Wakefield Council’s Museums and Castles Service safeguards and makes accessible approximately 110,000 artefacts that document and record the human, social and cultural history of Wakefield and district from the distant past to the present day.

The Service’s focus is on enabling people to explore the district’s collections for inspiration, learning and enjoyment. This can have a impact of their quality of life, influencing the community’s levels of aspiration, health and well-being and skills and employability.

Art in Mind

Art in Mind was a six week pilot project delivered in Castle and Wakefield Museum. Wakefield Council Museum Service and Wakefield Council Health Improvement Team commissioned Dr Jane Howroyd, a freelance creative workshop facilitator, to devise and deliver workshops with the aim to:

• increase wellbeing though the “5 ways to wellbeing”
  • Connect
  • Be active
  • Take notice
  • Keep learning
  • Give
• use arts activities and museum collections to offer health and weight loss information to participants in an informal environment – ‘stealth health’;
• help participants to feel more comfortable achieving their personal goals; and
• build confidence to try new things and potentially access other services which may help to aid their weight loss and wellbeing.

The target audience for this project were participants on Wakefield Council’s Weight Management Service. The sessions were offered as part of the interim offer available through the council’s services to complement more conventional weight management interventions. Participants were personally invited by letter.

The initial pilot consisted of six morning sessions in Castleford Museum and six early evening sessions in Wakefield Museum. This was later extended with a further six sessions in Wakefield Museum.

The sessions included art, design and craft activities including landscape and still life drawing, collage, painting, silk and ceramic painting, acid etched glass, block printing and lino cutting as well as the opportunity to handle museum objects. Through these activities the participants were given the opportunity to learn more about portion control, sugar content in drinks, calories in alcohol, and healthy food choices, etc.

One of the sessions invited participants to look at the changing size of dining plates through history using ceramics from the museum collection. From this experience, the participants designed and decorated their own painted plate. This activity gave participants the chance to consider portion control and the influence of plate size when making healthy meal decisions.

The “5 ways to wellbeing” provided the framework for evaluation for all of the sessions. The participants were invited to answer a series of questions and make comments at the start and end of each session.

Successes

The sessions gave the participants the opportunity to discuss issues such as healthy eating, lifestyle, diet, home life and offered them a chance to find support from one another.

One participant mentioned not getting out of the house very often. The group helped by giving suggestions and ideas of things they could do to get them to feel more comfortable about leaving their house.

During one session, three participants started to share information about their diabetes, how they managed it and experiences they had. From this it was possible to signpost to key information about the Diabetes UK website, ‘sugar swap’ leaflet and information about low sugar fruit options.

The feedback from the sessions showed progressive change. One particular participant gave a consistent ‘after’ feedback scores at around 3-4 in early sessions. By the last few sessions, all were given a top score of 5, suggesting an improvement in wellbeing.

The participants who took part in all twelve sessions said that they were sad that the sessions were ending but that they intended to keep in contact with each other. They were also pleased to talk about what they have done with the items that they had made throughout the course including keeping them on display and wearing/using them regularly.

In addition, some participants aimed to continue to be creative, with one participant attending mainstream adult workshops in the museum service and others purchasing their own art equipment to use at home. Several participants said that they would like to attend a discrete swimming class after hearing about it during the sessions. 

Challenges

After the first few sessions the number of participants reduced but seemed to plateau, as some people decided that it wasn’t for them.

The number of participants attending the sessions in Castleford was lower than those in Wakefield. This was possibly due to the venue or perhaps the time of day that the sessions took place (during work hours).

Six weeks was not long enough to really see significant changes, and so a continuation of sessions was offered, but the group had lost momentum as there had been a break in delivery.  The next phase of the pilot will offer two concurrent 12 week programmes at both Wakefield Museum and Pontefract Castle – both in the early evening. 

Outcomes

Feedback showed that participants appreciated the opportunity to connect with other people in a similar situation and have space to take notice and learn for pleasure, health and wellbeing. Several participants said that they felt special to have been invited to the sessions and that it had given them opportunity to engage in an activity ‘out of the house’. One participant said that taking part in this group had inspired them and given them the confidence to try more new things and another participant said that they were planning to attend another local art class as a result of these sessions.

Authors:

Jane Howroyd, Freelance Creative Workshop Facilitator

Vicky Shearman, Senior Cultural Development Officer, Museums and Castles, Wakefield Council

Rachel Wilcox, Programme and Practice Manager, Sport and Health Improvement, Wakefield Council

Contact: museums@wakefield.gov.uk

Twitter: @WFMuseums

Website: www.wakefield.gov.uk/museums