local level. They work with respect to the healthcare setting as a community, responding to patients, families, visitors, and staff and facilitating partnerships between departments.
• aims to uphold the arts and health field as a creatively charged environment with which artists can engage, where artforms can be challenged, enriched, and extended to produce ground-breaking, inventive new work which engages with the development of children’s arts in Ireland

Areas of activities

Helium is currently progressing four creative programmes:

• Helium’s Community Health Programme provides interactive performances in waiting areas for children aged 0-3 years in local health centres during Child Development Clinics and Early Intervention Clinics in disadvantaged areas with the aim of improving attendance.
• The Artists in Residence Programme is a sustained engagement whereby an artist works with a healthcare community over a number of months. In 2009, the residency project saw four artists working collaboratively with approximately 500 children for 20 weeks across four hospitals using Ait Eile, the hospital webportal, to share their work.
• Helium’s Artists on Call Programme provides hospitals with a regular performing artist on a once-off or short-term basis. This artist can facilitate workshops or purpose designed, site specific performances which travel bed to bed.
• The Professional Development Programme offers training and support to artists and healthcare staff wishing to engage in arts and health practice.

Artform(s)

Architecture, Dance, Film, Literature, Multidisciplinary, Music, Theatre, Visual Art