Art, health promotion and community health: Constructing the ‘Madrid Salud’ model

Abstract

This study breaks new ground by exploring the relationship between art and an aspect of health, health promotion and community health. Madrid Salud is a public body of the Madrid City Council that is responsible for this purpose. In 2011, it launched the ‘Art and Health’ project, which incorporated art as a tool for this. The study sets out to gather, document and highlight data on the ‘Art and Health’ project. The impact of collaboration between art and community health is not only shown by quantitative data but also through creative and artistic tools that reveal the potential of these actions. The results are organized both quantitatively and qualitatively using the numbers of participants, the social and cultural agents involved, workshops and artistic productions. The examples obtained confirm that art is a valid tool for opening up ways for the public to take part in preventive healthcare and health promotion.

Leveraging Arts for Justice, Equity, and Public Health: The Skywatchers Program and Its Implications for Community-Based Health Promotion Practice and Research

“…A large and growing evidence base demonstrates the value of cross-sector collaboration between community-based arts and health promotion to substantially increase impact and shape equitable policy (Ávila et al, 2019; Gordon-Nesbitt & Howarth, 2020; Madsen, 2019; Wang et al, 2004). Sonke et al’s (2019) groundbreaking white paper “Creating Healthy Communities Through Cross Sector Collaboration” presents a powerful call for partnerships across public health, arts and culture, and community development to address the upstream issues of collective trauma, racism, social exclusion and isolation, mental health, and chronic disease.…”