The Connections Between Art & Wellness

Just What the Doctor Ordered

New studies reveal art's significant impact on human health and wellness.

By Elizabeth Chubbuck Weinstein

Imagine visiting your doctor,

and instead of prescribing you some sterile unpronounceable bottle of pills, he or she said simply: “Visit your local art museum.” A group of physicians in Toronto are doing just that, as part of a community access program begun two years ago by the Royal Ontario Museum.

Seems far-fetched? Increasingly, research is showing that having an aesthetic experience such as gazing at a painting or listening to music—or better yet, engaging in a creative activity like singing or drawing—provides a host of therapeutic benefits, ranging from lowering stress and healing mental anguish to improving memory and fostering empathy. In fact, when we perform art-related activities, studies show that the pleasure centers in our brains actually “light up,” meaning that serotonin, better known as “the happy chemical,” is released.

These days we could all use an extra dose of “happy”. The prolonged stresses of the COVID-19 pandemic are taking a toll on all of us, affecting not just the health of our bodies but also the state of our mental and spiritual wellbeing. According to a Household Pulse Survey conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) and the Census Bureau, around thirty percent of the country is experiencing symptoms of clinical depression, compared to around seven percent reported last year. In addition, the survey showed that around thirty-six percent of people are feeling more anxious about life right now compared to around eight percent last year. The Centers for Disease, Control and Prevention (CDC) reported on a similar study performed last June which concluded that adults are struggling with “considerably elevated adverse mental health conditions associated with COVID-19,” ranging from “anxiety/ depression symptoms, trauma/stress or related disorder symptoms, substance abuse, and serious thoughts of suicide.” During a so-called “normal” year, anxiety levels for many of us tend to increase during the holiday season, affecting even the calmest of temperaments. Now that a new year has dawned, perhaps creativity offers a path towards a healthier 2021.

The study of neuroaesthetics explores the impact of artistic beauty on the human psyche and biological well-being. Various entities, including museums, hospitals, and arts-based nonprofits, are engaging in the interaction of the arts and wellness.

Courtesy of the LSU Museum of Art.

Our unique capacity to imagine something and make it real is what sets us humans apart from other living beings. One need only look back at history to find a veritable list of ingenious and creative accomplishments: from the 20,000 year-old cave paintings in Lascaux, France to the 1851 opera Rigoletto to 2020’s SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, our creations originate within our minds. Humans are hardwired with the instinct to create. So, it should come as no surprise that our brains automatically respond positively when encountering aesthetic stimuli.

When we engage in creative activities or simply have aesthetic experiences, we stimulate the vagus nerve, the main component of the parasympathetic nervous system, which is responsible forall bodily activities that occur when we are at rest. Sometimes referred to as the “rest and digest” system, it is the opposite of the sympathetic nervous system which controls our “flight or fight” reaction to dangerous or threatening situations. The vagus nerve is the longest cranial nerve in our bodies and carries an extensive range of signals between the brain and many important organs, including the intestines, stomach, heart, and lungs. This means the vagus nerve helps control mood, immune response, digestion, and heart rate, all of which have an impact upon mental health.

The expanding field of study examining the effects of art on our health is called neuroaesthetics. This study is at the intersection of psychological aesthetics, biological mechanisms, and human evolution. Scientists in this field are studying what happens to our biological circuitry when people experience or create art, using mobile devices and “smart” wearable sensors to measure the amount of change that occurs in respiration, temperature, heart rate, and skin responses.

Susan Magsamen is the founder and executive director of the International Arts + Mind Lab, an initiative of the Brain Science Institute at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. In an article titled “Your Brain on Art: The Case of Neuroaesthetics” for the journal Cerebrum, she states: “The field of neuroaesthetics offers research-based evidence that a variety of arts-based approaches may work to improve quality of life, mobility, mental health, speech, memory, pain, learning, and more. Such interventions could potentially lower the cost and burden of chronic disease, neurological disorders, and mental health issues for millions of people.”

Visual arts are not the only form of creative practice that have proven to have an impact on health. Programs like Dance for Parkinsons—offered through local dance companies the New Orleans Ballet Association and Of Moving Colors—have found much success in offering creative movement classes to disabled populations.

Photo courtesy of Of Moving Colors Productions

These alternative practices are catching on. Mikhayla Harrell, Museum Educator at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art, advocates for routinely stimulating the vagus nerve as an effective means to achieve a healthy work/life balance. Harrell is also a longtime instructor of yoga, which utilizes mindfulness, meditation, and breathwork techniques to help promote the “relaxation response” produced by the vagus nerve. Harrell says, “When we look at art, listen to music, or move our bodies in an artful way, we soothe the nervous system and then we are able to respond rather than react. People can program themselves [to relax]. It’s called ‘toning’ the vagus nerve.” When this nerve is toned, we manage stress better, have less anxiety, get more sleep, and generally attain all the good things that come from being more relaxed. Harrell brought a holistic mind-body approach to her work at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art in New Orleans, which since last March has been offering free virtual wellness programs such as “Art & Zen” and yoga. In November, Harrell and her museum colleagues staged a Virtual Wellness Summit in conjunction with the exhibition Entwined Ritual Wrapping and Binding in Contemporary Southern Art. Tagged as “A Soothing and Uplifting Day of Free Art and Mindfulness Programming,” the presentation of virtual talks, tours, and guided art-making activities explores the connections between art and healing.

In addition to art museums, cultural organizations representing a wide array of artistic disciplines offer wellness programs, often in partnership with healthcare facilities as part of their community outreach efforts. Some programs are available to anyone who signs up and others target specific health issues. Dance for Parkinson’s, founded in New York in 2001, is now a global program with local affiliates, among them the New Orleans Ballet Association (NOBA) and Baton Rouge’s Of Moving Colors Productions. Similarly, NOBA and the Southeast Louisiana Veterans Health Care System collaborate to produce “Freedom of Movement” currently offered virtually. Set to music by local musicians, this creative movement class is designed for mobile as well as seated and wheelchair based veterans.

A growing trend, many hospitals have started to incorporate aesthetic approaches to therapy within their clinical practice. Music therapy is one of several options offered by Arts in Medicine at Baton Rouge General. According to their website, “Breath-enhancing exercises allow patients to develop a self-management plan while strengthening their pulmonary capabilities, increasing their motivation and improving the results of rehabilitation.” Our Lady of the Lake, also in Baton Rouge, offers patients opportunities to create art as well as to behold works of art on permanent display in both the Mary Bird Perkins Cancer Center as part of their ongoing Healing Arts program and, more recently, within the newly built Children’s Hospital. Taking their program a step further, Children’s Hospital in New Orleans recently expanded their patient offerings by establishing a dedicated art therapy suite inside their new Behavioral Health Center. According to the hospital’s website, “With a dedicated room and art therapist, each child and adolescent benefits from one to two expressive therapy groups per day, including music and art, which is at the core of the inpatient behavioral health program at Children’s Hospital.”

Through the Arts in Medicine program at Baton Rouge General, patients with lung problems are encouraged to practice breath-enhancing exercises associated with music.

Photo courtesy of Baton Rouge General

The notion of art being therapeutic itself is not new. Art has served as a form of communication from the very beginning. Art therapy as a discipline and practice that dates back to the 1940s. The American Art Therapy Association was founded in 1969, and the profession of art therapy has grown rapidly since that time. To practice art therapy, one must obtain a master’s or PhD in the field and receive board certification. Art therapists work with people who are challenged with medical and mental health problems as well as individuals seeking emotional, creative, and spiritual growth. Tiffanie Brumfield, for instance, teaches Art Therapy at Louisiana State University and manages her own private practice, Prescriptive Arts. She is also a consultant for Jefferson Oaks Behavioral Health in Baton Rouge. As Brumfield aptly states, “People don’t always have the words to express feelings, especially when in distress.” In her practice, she encourages patients to create an image related to the issue that is troubling them. “When we take something that is internal and then externalize it in the form of an image, we are able to become more objective because we can then quite literally ‘see’ it. This concrete form [which is now outside of us] allows us to act upon it, to look at it and address the problem.” Not only do images facilitate our ability to talk about sensitive subjects, but they also enable us to share our experiences with others in a way that only a visual language can impart, as in the popular saying: “A picture paints a thousand words.” As Brumfield points out, “Creating a visual representation makes the issue less threatening and provides a sense of empowerment. When the image is shared with others, people feel calmer. Art can promote a sense of mastery [over the problem], providing a release and allowing us to connect with others. Creating requires action, and when we act on a problem, we change.”

Living in a time where human interaction and stimulation is so limited, many people feel a sense of disconnect and loneliness. To combat such feelings, Brumfield encourages people to take up some form of creative practice, and makes it a point to differentiate between the concepts of “solitude” and “isolation.” “When we engage ourselves in creative activity, we don’t feel alone,” she says. “Instead, we become engrossed in the act of making, which engages the senses and focuses our attention, creating calm.” Over time, perhaps, we may enjoy ourselves and become invested enough in the creative activity to attain “flow,” the mental state of being completely present and fully immersed in a task, so much so that our creativity seems to “flow” out of us. According to Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, one of the cofounders of Positive Psychology and author of several books, including Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience, people who can achieve and control “flow” are significantly happier. “Flow” just may be the secret to achieving happiness—or at least attaining a more satisfying life.

The Ogden Museum of Southern Art is one of many museums across the country incorporating wellness programming into its offerings. Pictured is an instructor leading an online yoga class in the galleries.

Photo courtesy of the Ogden Museum of Southern Art.

The data is clear: Art is good for our health. No prescription is required to receive the boost in mental and physical wellbeing that may be gained from a museum visit or a symphony performance. Better still, such benefits are enhanced when embracing one’s own creativity by painting a picture, singing a song, or learning a dance. An artful life makes for a happier existence, and, as it turns out, a healthier life, too. h

Elizabeth Chubbuck Weinstein is an independent curator, writer, and creative consultant based in Baton Rouge.

Ogden Museum of Southern Art New Orleans Virtual Wellness Seminar: ogdenmuseum. org/ogden-museum-virtualwellness-summit/

Dance for Parkinsons: danceforparkinsons.org

Prescriptive Arts: prescriptivearts.com