Culture

The arts as painkiller 95
Environment for Care programme through which it promotes best
practice in employing arts in large-scale capital investments. 8 The
managing team for Liverpool’s status as European Capital for
Culture in 2008 has appointed a Creative Health and Well-Being
Manager, who will develop partnerships ‘across arts and health
boundaries in Liverpool’. Perhaps most controversially, spending on
paintings and sculptures in 2003-2004 by NHS Trusts was estimated
at £9 million. Although it was explained by a number of the Trusts
that much of this funding was from charitable donations not public
funding, it seems remarkable that there should be money available
for arts in hospitals when according to the British Medical
Association, three out of four NHS Trusts in England was experiencing
a funding shortfall during the current financial year. 9
The possible health benefits of the arts to individuals and
communities have received increasing attention over recent years
and numerous initiatives have been set up in this area by government,
public health agencies, charities, and arts organisations.
Whilst there is a long tradition of providing art and sculpture in the
healthcare environment (see for instance the work of charities like
Paintings in Hospitals, founded in 1959) and many hospitals have
always made an effort to make their buildings attractive and
welcoming places for patients, there is also a clear qualitative shift
towards the perceived power of the arts to actually improve health
and health care. In a report commissioned by Arts Council England
and the Public Health Directorate, written by the Centre for Arts and
Humanities in Health and Medicine (CAHHM) the authors argued
that “we need an arts in health workforce”. 10 As the well-known
advocate for the social value of the arts, Francois Matarasso, puts it,
“In fields like health…where the use of the arts was wholly excep-