Power Of Arts Therapy In Focus
27 November 2009
International arts therapy expert Dr Susan Hogan is to reveal some of her latest and most absorbing work to date when she presents her inaugural lecture next week at the University of Derby.
Dr Hogan is a Professor in Cultural Studies and Art Therapy at the University of Derby, and Images of Broomhall - Urban Violence and Using the Arts as a Research Aid, is a captivating lecture which will detail her work in the Broomhall area of Sheffield.
The inaugural lecture takes place on Tuesday, December 1 at 6.15pm in room OL2 at Kedleston Road.
As part of the research project, a community activist walked through the streets with Dr Hogan looking at areas including places where people had been using drugs and other communal locations where there are social issues.
She explains that images from the exhibition are a classic example of a 'walking interview' where the interviewee guided her on a journey through Broomhall - stopping at vital points on the tour for the academic to capture sometimes graphic and harrowing images on route.
Dr Hogan's research work has now been sent to local organisations in the area to demonstrate how the medium of art can effectively highlight social issues.
Meanwhile, Dr Hogan is one of the researchers involved in a new project being launched in Sheffield today (27 November) which aims to transform the way society views older women.
The project, entitled 'Look at me! Images of Women and Ageing', is being led by a team of researchers from the Universities of Sheffield and Derby and by Eventus, a Sheffield-based cultural development agency. This is a two year collaborative project funded by the Economic and Social Research Council as part of the New Dynamics of Ageing Programme.
The team are currently calling on local women to take part in a series of creative, group workshops to be held in Sheffield exploring how women are represented in the media and society as they grow older. The workshops will investigate the messages these images give out and how they affect women's well-being. The workshop facilitators will then work with participants using photographic, art therapy, and video techniques to create new and alternative images of women and ageing.
The images produced in these workshops will eventually be exhibited in public venues, including art galleries and shopping centres, around Sheffield. At these events, members of the public will be asked to respond to the images they see to help inform the research team's understanding of how people react to stereotypes, and if there is any public appetite for images which offer an alternative view on ageing.
Dr Hogan and the University of Sheffield's Rosy Martin, an artist and photographer, will be running two sets of workshops. Clare McManus, Director of Eventus, will be working with two community groups of women to recruit professional photographers to help them capture their views of ageing. Dr Lorna Warren from the Department of Sociological Studies at the University of Sheffield is the project director.
Dr Hogan said: "I have been developing skills and expertise in creative research methods and this project is very innovative methodologically in its use of art elicitation techniques as well as the use of phototherapy as a research tool and community artists."
Next Tuesday's inaugural lecture at the University of Derby is free, and open to everyone, and will be followed by light refreshments.
Book your place at www.derby.ac.uk/hogan and find out more about the lecture or alternatively please email University of Derby Events Officer Angela Drinkwater on a.drinkwater@derby.ac.uk or call 01332 591046.
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For more information about this news release, contact Deputy Head of Corporate Relations Simon Redfern on 01332 591942 or 07748 920038.
For further information about the new project Look at me! Images of Women and Ageing, please contact: Lauren Anderson, Media Relations Officer, University of Sheffield, on 0114 2221046 or email l.h.anderson@sheffield.ac.uk.
