Mapping of Initiatives on Culture, Health and Well-being

In early 2017, the National Museum of Contemporary Art, Athens (EMST) in collaboration with the First Psychiatric Department of the University of Athens, Eginition Hospital carried out a three-month pilot art psychotherapy program on the museum’s premises. The program was held for a closed group of 10 participants, following an open call. During the long-lasting period of economic, political and social crisis that Greece was facing, the two institutions have been collaborating in order to offer participants a space for self-expression, creativity, critical thinking and for reducing anxiety through art making while simultaneously engaging participants with the museum collection.

During the autumn of 2020, the Cluj Cultural Centre implemented a pilot project consisting in a cultural initiative oriented towards reducing the symptoms of burnout in a group of 11 people, offering participation in a series of specially designed creative workshops to this group of people with burnout symptoms. Developed in co-design process and built on practical exercises using various artistic techniques, the workshops contributed to the development of imagination and emotional intelligence, stimulated the ability to express, reduced anxiety and cultivated self-esteem with the final purpose to help people overcome their burnout with time.