AHN NEWS: September 2006 This month's issue of AHN News is dedicated to the COMMUNITY-BASED ART. I interview Anne and Christopher Ellinger about the growing field of SOCIAL HEALING ARTS. I also review the book, The Beginner's Guide to Community-Based Arts, and this month's featured links are the Crossroads Project and the Community Arts Network. It is truly exciting to see the myriad ways the arts are being used as a powerful catalyst for positive change within communities. This issue of AHN News just scratches the surface. I invite you to send me other resources on this topic, and I will post them next month in Readers Respond -- please email me at marydaniel@artheals.org. Wishing you a creative and community-building September, -Mary Daniel Hobson, Director, Arts and Healing Network |
| AHN INTERVIEW: Anne & Christopher Ellinger
-Anne & Christopher Ellinger Anne & Christopher Ellinger are a dynamic duo in the field of art and healing. They originally connected with the transformative power of the arts through their work with Playback Theatre and founded their own group called True Story Theater. Since then, they have become one of the leading voices in the field of Social Healing Arts. They have launched a web site at www.socialhealingarts.org, sponsored events, and conducted a research study on the field funded by the Fetzer Institute. In addition to their passion for the movement, they bring to the Social Healing Arts a background in philanthropy and wealth counseling as the founders of More Than Money, the 50% Club and the Zing Foundation. As a result, they are uniquely qualified to answer the question of how to best support the growth of the Social Healing Arts. The following interview was conducted via email in July 2006. Mary Daniel Hobson: Tell me a little bit about your background and how your journey led you to become involved in the Social Healing Arts? |
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| Anne & Christopher Ellinger: The two of us met 25 years ago, at a social change community in Philadelphia that greatly shaped our views and life. People there believed that to build a just society, healing had to happen on all levels - within ourselves, our families and neighborhoods, as well as within our institutions and the culture as a whole. Christopher had been in a mime troupe, and I had been part of a feminist theater company, and our first big date together in August 1981 was to a fantastic weekend gathering of political theater groups held in Minnesota. Then we put our attention as activists and educators elsewhere for two decades. Like many activists, we didn't view the arts as political or effective enough to be our focus. However, in the national conferences we held we brought in an unusual form of theater that helped participants tell their stories in the moment called Playback Theatre. We fell in love with Playback Theatre. It's a magical and powerful form that helps people know they've been heard as individuals and as a community. In 2001, we got trained in it and started our own troupe called True Story Theater. We came to appreciate deeply through our experience of helping many different communities (such as people with cancer, inner city teens, and more) tell their stories, what a potent force the arts could be to open hearts and minds and bring people together across differences. We became impassioned by a vision of participatory arts being far more integrated into work for social change, and two years ago started Zing Foundation to apply our skills as organizers and social entrepreneurs to help make that happen.
Anne & Christopher: By social healing arts, we are referring to arts that generally (but not always) share three qualities: INTENTION to strengthen or mend the social fabric, create social action, or spark substantive dialogue on social issues, PARTICIPATION of ordinary people - from dozens to thousands - in art making, affirming the creative force within all people), and lastly EVERYDAY VENUES where people live and work, not just in museums, galleries, and theatres. Many terms are used in this field -- arts for social change, for social action, for community development, for civic dialogue, for civic engagement and more. We're not attached to the specific language “social healing.” We want to help the field as a whole (by whatever name) become better known, respected, and supported. One of our favorite examples is the AIDS Quilt, because so many people have been personally touched by it. The intention of the project, from the very start, was not only to help individuals mourn and heal from the loss of their loved ones (personal healing), but also to create social action to stop the disease by making vivid and personal the extent of the loss (social healing). It has inspired vast participation, with hundreds of thousands of people making gorgeous quilt squares commemorating people who have died. You can imagine people sewing and weeping, in the everyday venue of their homes, witnessed by family and friends. And when the compiled 38,000 quilt panels were displayed in 1996 it was one mile long down the Washington Mall to Capitol Building where thousands walked by awed by the beauty and by the magnitude of the loss of life of so many people who were so obviously loved. |
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Anne & Chris Ellinger: Last year we were contracted by the Fetzer Institute to do a research project exploring the field of arts for social healing and what is needed to help it grow. After several months of interviewing dozens of artists from many different backgrounds and modalities, as well as others promoting the field (through training, funding, evaluation, information dissemination, and more), we had to stop and write up some of what we learned. We were very inspired by glimpsing what an incredible wealth of creativity is happening, as well as humbled by how much support could be helpful for it to grow to realize its potential social change impact Mary Daniel: What do you see as the biggest challenges and/or opportunities for growth in the field of Social Healing Arts? Anne & Christopher: Some key needs are to assist partnership building between artists and NGOs (and others doing important social healing work); to reach funders and demonstrate the impact of arts for social healing; to train more artists in how to do effective and lasting social healing work (e.g., learning principles of community development); to evaluate and document the lessons from their work; and, lastly, to communicate more widely the positive benefits and low costs of arts for social healing. Mary Daniel: You recently held a conference called HeART Beat. Tell me a little bit about this -- how did it go? |
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Mary Daniel: What did you learn from this amazing gathering? Anne & Christopher: The big question after the conference is, “What now?” Our original intention for the gathering had been to introduce new people, especially potential funders, to the power of the field. This happened some, but not as much as we had wished. What happened, instead, is that we saw how hungry many practitioners are for connection with each other. So many people at the conference exclaimed, “Thank you for bringing us together!” and “I thought I was the only one!” As a result, we have started a yahoo listserv, socialhealingarts@yahoogroups.com, which anyone may join, and a website www.socialhealingarts.org that includes a discussion forum. We have a follow-up potluck gathering planned for September. Mary Daniel: You have also been very involved in the field of philanthropy - how does that work impact or influence your work with social healing arts? |
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Mary Daniel: Do you believe art can heal and if so, how? Anne & Christopher: Oh yes! We have seen this healing before our eyes. With projects like the AIDS quilt and our own work with Playback Theatre, we have witnessed people go through a powerful transformative journey that the arts helped facilitate. We have seen the arts help people overcome some of their isolation and connect with other people. It has helped people process feelings that are difficult for them (e.g., raw grief, fear, anger) that come from personal and family issues, and many times from bigger issues and events that have affected many, many people. Working with the arts increases compassion and understanding, and helps people bridge differences. And it enables people to gain new perspective on their own circumstances and the bigger events of which they are part. Mary Daniel: What advice do you have for someone interested in getting involved in the social healing arts? Anne & Christopher: First, get training so you do the work well, both achieving something artistically that will move people, but also strengthening the skills of social healing work that will truly make a difference. Second, partner with others doing the social healing work to amplify the effectiveness of what you are doing. Make sure they are taking responsibility over time for managing the impact in the community in which you are working. Finally, get passionate. If it speaks deeply to you it will more deeply touch others. For more information about the Social Healing Arts, please visit www.socialhealingarts.org |
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FEATURED BOOK:
Beginner's Guide to Community-Based Arts: Ten Graphic Stories about Artists, Educators, and Activists across the United States
By Keith Knight, Mat Schwarzman, and many others
"Every community has issues. The world needs people willing to be part of finding solutions. You and the people in your community can collaborate on art for social change. The stories in this book prove transformation through art happens everyday. The job may be challenging, but it comes with the great power to unlock human creativity.” -Keith Knight and Mat SchwarzmanThe Beginner's Guide to Community-Based Arts is a wonderfully unique book about community-based arts. Presented in comic-book fashion, it recounts the stories of ten different projects across the United States from the Medea Project which uses the arts to rehabilitate women prisoners in California to Healthy Lifestyles in New Mexico which stems the tide of diabetes and ill-health in the Native American community by teaching native traditions, performances, and art. This book even includes the 2002 AHN Award Winner Lily Yeh of the Village of Arts and Humanities, who has transformed inner-city Philadelphia with the creation of community-generated parks, mosaics, and other artworks.
However, this book is more than just a set of great examples - it is also a guidebook about how to start a community-based project or how to deepen an existing one. Each section includes concrete group exercises to engage community issues. The book is structured around an acronym - CRAFT, which stands for the 5 stages of the creative process: Contact, Research, Action, Feedback, and Teaching. Because of its comic-book format, it would be a great resource in working with youth. However, don't be misled by the format into thinking this book is for youth only. It is full of inspiration and guidance for anyone at any age who is looking for a way to begin or strengthen a community-based project.
This 171-page softcover book was published by New Village Press in 2005 and sells for $19.95. Click here to order through New Village Press.
FEATURED LINK:
Crossroads Project
www.xroadsproject.org/
Crossroads Project for Art, Learning and Community helps students, artists, educators and community groups to plan, implement and evaluate effective community-based arts projects. Based in New Orleans, Louisiana, and online, the project director is Mat Schwarzman, co-author of The Beginners Guide to Community-Based Arts. The site includes resources such as excerpts from this book and more.
FEATURED LINK:
Community Arts Network
www.communityarts.net
I have featured the Community Arts Network (CAN) in the past, but I had to mention them again as they are such an invaluable resource on community-based art. As their web site describes, “The Community Arts Network (CAN) supports the belief that the arts are an integral part of a healthy culture, providing both intellectual nourishment and social benefit, and that community-based arts provide significant value both to communities and artists.” CAN offers an extensive collection of articles and resources in their Reading Room, a newsletter called API News full of inspirational projects, a blog called CAN Blog featuring news and insights on community-based art, and more.
FEATURED POST:
The Arts & Healing Connection Center
Each month, we publish a highlight from the Arts & Healing Connection Center.
This month we feature a post by artist Patricia Roshaven who started a wonderful dialogue on the Connection Center with her question about the value of art therapy for deepening the power of one's creative expression as an artist. She writes:
“Hello -- I'm wondering if you agree that one of the side effects of art therapy, besides become more whole, is art that is more interesting, has more depth and is more original. It seems that becoming whole through art therapy is a way to become a first-rate artist. I'm very interested in your comments. Thank you."
To read the whole dialogue this question sparked, please click here
To learn more about Patricia, visit her blog at www.roshaven.com/blog.
This post appears on the Connection Center under the forum, "Ask a Question...Give Advice".
| READERS RESPOND Readers repsond to last month's issue on Art and Spirit
I was sent your link by a friend. I live in England, and I am just about to extend my painting style into spiritually inspired art as I have found a psychic ability since my father died and we started 'talking'. It seems I am destined to become a medium at some point and already my information from spirit people and psychic info for people here, has all been validated. Here is my link to my website and art: www.patrickserver.co.uk/vjw/design.htm |
Christia Cummings writes:
Vanessa Wagstaff from England writes:
READERS RESPOND
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