Maridulu Budyari Gumal: Sydney Partnership for Health Education Research and Enterprise, also known as SPHERE, is an academic health science partnership changing the face of Australian healthcare. They are hosting two events in June to help bring attention to their creative research outputs.
Artists to the Rescue: Collaborating to Improve Health Care
Presented in association the The Black Dog Institute, this dynamic and interactive panel session will explore the myriad ways art can be used to create and share health knowledge for diverse audiences in compelling, engaging and inspiring ways. The panel discussion will be led by Dr Helen Vatsikopoulos, an experienced practitioner and current academic in the Journalism program at the University of Technology, Sydney. Each project featured in the showcase draws on different art forms – from textiles and sculpture to poetry and video – highlighting the many ways that the arts can enrich conversations on health(care) and how research can be communicated using visual, performative and literary means.
Project’s featured will include:
Topsy Turvy: COVID Meaning Making through Art
COVID-19 has been a surreal collage of experiences. At times it has felt chaotic but we’ve found ways through with different stories. The ‘Topsy Turvy’ exhibition – created through a unique collaboration with SPHERE Council members and the SPHERE CCI&KT Strategic Platform – uses art to document, share, and generate new insights into COVID-19 experiences.
More information can be found here.
Crafting Care: Stitch it for Dementia
A game of snakes and ladders, a diamond, a set of keys, a mask, climbing roses on an archway … What do these have in common? The panel is the brain child of the Knowledge Translation and Consumer and Community Involvement Strategic Platform (SPHERE KT), which forms part of Maridulu Budyari Gumal: the Sydney Partnership for Health, Education, Research and Enterprise (SPHERE). We will be exploring how art can be used to create and share health knowledge in compelling ways.
More information can be found here.
SUCCEED Child Feeding Alliance
For a multitude of reasons, whether short term or long term, there are babies, children and adults whose bodies need to access their food and nutrients via a tube. Sometimes via the nose or directly inserted into the stomach or bowel. The simple fact is that these tubes allow people to access food and nutrients which keep them alive. But while that may be simple, this daily reality can often be fraught with isolation, shame and fear. Kate Disher-Quill, A Melbourne based multidisciplinary artist, collaborated with SuCCEED (The Supporting Children with Complex Feeding Difficulties) Project to create a series of portraits surrounding seven families with ‘tubie kids’. The project aims to share the challenges and vulnerabilities of these mothers while celebrating the courage and resilience. It also gives a voice to these children, who just like any other child, need to be nurtured, loved and accepted.
More information can be found here.
The event will take place on the 6th of June from 3pm to 5pm at the UTS Great Hall, Level 5, Tower Building, Ultimo NSW 2007. More information can be found here.
Art + Science/ Health = Wellbeing
This workshop series explores how arts-based approached enable people to connect, express themselves and share knowledge about important health and social issues. These projects also engage diverse populations, generate empathy and tackle inequalities.
Featured workshops include:
Crafting Care
12-2pm Tuesdays 31 May, 7 and 14 June
Textile artist Michele Elliot will be crafting care, inviting others to join her in making a collaborative work that responds to the ‘Stitch it for Dementia’ project she facilitated, while asking us all to consider what care means to us.
Emotional Landscapes
12-2pm Wednesdays 1, 8 and 15 June
We will be exploring the emotional landscape of climate change through collage and creative writing, creating an evolving artwork that will help inform future research and practice addressing the nexus between climate and mental health.
SPHERE Project Live Drawing
12-2pm Thursdays 26 May, 2 and 9 June
Anton Pulvirenti will do live drawing, illuminating SPHERE projects that address living well together across the life span. Anton will build the story of health collaborations across research, clinical practice and consumer lived experiences
The series will take place from the 25th of May to the 18th of June, hosted at the Tower Building exhibition space, level 4, Building 1 UTS.
