There has been a greater emphasis on the social impact of museums, as shown by the Museums Association’s (MA) vision for the sector, Museums Change Lives. A key part of the initiative is how museums can enhance health and wellbeing through partnerships with external organisations as well as meaningful participation and volunteering.
The Oxford English Dictionary defines wellbeing as “the state of being comfortable, healthy or happy”. As a principle, wellbeing connects physical and mental health, and considers our ability to function in the modern world.
The Happy Museum Project, which promotes wellbeing and sustainability, states on its website: “Wellbeing is about more than just smiles or positive emotions, [it’s] about the quality of our lives and our relationships.”
The Happy Museum highlights the New Economics Foundation’s (NEF) Five Ways to Wellbeing:
1. Connect
2. Be active
3. Take notice
4. Keep learning
5. Give
The Culture, Health and Wellbeing Alliance, which includes academic bodies, museums, associations and other organisations, was established in 2015 at the National Alliance for Museums, Health and Wellbeing to support the increasing contribution that museums and heritage sites can make in this field. As well as providing training and resources, the alliance has been collecting evidence that the sector has a practical role to play.
“Museums can provide social spaces where users can connect with new people and allow them to give their time through volunteering that gives a sense of purpose,” says Laura Bedford, the project coordinator for the alliance.
“If people are uncomfortable in clinical settings, then museums can provide alternative spaces where they feel more relaxed, safe and comfortable.”
Much supporting evidence for this role comes from the 2017 report Creative Health: The Arts for Health and Wellbeing, from the inquiry by the all-party parliamentary group on arts, health and wellbeing.
And the National Alliance for Museums, Health and Wellbeing published findings from its 2017 survey.
“The first report was a baseline looking at what was going on,” Bedford says. “The second survey builds more of a picture and overlaps with the health sector, looking at topics such as social prescribing, so we can understand the challenges and key lessons learnt.”
Elsewhere, the Happy Museum has built up a raft of case studies that illustrate the difference its members can make. The project began in 2010 when its founder and inaugural director Tony Butler secured funds from the Paul Hamlyn Foundation to commission 22 museums to trial projects that reimagine the purpose of museum.
This type of work also has an economic impact. The Happy Museum’s 2013 report, Museums and Happiness, written by Daniel Fujiwara, a researcher at the London School of Economics, quantified the value of museums to people’s happiness as £3,000 per person per year.
Museums Change Lives also argues that improved wellbeing is a moral, ethical and economic imperative. “Social problems create high costs for society and it will make a difference if museums play even a small part in reducing them,” the 2013 reports states.
The impact of wellbeing work also benefits participating museums, by enhancing their reputation, reconnecting with their original social purposes and improving their bottom line.
“Funding bodies such as the Heritage Lottery Fund and Arts Council England are looking for health and wellbeing benefits,” says Hilary Jennings, the project director of the Happy Museum. “If you adopt our principles, such as encouraging active citizenship and mutual relationships, you put yourself at the core of your community, which makes you more valuable, but also strengthens support for your museum.”
For example, Abergavenny Museum worked with the Happy Museum on a co-curated project that taught crafts to vulnerable young people. This helped the museum build links with other organisations, but the museum also found that staff benefited from improved confidence.
For Laura Bedford from the Culture, Health & Wellbeing Alliance, the NEF’s Five Ways helps museums realise that rather than targeting specific groups, their day-to-day activities can already be beneficial.
“Some museums have been going down the route of aiming provisions for particular audiences with particular needs, such as older people or those with health issues, but more organisations are now looking beyond that towards their general audiences,” Bedford says.
Museums can tailor their offerings for the needs of local communities by starting with their local authorities’ joint strategic needs assessments and working with external partners such as GPs on social prescribing.
In Nottinghamshire, Mansfield Museum has been working to improve the health of local people since the 2012 London Olympics. To coincide with a related exhibition on sport, the museum invited local clubs to put on activities in its galleries.
The success of these led to monthly fitness events run with the local leisure trust. These attracted people who would not normally use nearby leisure centres, says the museum’s development officer Jodie Henshaw.
“The museum was able to offer a traditional health and wellbeing offer for a group that found leisure centres quite intimidating,” she says.
Several venues are successfully embedding wellbeing into their everyday practice, including Rugby Art Gallery and Museum, which has made health key throughout its exhibitions, activities and projects.
In a blog post, the museum’s arts, heritage and visitor services manager Nikki Grange wrote: “There has been a subtle message flowing through the art gallery and museum: that the enjoyment of, and involvement in, arts and culture can raise our happiness levels.”
Grange added that exhibitions have been linked to wellbeing, including one on craft called Units of Knitting: The Reknit Revolution (June-September 2017), which referenced the practice’s therapeutic properties.
The museum also developed craft activities, such as reminiscence boxes for people with dementia and their carers.
Despite the benefits and the range of good work going on across the sector, challenges remain.
The most common is the need to build understanding and relationships with unfamiliar sectors, such as the health sector, as well as measuring the impact of work.
“This is something the sector doesn’t feel confident about and it is difficult, as the health sector has particular tools that they use,” Bedford says. “But if museums want to be more creative then you can co-create evaluation with the users themselves. And that side is something museums can be very good at.”
For museums new to wellbeing work, Mansfield Museum’s Henshaw recommends starting small.
She points out that venues may already be involved in relevant activities: “The kinds of things museums do, such as reminiscence projects and creative workshops, is health and wellbeing – it’s just about how we brand and focus on it.”
The Oxford English Dictionary defines wellbeing as “the state of being comfortable, healthy or happy”. As a principle, wellbeing connects physical and mental health, and considers our ability to function in the modern world.
The Happy Museum Project, which promotes wellbeing and sustainability, states on its website: “Wellbeing is about more than just smiles or positive emotions, [it’s] about the quality of our lives and our relationships.”
The Happy Museum highlights the New Economics Foundation’s (NEF) Five Ways to Wellbeing:
1. Connect
2. Be active
3. Take notice
4. Keep learning
5. Give
The Culture, Health and Wellbeing Alliance, which includes academic bodies, museums, associations and other organisations, was established in 2015 at the National Alliance for Museums, Health and Wellbeing to support the increasing contribution that museums and heritage sites can make in this field. As well as providing training and resources, the alliance has been collecting evidence that the sector has a practical role to play.
“Museums can provide social spaces where users can connect with new people and allow them to give their time through volunteering that gives a sense of purpose,” says Laura Bedford, the project coordinator for the alliance.
“If people are uncomfortable in clinical settings, then museums can provide alternative spaces where they feel more relaxed, safe and comfortable.”
Much supporting evidence for this role comes from the 2017 report Creative Health: The Arts for Health and Wellbeing, from the inquiry by the all-party parliamentary group on arts, health and wellbeing.
And the National Alliance for Museums, Health and Wellbeing published findings from its 2017 survey.
“The first report was a baseline looking at what was going on,” Bedford says. “The second survey builds more of a picture and overlaps with the health sector, looking at topics such as social prescribing, so we can understand the challenges and key lessons learnt.”
Elsewhere, the Happy Museum has built up a raft of case studies that illustrate the difference its members can make. The project began in 2010 when its founder and inaugural director Tony Butler secured funds from the Paul Hamlyn Foundation to commission 22 museums to trial projects that reimagine the purpose of museum.
This type of work also has an economic impact. The Happy Museum’s 2013 report, Museums and Happiness, written by Daniel Fujiwara, a researcher at the London School of Economics, quantified the value of museums to people’s happiness as £3,000 per person per year.
Museums Change Lives also argues that improved wellbeing is a moral, ethical and economic imperative. “Social problems create high costs for society and it will make a difference if museums play even a small part in reducing them,” the 2013 reports states.
The impact of wellbeing work also benefits participating museums, by enhancing their reputation, reconnecting with their original social purposes and improving their bottom line.
“Funding bodies such as the Heritage Lottery Fund and Arts Council England are looking for health and wellbeing benefits,” says Hilary Jennings, the project director of the Happy Museum. “If you adopt our principles, such as encouraging active citizenship and mutual relationships, you put yourself at the core of your community, which makes you more valuable, but also strengthens support for your museum.”
For example, Abergavenny Museum worked with the Happy Museum on a co-curated project that taught crafts to vulnerable young people. This helped the museum build links with other organisations, but the museum also found that staff benefited from improved confidence.
For Laura Bedford from the Culture, Health & Wellbeing Alliance, the NEF’s Five Ways helps museums realise that rather than targeting specific groups, their day-to-day activities can already be beneficial.
“Some museums have been going down the route of aiming provisions for particular audiences with particular needs, such as older people or those with health issues, but more organisations are now looking beyond that towards their general audiences,” Bedford says.
Museums can tailor their offerings for the needs of local communities by starting with their local authorities’ joint strategic needs assessments and working with external partners such as GPs on social prescribing.
In Nottinghamshire, Mansfield Museum has been working to improve the health of local people since the 2012 London Olympics. To coincide with a related exhibition on sport, the museum invited local clubs to put on activities in its galleries.
The success of these led to monthly fitness events run with the local leisure trust. These attracted people who would not normally use nearby leisure centres, says the museum’s development officer Jodie Henshaw.
“The museum was able to offer a traditional health and wellbeing offer for a group that found leisure centres quite intimidating,” she says.
Several venues are successfully embedding wellbeing into their everyday practice, including Rugby Art Gallery and Museum, which has made health key throughout its exhibitions, activities and projects.
In a blog post, the museum’s arts, heritage and visitor services manager Nikki Grange wrote: “There has been a subtle message flowing through the art gallery and museum: that the enjoyment of, and involvement in, arts and culture can raise our happiness levels.”
Grange added that exhibitions have been linked to wellbeing, including one on craft called Units of Knitting: The Reknit Revolution (June-September 2017), which referenced the practice’s therapeutic properties.
The museum also developed craft activities, such as reminiscence boxes for people with dementia and their carers.
Despite the benefits and the range of good work going on across the sector, challenges remain.
The most common is the need to build understanding and relationships with unfamiliar sectors, such as the health sector, as well as measuring the impact of work.
“This is something the sector doesn’t feel confident about and it is difficult, as the health sector has particular tools that they use,” Bedford says. “But if museums want to be more creative then you can co-create evaluation with the users themselves. And that side is something museums can be very good at.”
For museums new to wellbeing work, Mansfield Museum’s Henshaw recommends starting small.
She points out that venues may already be involved in relevant activities: “The kinds of things museums do, such as reminiscence projects and creative workshops, is health and wellbeing – it’s just about how we brand and focus on it.”
