3rd Workshop: Policy and Practice

Aside

Our third lively workshop looked at partnership working between Arts Council England and the Baring Foundation and National Museums Liverpool and the Department of Health.  Philip Cave, Director of Engagement at Arts Council England, described developments in terms of engaging older audiences.  He introduced two of the projects from the Arts and Older People in Care programme, a £1 million programme running over three years. In discussions we touched on the difficulty of outcomes and the tensions between health outcomes and providing a good art experience.

We then heard from two of the Arts and Older People in Care programmes – based on two distinct models which aim to embed practice. Kate Duncan, the Creative Programme Manager from City Arts, Nottingham, described their wide-ranging city-focused approach, whilst Deborah Munt, Director of We Do, West Yorkshire, described their membership model. Our speakers were generous in sharing challenges such as fitting in with care home timetables, the slow lead-in time required to develop relationships with care homes and designing programmes to cater for non-verbal needs

Finally, Claire Benjamin, Deputy Director Education and Visitors from National Museums Liverpool described their ambitious House of Memories programme.  She described both their successful engagement with policy and their commitment to providing high quality training which continues to be rolled out across the country.

The workshop stood out as a safe place in which to navigate exciting developments in arts and older people work.

resilience philip cave

Guest speakers (l-r) Claire Benjamin, Kate Duncan, Deborah Munt, and Phillip Cave