Connection and reparation: Narratives of art practice in the lives of mental health service users

Abstract

This article reports on research which set out to explore the meanings attached to community-based arts practice within the lives of individuals with enduring mental health issues. The research was a collaborative venture, with the first phase culminating in a film, which montaged the lives and works of the artists involved. The audio-visual narrative interviews yielded rich data, which may be analysed to explore a number of themes and issues pertinent to understanding this participant profile. However, this article focuses on specific strands in the narratives which enable an exploration of the meanings attached to art practice and to different forms of engagement in the arts. What such meanings may tell us about the individual's strategies for survival, recovery and positive psychological functioning is discussed. The discussion centres on how learning from narratives can be brought to our developing understanding of positive psychology and the role of art practice in well-being. The concluding part of this article looks briefly at how consideration of both positive psychology and psychotherapeutic processes can further our understanding of how art practice and its narratives impact on individuals with enduring mental health difficulties.

Keywords:

• narrative
• mental illness
• art practice
• audio-visual
• positive psychology

Acknowledgements

This research was part funded by the Arts Council England and the South London and Maudsley Charitable Trust. Special thanks must go to all participants, researchers and co-ordinators, some of whom are all of the above. Thanks also go to Helen Shearn of the South London and Maudsley, Maxine Walker, Emily Candela and Mark Crawley of the Widening Participation Central Unit at the University of Arts London for their tireless support.

Notes

1. Credit for the burgeoning interest in 1st person narratives of people with mental health difficulty which reframe the experience of mental illness based on service users’ own testimony must go to Professor Gail Hornstein. Her continuing efforts to demonstrate the paucity of the medical model of illness have been highly influential. See, for example: Agnes's Jacket: A Psychologist's Search for the Meanings of Madness (Rodale, 2009).

2. See the Thou Art website: http://www.thouart.org/

3. University of the Arts London.

4. HealthTalk Online being an example of how stories gathered as research data can also be disseminated and used for the benefit of the general public seeking stories of the experience of a range of illnesses: see http://www.healthtalkonline.org/