Amplifying Artscapers event boosts feelgood factor at Storey’s Field Centre
An Amplifying Artscapers event at Storey’s Field Centre celebrated the programmes developed with a growing network of schools and delivered in partnership with family therapy charity Cambridge Acorn Project, Fullscope, and research partners from UCL and ARU.
Organised by Cambridge Curiosity and Imagination (CCI), an arts and well-being charity founded in 2007, the event was a tribute to all the charity’s supporters.
Patron Robert Macfarlane thanked “everyone who has supported CCI to facilitate more opportunities for children and young people across the county to have precious arts-in-nature experiences, and to share our growing evidence base that this work can be generative for good mental health”.
Robert said: “Looking around this room and hearing about the everyday heroes that change lives in that slow, hard, day to day work – teachers, academics, parents, artists, scientists – this organisation and others like it are joining them, and they become greater in the sum of their meeting. The stories we’ve heard are about relations, of new joinings happening, of growth and goodness and justice emerging from that.”
Headteachers David Aston of Wilburton C of E Primary School and Paul Jones of Hampton College Primary, Peterborough, discussed artscaping being used as a methodology to intervene early to support children’s wellbeing, so children who might sit slightly below the threshold for external mental health interventions could be supported to prevent or avoid issues from escalating.
David said: “Artscaping has had a huge impact on the individual, on children who struggle to self-regulate. It gave those children time to talk and space to explore and be creative with one-on-one time with adults.
“The transformation on individual children has been remarkable and something which, without the capacity-building this project gave us, we wouldn’t have been able to achieve.”
Ruth Sapsed, director, Cambridge Curiosity and Imagination, said: “About 70 people joined us – artists, teachers, parents, volunteers, academics, city and county council community development colleagues.
“The room was filled with hangings from the fantastical forest and artwork created by children in projects across the county.
“It was a joy to see so many connections being strengthened.”