helenfarrellart

Mountpleasant Mural community project in MISA courtyard, St James Hospital Dublin. May - September 2017 . These paintings on view in the   Mercer’s Institute for Successful Ageing (MISA)    courtyard  in St. James's Hospital, Dublin 8 are from the  Mountpleasant Mural Project, a very successful community outdoor arts endeavor, which was one of the events of the Ranelagh Arts Festival 2013. Members of the public in Ranelagh were invited to add their brushstrokes and signatures, to these paintings, which celebrate local areas and events.  This project was one of many integrative community art events that took place in parks, in schools and on the streets in Ranelagh during the festival.  As an artist with a special interest in    bringing art into everyday communities, I was excited to be approached by Roisin Nevin,Creative Life Co-ordinator at MISA and asked to select and prepare a collection of artpieces for a show in the courtyard in MISA. These artpie

Arts in Healthcare is a little recognised, but expanding and important area in Ireland today, having the potential to transform healthcare experiences and societal health through the Arts. I was fortunate to gain valuable and enjoyable experience in this field while working as a Creativity Facilitator for a year in a Residential Care Hospital in Dublin in 2014.  This post gives a brief overview of a wonderful and innovative summer long Outdoor Art Exhibition which we curated in the hospital courtyard. Some of our residents chose to give a comment on their input into this show -  I have included these in itallics. "Pillowcase project" "Love" - Mosaic on wood. Comment by artist "Wow!"  Our "Outdoor Art Exhibition" was especially popular, so I am uploading some images of this event, which will give a flavour of some of the work we made. "Blue Tree" - Watercolour on weatherproofed paper. Commen

.This is an area I have a big interest in, having been involved in both the arts -  as an artist and also in  healthcare - as a nurse for most of my adult life.  We are all creative beings, and when we connect with our unique creative source, we become more “whole”, helping bring together our essential connection of body, mind and spirit and thus helping maintain or restore our health.   “Creativity for Wellness” incorporates all the arts: music, the visual arts, drama, literature, gardening and movement, to name a few. “Creativity for Wellness” is closely linked with Arts in Healthcare. This discipline can best be explained as Art for Arts sake, as it is not considered a therapy as such. For example, art therapists work closely with psychologists, while Arts in Healthcare offer countless benefits towards personal and societal wellbeing by simply connecting with our creativity. Arts in Healthcare is a little recognised, but expanding and important area in Ireland today

An invite to collaborate?  An artist pal sent out an invite to painters to do a painting or drawing each week for a year for a collaboration.  I felt excited to be part of a collective like this. About ten artists from all over Ireland were involved and we shared our work on Facebook each day. It was inspiring to see how our work progressed and we had a very fine on-line exhibition among ourselves at the year end.  52 Watercolour paintings of flowers Early on I decided to do small pieces, as I knew that doing anything big would have to grapple with major life events, as they tend to pop up now and again!  It was early inthe year, and we were observing the warming up of the earth after the winter and regeneration of plant life, I put my energies into painting flowers  Most of the plants I painted I found in our garden. Others were inspired by photos I had taken previously. It was amazing to find quite a few flowers growing in what looked like a garden still very much as