Art and Culture as Therapy: Icelandic museums and Alzheimer

It was an extraordinary experience to see the apparent energy during the two days presentation of the book, Art and Culture as Therapy: Icelandic museums and Alzheimer, 19th and 20th September 2017. Below are some images from Francesca Rosenberg‘s lecture in Salurinn Kópavogur where she explained MoMA‘s Alzheimer program "Meet me at MoMA". In the following posts are images from the workshops at the National Gallery of Iceland. There we worked from the exhibition Nation‘s Treasures, ‘ways of seeing’ through the arts, literature, music and architecture incollaboration with artists and students from Iceland Academy of the Arts.

With Francesca Rosenberg: Ways of looking into the art of painting

For her workshop Ways of looking into the art of painting, Francesca Rosenberg chose the painting ‘Bassabáturinn’(‘Leader’s boat’)(1930) by Gunnlaugur Scheving (1904 – 1972) to observe. She was able to detect strong links with Icelandic general culture but which also could call upon themes and personal experiences in relation to the sea, family relationships and communication, labour and weather.

With Andri Snær Magnason: Words, freedom and imagination

In his workshop Words, freedom and imagination, the writer Andri Snær Magnason chose the paintings, ‘Fjall’ (Mountain) (1998) by Georg Guðni(1961-2011) and ‘Attending’ (1973) by Hreinn Friðfinnsson (b.1943). Andri Snær constructed a dialogue between the two by asking the participants to describe their impressions with the first word that came to their minds when looking at the artwork. 

With Kristín Valsdóttir: Musical narratives

For her workshop Musical narratives, Kristín Valsdóttir had chosenNervescapes VII by Hrafnhildur Arnardóttir / Shoplifter (b.1969), an impressive emotional landscape where the musicians would lead the participants into new atmospheres and connect to each other.

With Javier Sánchez Merina: Making the museum more familiar

The day before the symposium, the architect Javier Sánchez Merina had prepared his workshop Making the museum more familiar, togetherwith a group of architecture students, and in collaboration with a day centre and volunteers who suffer the Alzheimer disease. The architecture students brought familiar furniture from their homes in order to create ‘natural settings’ that the participants could identify with and react to as they were at home with different artworks as a centre piece depending on the atmosphere.

Closing session: Evaluating the day!