Through the use of Art Therapy, Coda aims to change the lives of adults and children with mental health and wider social issues. Through creative therapy and a range of professionally structured activities, we can help people feel better, build their confidence and allow their self-expression to shine through.
Art therapy is a form of expressive therapy that uses the creative process to improve a person’s physical, mental, and emotional wellbeing. We work with art therapists, music therapists and drama therapists.
A qualified Art Psychotherapist will have completed a BA, followed by 1,500 supervised volunteer hours before they can progress to their MA. This can take up to seven years to complete and we are fortunate to have links with a growing number of these highly skilled professionals. You can find out more on the BAAT website: www.baat.org
Coda works with people of all ages and abilities, and can offer group programmes and workshops as well as one-to-one work with fully qualified Art Therapists. Coda also works with experienced teachers, artists and facilitators to offer enjoyable, social activities, bringing people together for relaxation, leisure and learning.
Coda’s Art Therapy has three broad aims:
To improve mental health, well-being and wider social issues through creative therapies
To increase access to and participation in indoor/outdoor creative activities and to reduce social isolation
To improve the quality of life for individuals of all ages, abilities, gender, culture, race or background in England and Wales
Understanding Social Prescribing
You may have heard the term Social Prescribing. It is a term that is becoming more widely used and it refers to health care professionals providing information to patients to find support that exists within the community to improve their health and wellbeing.
To read more, including the goals of Social Prescribing and why Coda is excited to be involved, click here.
Coda’s Progression Model towards Health and Wellbeing
1) Arts on Prescription Programmes – For a client with high to medium level mental health needs to be referred onto Arts on Prescription Programme
2) Creative Wellbeing Workshops – Informal drop-in creative sessions for clients with a diverse range of mental health issues. Clients can attend whilst awaiting referral onto an Arts on Prescription Programme or attend once this has completed or attend just because they enjoy it!
3) Peer Support Activities – For clients to be supported to create their own peer support/friendship group and access other community-based activities
Please refer to Coda’s Code of Conduct for all of our group sessions: Coda Code of Conduct policy for Group Programmes
Creative Wellbeing Groups
These sessions take place in four locations across the area. The sessions are open-studio style drop-in groups.
We’d love to see you in either Lymington, Fordingbridge, Hythe or New Milton.
Club Create
These arts and crafts sessions for learning disabled adults are fun, active workshops led by professional art facilitator Karen Blake.
Sessions take place in Coda Music & Arts Centre’s Café on a Friday morning from 10.30am to 12pm throughout term time and we are still welcoming newcomers.
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Arts on Prescription
These are sessions for adults only that have been referred to us by Social Workers, GP’s, Social Prescribers or can even be self-referral. They’re closed groups run over a 14 week period by an Art Psychotherapist, assisted by one of our excellent volunteers.
The Arts on Prescription groups form the first step in our progression model (see above). Find out more on our Arts on prescription page.
Art Therapy for Education
hArt runs pre-planned and completely bespoke programmes for schools. Full details of our services for education can be found here.
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One-to-one working
hArt runs one to one art therapy sessions. These give a really personalised experience for the recipient and allow artistic expression to flow in the comfort of a more relaxed, quieter environment.
For further details on how to book one of these sessions, please contact us.
Children's Art Therapy
hArt has previously run a very successful programme for young children affected by domestic abuse, funded by Children In Need, and aims to offer similar programmes again in the future.
Outdoor Projects
For several years, hArt has delivered outdoor projects for people of all ages at various locations, offering opportunities for creative work inspired by the environment alongside some hands-on practical skills, working with a fully qualified art psychotherapist and an experienced woodsman. We looking forward to delivering more brilliant outdoor projects as soon as we are allowed in 2021.
Inter-generational Events
We like to bring together people of all ages around creative activities and have offered memory box projects, working with pupils from local junior schools and residents from care homes who shared memories of school days.
We have also run drum circles for a variety of age groups and look forward to offering similar events in the coming year.
