Stretched carers find a voice at Highland Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival
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Unpaid carers in the Highlands struggling to be heard have turned to protest art to voice their frustration.
An exhibition featuring work by families living with long-term conditions and struggling to access services is showing at Eden Court Theatre in Inverness.
Many are afraid to complain openly but are putting across their candid messages anonymously in art – whether it is in thought-provoking images, or words flowing with irony.
The exhibition forms part of the Highland programme for the annual Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival running during October.
It has been put together by arts organisation, Creativity In Care, which runs a range of projects for individuals and communities across the Highands.
Chief executive Karrie Marshall said: "It is about supporting people to create things which express who they are and to give them a voice.
"It could be people living with dementia, families who are caring for people, people living with mental ill health."
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Forms of art include painting, collage, sewing, poetry and crafts.
"It is never about the art – it is about the process of creating something and making social connections," Ms Marshall said.
The organisation's work with unpaid carers is funded by NHS Highland and currently involves about 60 families who care for someone at home.
"The protest art came about because we were meeting families who seemed to be falling through the net," Ms Marshall said.
"They were not getting the support they needed. They felt they were fighting services all the time.
"Because we are a creative organisation, we said, 'let's find a way for you to express that emotion'.
"We found when families created protest art, there was often a slightly lighter mood because they had expressed something."
Many carers often feel a sense of low self-esteem and isolation because of their circumstances – and certainly that is the case with many of those taking part in the project.
"When people care for someone day in, day out often they do not have a social life and a sense of their own identity," Ms Marshall said.
"We share each other's art work but they have not met once together.
"But we hope to get them together – if they want that
"There is a programme we are putting together for 2024 and we hope families who have experienced a whole range of difficulties can come together to do a creative project."
There is also an acknowledgement that services are stretched and it is not possible to meet every single need for carers but through the projects, Creativity in Care is starting conversations and sometimes people are finding their own solutions and bringing about changes.
Community artist Donna Murray, who helped run a protest art workshop for the festival, sees the difference which creative activities can have on people – and how their confidence grows.
"You start to see people interacting with each other's work," she said.
"They are curious about what people are doing and the story behind it."
Another team member, Pip Dunford, encourages people to express their thoughts through poetry.
"The writing is not done in a critical way," he said.
"People are there to see what they can produce rather than it being analysed."
Other events during the festival include exhibitions, workshops and music performances.
The programme also includes a 100-puppet installation, live storytelling and a short film, Windows of Reality, exploring people’s experiences during the coronavirus pandemic.
The stories and puppets were created by individuals and families from across the Highlands.
It will be held at Eden Court Theatre in Inverness on Friday November 3 from 12.30pm-6.30pm.
