In three episodes, our expert practitioners share insights from experience about the value of creative interventions for community building and health and well-being initiatives. Episodes explore projects delivered in the UK, Uganda and the US in a range of contexts from clinical and community-based settings to refugee settlements.
Edugie Clare Robertson
Musician and Sound Healer
Scotland
Edugie Clare Robertson, musician, sound healer and affiliate artist with UNESCO RILA reflects on her experiences of using the arts in community development and wellbeing work. Edugie shares her experiences of working on three different projects in the UK. She demonstrates how arts-based projects can enable varied groups – from marginalised communities, to refugees and asylum seekers, and parents of neonatal babies – to feel cared for, connected to, and valued by wider society.
Don McCown
Professor of Public Health
USA
Don McCown, Professor of Public Health and Director of the Centre for Contemplative Studies at West Chester University, Pennsylvania, shares his experience in clinical, educational and community-based settings. Don has been using arts-based approaches to encourage mindfulness and improved wellbeing among various socially marginalised groups, including homeless veterans and elders seeking to overcome loneliness. Don highlights the value of creative interventions in creating safe spaces for self-expression.
Rosco Kasujja
Clinical Psychologist
UGANDA
Rosco Kasujja, Clinician and Director for the Department of Mental Health and Community Psychology at Makerere University, Uganda, tells us about COSTAR (Community-based Sociotherapy Adapted for Refugees) a research-based project with Congolese refugees based in Uganda and Rwanda. Rosco reflects on how the arts-based initiative ‘Changwale’s Got Talent’ developed organically as part of the project, building trust and rapport between researchers and community members, and creating a legacy of arts practice for wellbeing in the refugee settlements where COSTAR was active.
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