Event
Arts for Health Partnership Programme in West Cork is sharing drawings, paintings, poems, and written recollections, reflecting the memories and present-day concerns of the participants who took part in ‘Bringing Art Home – In West Cork’. The exhibition runs from 17 September – 6 November 2021 at Uillinn: West Cork Arts Centre.
Day Care Centres in West Cork have been closed since March 2020 and this has meant that for the last 18 months members have not been able to get together for social, health and creative activities.
To try and find a way to create social engagement and make a pathway for participation in the arts, the Arts for Health team came up with ‘Bringing Art Home’ with Programme Manager Justine Foster and artists Fiona Kelleher, Justin Grounds, Sharon Dipity, Anne Harrington, Bénédicte Coleman and Michael Greenlaw. Each artist was commissioned to devise a postal project with their Day Care Centre participants in mind – a letter of invitation to correspond with the artists and engage in a creative exchange of drawings, poems, thoughts and memories.
In May 2021, to coincide with Age & Opportunity’s Bealtaine Festival, Ireland’s national celebration of the arts and creativity as we age, Arts for Health published a booklet sharing excerpts of the creative exchanges. This exhibition, curated by Michael Greenlaw and Bénédicte Coleman, shares first-hand the original correspondence shared at such a historic time. On view are drawings, paintings, poems, and written recollections, reflecting the memories and present-day concerns of the participants.
The exhibition shows the first series of correspondence from Bringing Art Home, along with additional work produced by participants as part of Ways & Means, the second phase of the project which has been ongoing since May, led by artists Michael Greenlaw and Bénédicte Coleman.
‘We hope you find the exhibition of interest; we believe it shows the tremendous creative talent lying within older people in our community and the amazing wealth of knowledge they possess.’ – Michael Greenlaw and Bénédicte Coleman, Curators and Artists
