Creative Health
Vital Arts’ Participation Programme brings creativity into hospital life by offering uplifting arts experiences at the bedside, connecting patients with creative opportunities beyond hospital, and supporting new ways of working through artist-clinician collaboration. The programme helps improve wellbeing, strengthens community links, and builds creative health skills across Barts Trust.
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Arts Encounters
From bedside performances to pop-up workshops, Arts Encounters brings inspiring creative moments to patients and staff across Barts Trust.
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Creative Pathways
Creative Pathways connects patients with local arts opportunities and supports local creatives to work with clinical teams, building skills and capacity in the community.
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Innovate with Art
Innovate with Art drives creative health innovation by partnering with researchers, clinicians, and artists to develop and evaluate arts-based projects.
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Commission workshops
Artists commissioned by Vital Arts to produce site specific work deliver arts workshops and share insights into their practice and techniques with staff and patients.
A legacy of creative participation
Over the years, Vital Arts has delivered a diverse range of participatory arts projects across Barts Health NHS Trust, offering patients meaningful, creative experiences during their hospital stays. These initiatives have spanned music, theatre, film, visual arts, and literature - all designed with inclusivity, imagination, and wellbeing at the fore.
Children’s wards came alive with projects such as ‘Spill the Magic Beans’, delivered by Apples and Snakes, a storytelling and installation project inspired by myths and nature; and Comedy Club 4 Kids, which brought professional comedians to deliver performances tailored for young audiences. Film Club empowered young patients to script, shoot, and edit their own short films, giving voice to their unique perspectives and experiences.
For adult patients, including those living with dementia or receiving long-term care, programmes like Musical Favourites (in collaboration with the City of London Sinfonia) delivered live classical performances to the bedside; Spoken Word Workshops invited patients to write and share poetry and personal reflections; and Music in Hospitals & Care featured intimate concerts by professional musicians, creating calming, uplifting environments across wards.
Projects such as One Moment in Time, a theatre-based workshop including beautifully crafted puppet theatre, live music, one to one bedside storytelling and puppet making, and Archive Adventures with Whitechapel Gallery, which used historical hospital artefacts as creative prompts, helped patients reflect and reconnect with their identities. Meanwhile, Fun Palaces celebrated community-led creativity in hospitals through drop-in art, science, and performance activities open to all.
Together, these initiatives showcase Vital Arts’ enduring commitment to arts participation that uplifts, connects, and transforms hospital environments for patients of all ages and backgrounds.
Recent projects
Creative Health at Barts…
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Kazzum Arts
Arts activities for children at Whipps Cross Hospital
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The Friends Music Project
The Friends of the Royal London bring a regular rotation of musicians to RLH