Dementia Arts Trust – art, joy and re-found memories

Through art activities given in care homes and community groups, Dementia Arts Trust has been bringing joy to people living with dementia and their carers for nearly a decade.

In this episode, as part of Podcasthon, an initiative to raise awareness for charities worldwide, I chat with trust founders Joanne Robinson and Melissa Haddow about how these art activities build self-esteem, evoke memories and show those living with dementia what they can still accomplish, despite their diagnosis. 

Joanne and Melissa share poignant stories, like the emotional moment when a participant recalled cherished memories of her daughters while painting, leaving everyone in tears – the happy kind, of course! 

Joanne and Melissa are keen to share how proud they are of their teachers, who are not just art instructors, but empathetic guides who help individuals connect with their pasts, and that the success of these classes is not just in the art created, but in the connections formed and the human spirit revitalized. 

Art can have a profound effect on emotional wellbeing, offering experiences that traditional medicine cannot provide, as everyone at Dementia Arts Trust has witnessed time and time again.

Visit Dementia Arts Trust here

Little Art School at creativityfound.co.uk

Join the Creativity Found Collective at creativityfound.co.uk/joinus

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Researched, edited and produced by Claire Waite Brown
Music: Day Trips by Ketsa Undercover / Ketsa Creative Commons License Free Music Archive - Ketsa - Day Trips
Artworks: Emily Portnoi emilyportnoi.co.uk
Photo: Ella Pallet

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Transcript

1:41

Probably more important than anything, it shows people living with dementia what they can do. A dementia diagnosis often comes with this gamut of you now, can't do this, you can't do that, you can't do this. This is something you can do. Not only can you do, but it can become a really beautiful, important part of your life. The conversations you have around the pictures is just as important as the outcome for a dementia class. For 10 minutes, memories pouring out about her daughters. And as she left, we were all crying, everyone in the room sobbing, but in a happy way. It was so happy. Like the joy was visceral. And then as she left, she took each of our hands and she said, thank you for giving me my girls back today. Can you imagine if you gave a pill to someone and that happened? It brought them joy, it brought back memor. Welcome to this special edition of the Creativity Found podcast. As part of Podcasthon for one week, more than a thousand podcasts will highlight a charity of their choice. Not surprisingly, I have chosen to highlight a charity that champions creativity in adults. But the connections to Creativity Found don't stop there. Joanne Robinson is one of the founders of this charity and has her own Creativity Found story which you can Hear on episode 99 of this podcast. She is also a member of the Creativity Found collective with her business that encourages grownups to start drawing and painting the Little Art School. She is joined today by fellow founder in both the Little Art School and the charity we're going to talk about, Melissa Haddo. Hi, Joanne. Hi Melissa, Lovely to have you here. Joanne, can you start us off please by telling me what the charity is and how it helps people? Well, the charity is called the Dementia Arts Trust and it's been going for 10 years. In fact, I think next month is going to be 10 years since our very first lesson. And what we do is we give art lessons to people living with dementia and their carers. And there's no tablet, there's no pill you can take for dementia. But there are non pharmaceutical approaches like ours which honestly, if you could bottle it or put it into a pill, it's magic, it's absolutely magic. The effect it can have on people. So we give art lessons, it creates connections, we build self esteem and I think probably one of the things that's really taken us aback over the last decade is, is the joy, isn't it? Yeah, definitely. You get this joy in the room and probably more important than anything, it shows people living with dementia what they can do. A dementia diagnosis often comes with this Gamut of you now can't do this, you can't do that, you can't do this. Was. This is something you can do. Not only can you do, but it can become a really beautiful, important part of your life. It takes away from being about the dementia and about. It takes it back to the person again. Yes. Yeah. Oh, that's so beautiful, Melissa. How does this logistically work? So how do you actually get these artistic activities to the people that you want to help, the people with dementia? So we work with community groups and with care homes, and we have a team of teachers who have been trained on the dementia side of things as well as the art side. And they take everything with them in a suitcase into those locations they go with all the paper, the pictures. There's always a team of two to go in, and they provide all the materials that are needed to run the class. And have you ever had any kind of barrier to that? Do you ever find it difficult taking it to the places where you think it's needed, or do you find people are very open to. Yes, please come in and help? Yeah, probably. Our only limitation is, so we're a charity, we offer these classes completely for free in care homes and in community groups is funding. So we do a lot of fundraising as a charity, and we've been fortunate enough to get some grants. So our only barrier is how many classes can we deliver? Because we could deliver. You know, at the moment, we're geographically limited to Ayrshire, so we're across Ayrshire, which is a county in the west of Scotland, just south of Glasgow, and we deliver around here. But we'd love to go to other places. And we do get messages from people in, you know, in Brighton and Wales, say, please, could you come here? It's like, well, we would love to come here. We've just got to work out how to do it. And like all charities, you know, in the end, this comes down to funding. Yeah. We will definitely get into more detail about how people can help with the funding side of that. Towards the end of the episode, either of you, can you tell me some of the lovely things that you've seen, some of the really good reactions from people that you've helped? Are there any that, you know, stick in mind or. There's so many. So many. Yeah. Can I tell the one about the Bird Center? Oh, God, yeah. Yeah. Right. Okay. So this happened in October, and it was really special, and this kind of thing happens all the time. But the difference was because Melissa and I also, as long on top of the Dementia Arts Trust, we also have a children's charity, the Little Art Stars. We founding trustees of a mental health charity that works with children and we've also got a business, so. So we don't get to be at many of these classes unfortunately. And we would love to. And at the beginning we were. And it's really special and you go, you go to more than I do, but I. It. But there was just one class that took place in October. We were celebrating the 10 year anniversary of our business. So within six months or 12 months of setting up our business, we set up the charity. Which was mad and yeah, in hindsight, I mean, great, but crazy. Like my husband said, you make millions and then you set up a charity. But don't let the startup phrase when you're barely surviving, set up charity. But anyway, that's the way we rock. So we were celebrating this 10 year thing and each morning we had different groups, community groups in our care homes. They were coming into the Burns Centre, which is in Ayre and having these art lessons and it was a lovely celebration. So the class, it's a very structured format, these classes, it isn't that you sit down and just create. It is a structured scaffolded lesson and we've created that and it's been tested by St. Andrew's University and I can talk, we can talk about that later. But the class was actually a cape, a three tier celebration cake. You know, you can imagine like a wedding cake. And on the top of the cake was a heart. So they're drawing this cake and a lady's drawn the cake but instead of doing the heart at the top, she drew a Dolly's face. And then she began around the painting to draw Dolly's faces. And then she became very emotional, crying, but also smiling and laughing, saying, oh, oh, I've remembered, I've remembered. When my girls were little, we drew Dollys together and she began to write I love you all over the page and said that was what we did. And then these memories began to pour out. Oh, and we went on the beach and we did this and oh, it was just for 10 minutes. Memories pouring out about her daughters. And as she left, we were all crying. Yeah, everyone in the room sobbing, but in a happy way. It was so happy. Like the joy was visceral. And then as she left, she took each of our hands and she said, thank you for giving me my girls back today. Can you imagine if you gave a pill to someone and that happened. It brought them joy. It Brought back memories. And we're so dependent on pharmaceutical cures, we forget the brain's a magical thing. And if you can tap into something and art does that, music does that, there are. There are dementia charities working with music. Drama can do that, dance can do that. Claire, you know that, that all of these things can do that. And we're just. That's what we do. We do it with the art and we've been doing it for 10 years and we're really. When I say we, our team are really good at this. They were really good. There's probably another really important point when we're talking about joy. Right from the start, Joanne knew that we could teach people to paint and draw. That included teachers. But initially we went for more experienced artists. However, when you move into, like, the charity side of it, that empathy and engagement with the people with dementia or with the children dealing with trauma, it's not a skill you can teach. It's something that comes very naturally. And watching our teachers in those classes is just as joyful as the experience for the people coming to do the class. Very special people, very special. It's amazing team that go out there. Yeah. As a business and charities, we understand that the little art school, it's always been the same. The Dementia Arts Trust and the little art stars. We build self esteem. That's what we do. We do it by teaching art classes. Every part of our business and charities is about self esteem. So when you're recruiting, an interview, if someone's trying to talk about their art experiences and art, et cetera, et cetera, we're kind of going, so, have you ever worked with people with dementia? And if they haven't, honestly, you can tell straight away anyway, can't you? You can just see when, when their face lights up about the idea of going into care homes, you just think it. We've, we've, we've got it. We're really disinterested in whether you could do an oil portrait. What we want to know is, can you touch somebody's heart? Can you bring something out of them? And that's. That's our team. And then. And the success of the whole charity is down to them and what they deliver. Yeah, that's a really valid point and an interesting thing to talk about, about the people that are delivering and the extra that they have to give. You mentioned about the structure or maybe the way of structuring the actual sessions. So you're not just going, right, here's a bit of paper, do something. Tell me how you have come up with that. What goes into the thinking behind what your teachers do when they go to a care home? Yeah. So our little art school method is quite scaffolded that we begin with shapes. Whether we're teaching a five year old how to draw a mouse or whether we're teaching our online adult students, you know, how to start, everything begins with shapes. So when we started the charity 10 years ago, we didn't know this was gonna. Whether it would work, by the way. It was probably one of the most frightening things we've done that first class, remember? In truth. Yes. We ran this class and we're like, is it gonna work? And it was magic. They loved it. Yeah, we knew it was. And then about a year later, we went to St Andrews University to an amazing psychology lecturer called Maggie Ellis and said, look, it works, but we don't know why. And she said, well, why don't we work on that? And what they worked on was the structure of the class. So it's the scaffolded approach. Yeah. I want to explain how it works. The scaffolded. So basic. Starts with very, very simple shapes and then you just build up and layer from there and the teachers talk the students through it at each stage. It sounds very structured, but there is always a little bit of flex, especially in the dementia classes, around how it ends up. And the conversations you have around the pictures is just as important as the outcome for a dementia class. So the designs are based on. On trying to evoke memory. They're very reminiscent things like caravans or a pipe or. And we tailor it for the demographic of the class. So we have some men's classes, we have some mixed classes. We had to do a whole load of redesigns for the men's classes because they were just basically, say no more flowers, please. So we did pipes and kilt because we're in Scotland. Yeah. Although sound very Scottish. A Mini Cooper. A Mini Cooper that brought. But the. One of the ones that's evoked probably the most conversations is we've got a washing line with a big pair of bloomers on and it just always, always goes downhill. We've definitely seen a real shift through the 10 years, I think because of the product. It is. It started very much as a very female orientated audience. We were going out to including in our school classes. And over the years it has evolved into very much a real balance between men and women coming to the classes. Yeah. During COVID obviously everything, you know, in the lockdowns, we couldn't go into care homes or community groups, and they were the last places to open up. So we adapted it and went on to do videos. So we did live zooms with people in their homes and in the care homes. I mean, some really funny moments, but also some very moving moments as well. And there is an interview somewhere. We must make sure. It's on the website, actually, with one of our artists, Alec, and his wife. And they talked about what art had come to mean to them through the classes. I mean, he has his work framed all around the house and at one point his wife. So Alec has dementia and his wife is his carer. And she said, she said, and I do the classes too. And Alec just went. She's not very good. But his work was astounding and he will just lose himself in it. It's become a really, really important part. Of their life and it became a big part of how his, the children could engage with them over that period as well, because they could get involved in what was going on. And. Yeah, something to talk about. And I wonder, thinking with my creativity found hat on, and the stories that I've heard throughout all of the episodes of that podcast is that they may be coming back to something that they haven't done for whatever reasons, reasons we've spoken about, Joanne, for example, you know, being told you weren't very good or there are more important things to do. And so some people are probably coming to something that they never realized that they would love so much or never. Realized was missing time and time and time again. And we think the idea of children doing with grandparents being able to do something like this is joyous. Actually, we've just created a pack which we will be putting up on our website. Do you want to explain that, Louis? Because that was your idea. So it is. Well, it's actually off the back of something you did through coding, which was kind of a learning tree. Yeah, it's like a tree of memories and a tree. It's a therapeutic exercise using a tree. So we created a video doing it first of all with children, and then we created one that was very dementia specific. And it's creating a tree of memories. It's a really lovely exercise. We engaged with some of the care homes and some of the families with the idea. And the first care home we took it into has adopted it as an engagement for when a new resident comes in to talk about, you know, all of their family members memories, things that brought them joy. And then they create this tree of memories. And it's a reference point Then for the carers, when they're talking to them around day to day activities or finding out what they. I mean, it might be the only art activity they do while they're in the care home, but it's. It brings out all of this, these discussion points which are there then there for the carers and other visitors to talk to them about. Yeah, it's a lovely exercise. And we're going to be selling the pack and all the proceeds will go to the Dementia Arts Trust. So we'll be selling the pack on our website. We get it and it includes prompt cards, so it gives an idea of the types of questions to ask and the types of areas to. To discuss. And then they can build from there and obviously and create their own extra bits that they want to add on to it. Yeah, brilliant. Why did you start. You said you were going, is this going to work? You said you did it quite soon after starting the little art school, so why did you think it was needed? Why did you think it would be a good idea that people would want? Well, we both have family members who had dementia, so we both understood. We understood how heartbreaking dementia can be, how difficult it can be. And I was just having a chat with somebody. Everything starts with a chat. It's a random chat. So I was having a chat with somebody who happened to work at Air United Football Club and they have. They had a charity and they were running a project called Walking and Talking. Yes. And it was literally in conversation. Oh, I wonder if you could do drawing with people living with dementia. And for me, the connection was my grandma. And I just thought, oh, let's try it. And it began from that and we got this funding, this very small pot of funding to try it out and we did it and it was. Yeah, it was amazing. It was amazing. And we knew that. We knew from that moment, from that very first class taught by Ilana, our lovely teacher. This is so long ago. And. And we knew it was going to fly and it did. But we initially, we would bring people into the studio and we would do it with them. And then we realized that the mobility issues that were sometimes involved meant we couldn't get to people. And that was why we created Art in a suitcase, which means we can go anywhere, it's totally transporting. And we engage with Alzheimer's Scotland, with nhs, with various dementia groups across the community, and they bring together the groups of people who will benefit and then we can just go in and deliver. Ah, I see. Tell me how anybody can connect with you, contact you Tell us what you need, what you want, where they can go, how they can help, everything you want to tell the listeners to send them back in your direction. Well, go to our website. So it's Dementia Arts Trust and we've got a. Contact us. We've got to just get. Yeah, we put all of the information. There and, and you can get in touch with us and we'd love communicate with people wherever you are in the UK or beyond and chat to them about what we do and why. We're really proud of it and we're really proud of our team and moving forward on it. You know, we're planning where we're going to be going over the next 10 years. We've got a big celebration this year in September. We're holding a 10 day exhibition with a symposium in the middle where we'll be bringing other non pharmaceutical approaches to living with dementia together and talking about the positives. We'll be selling artwork to help with our funding and we'll just be holding the most amazing workshops. So we'll be bringing all our community groups and care homes into this beautiful venue, the Cutty Sark in Air. Yeah. And we'll be holding the classes. It's going to be, it's all centered around World Alzheimer's Day as well. So in mid September and we'll be, we'll be doing that. So that will all be up on the website as well. And maybe we can even put some of the paintings that we're going to be selling up there and 100% people artists donate them, which is so generous. And 100% of the cost of the painting will go straight to the charity and to delivering more art classes. Brilliant. Oh, that sounds like a really, really fun event. Thank you so much, Joanne and Melissa. It's been so lovely to find out more about this. Thank you. What a super episode. This has been my first episode as part of Podcasthon. Although the initiative is in its third, third year now, do visit www.podcasthon.org to discover hundreds of other associations through the voices and talents of amazing podcasters. That sounds a bit boasty. Like me. You can find a link to Dementia Arts Trust in the show notes for this episode where you'll also find a link to the Creativity Found page for Little Art School. Thank you. I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you did, perhaps you'd like to financially contribute to future episodes at buymeacoffee.com/CreativityFound There's a link in the show notes if you are listening on a Value for value enabled app such as Fountain Truefans or Podcast Guru. Feel free to send a few sats my way and if you have no idea of what I'm talking about, you can find out more by listening to my sister podcast called Podcasting 2.0 In Practice.