Artwork title: Drawing on Experience ... The future is yours to create
Artist: Drawing on experience group
Facebook: @ttcworcs
Worcestershire's Time to Change champions engage with communities across the county to encourage conversations to happen between those with lived experience of poor mental health and those who don't have this experience. With lockdown preventing the face to face conversations the team turned to using social media as a way of supporting and engaging with people. Drawing on Experience was the team's first online event and we formed a Facebook Group for budding "artist". We teamed up with Colourwheel, a local art teaching company, who kindly allowed us to use some of their online lessons to encourage group members to start drawing, painting and chatting online throughout the recent lockdown. Using the grants from the Time to Change team we were able to provide a comprehensive drawing kit to the first 50 registered Facebook Group members.
The drawings and paintings in the Talking with Art event from the Drawing on Experience team partially demonstrates how well the group developed, but it was the conversations and engagement across the group that supported people's mental wellbeing.
Hopefully soon the Worcestershire Time to Change champions will be back out at festivals and other local events engaging face to face with our communities. There are grants available up to £500 for champions and others to run events of their own in their local communities. For more information please visit the time to change website
Next stop: Royal Porcelian, The reception, Severn Street