Creative Health

Vital Arts’ Participation Programme brings creativity into hospital life through three strands: Arts Encounters, Creative Pathways, and Innovate with Art. Together, they offer uplifting arts experiences at the bedside, connect patients with creative opportunities beyond hospital, and support new ways of working through artist-clinician collaboration. The programme helps improve wellbeing, strengthens community links, and builds creative health skills across Barts Trust.

Arts Encounters

Arts Encounters brings inspiring creative experiences to patients and staff across Barts Trust - from bedside performances to pop-up workshops - making meaningful moments through art part of everyday care.

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Creative Pathways

Creative Pathways connects patients with local arts opportunities beyond hospital and supports creative practitioners to co-create bespoke programmes 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 that improve patient outcomes and address health inequalities across the Trust.

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Commission workshops

Artists commissioned by Vital Arts to produce site specific work are invited to spend time with patients, delivering arts workshops and sharing insights into their practice and techniques.

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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 their heart.

Children’s wards came alive with projects Spill the Magic Beans with Apples and Snakes, a storytelling and installation project inspired by myths and nature; and Comedy Club 4 Kids, which brought professional comedians to deliver side-splitting 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.