Can Art Save Us?

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. After nine seasons, 65 episodes and more than 6,000 downloads, I'm very grateful that this independent podcast has earned the trust of listeners and artists around the world. Thank you to every guest and listener because this reach has been built entirely through organic growth and without a paid PR machine. I...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Tom Lutz, is a celebrated author, travel photographer, founder of the Los Angeles Review of Books and a distinguished professor at UC Riverside, the University of California. His current book is: 1925 - A Literary Encyclopedia, and this is much more than a reference work. This is a cultural x-ray on 1925, whic...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Birungi Kawooya is a self-taught British-Ugandan artist, wellbeing researcher, and creative facilitator. Her name, Birungi, means 'Bringer of Good Things,' a name deeply rooted in Ugandan culture. Her art practice is a return to her heritage. Reconnecting with Ugandan culture, artisanal practices, and the natu...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Today, public relations is powered by digital storytelling, inclusivity, immersive experiences, data and hybrid strategies. But it's also shaped by distinct and diverse artists who happen to be PR creatives. And that's exactly what this exhibition episode uncovers and celebrates. For the first time, the Art of...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. You may be someone who has already experienced a 360 life change through ill health, or are currently supporting somebody with a life changing diagnosis. Dr Shanali Perera's own 360 story is one of sudden, abrupt and frightening change. 10 years ago, as a medical doctor, Shanali was specializing in rheumatolog...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Professor Ericka Verba, is the director of Latin American Studies at California State University. She's an author and a musician, recently reviewed as a rising star by the Los Angeles magazine voyage LA. She is notably the author of the first English language biography of Violeta Parra out now entitled Thanks...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Tere Chad is a multidisciplinary artist and curator from Chile, currently based in London. She is fast rising as an international artist and to date she has held seven solo exhibitions, completed seven residencies participated in more than 50 collective exhibitions and has curated over 20 shows on four differe...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Nicola Avramovich is not only considered one of Serbia's finest classical pianists, but one of the best of his generation.  He is a sought after performer giving numerous recitals and chamber music concerts worldwide, including prestigious festivals and leading concert halls here in the UK, Nicola Avramovich i...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Gabriela Elisabeth Edawani Fernandez, known as Ina Leah, is a transdisciplinary artist and her work is rooted in the practices of the indigenous Lamaholot people of East Nusa Tengara, home of her cultural heritage. The Lamaholot people are indigenous to the southernmost province of Indonesia and the small isla...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Jane Wright is a ceramicist, violinist and champion of community arts. A West Yorkshire born musician and artist, Jane is now based in the iconic seaside town of Margate in Kent, famous for its art history. Margate was home to the renowned water colourist Turner, considered to be the best loved English Romanti...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. David Emmanuel Noel, is a visual and interdisciplinary artist who often splits his time between New York and London. He collaborates with musicians and performers to explore race, identity and culture with an emphasis on public engagement. He's interested in promoting a fairer, kinder and inclusive society and...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Sometimes it seems people are just born gifted and Zoom Rockman started his working  artistic life from the age of eight, when he was self-publishing his own monthly comic, The Zoom, now considered a collector's item. Today Zoom is an award-winning political cartoonist, illustrator, puppet animator, and now th...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Sunaura Taylor is an artist, writer, activist, academic and mother. Sunaura is the Assistant Professor in the Division of Society and Environment and the director of the Disabled Ecologies Lab at the University of California, Berkely. A skilled artist, her artworks have been exhibited at venues such as the CUE...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Tonye Ekine is one of the top 40 British Rising Stars recognized by the Royal Society of British Artists. He is also recently back from the world renowned, Venice Biennale, where he was selected for a highly prestigious fellowship with the British Council. In its 60th anniversary year, the Venice Biennale attr...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. What's it like to be the least likely artists to have two hit, number one albums on Decca Records, one of the world's most iconic labels? Decca Classics, discovered and pursued singing nuns, the Poor Clares of Arundel in West Sussex, to record with them. The debut album, 'Light for the World,' sold out of cds...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. A first for the series, a mother and daughter, discussing parallels between their work. They have both successfully bypassed conventional and formal routes into painting and publishing winning awards and five star reviews. Following her teaching career, Yeside Linney, is a mostly self-taught artist who has qui...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. This episode is about "Joyful madness" and a brilliant collaboration between Science and the Arts. Dr. Weliton Menário Costa, also known as Weli both as a scientist and as a recording artist, is the global winner of the "Dance Your PhD" competition. Complex academic research is communicated through dance to re...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. What happens when the judicial system we're taught to trust is in fact part of a complex web of systemic failure and structural discrimination on vast scales? My guests in this episode have raised one of the most important spotlights on systemic failure in Australia's prison system. Indigenous Australians are...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Julie Hesmondhalgh is one of Britain’s most loved actresses, she plays roles for stage and screen that tackle important issues and reach out to the hearts and minds of audiences everywhere. Her roles in drama have included sexual violence, the calamity of hate crimes, the representation of transgender people,...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Dennis Clausen, is a professor of American Literature and Screenwriting at the University of San Diego in the USA. He’s a highly respected, award-winning author of many works of fiction that reflect his lived experience and special interest in American small towns. He’s also written, Storytelling as Art and Cr...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. David Attree is a ‘people’s poet,’ he’s also known as a ‘Poet-Chef,’ ‘Famous Dave,’ and more recently as the voice of the ‘Week in Words,’ aired on BBC Radio across three counties. His poetry is also currently on buses in the city of Brighton, known internationally as a centre of creativity. But fame isn’t wha...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Do you like dancing? Do we dance enough? Or maybe the question is, why don’t we dance more? Dr. Angela Pickard is the UK’s first Professor of Dance Education. She has worked with talented dancers and choreographers across a multitude of theatres and sites in the UK and internationally. From toddlers to The Roy...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Cassa Pancho, MBE, founded Ballet Black in 2001, Britain’s most diverse ballet company celebrating dancers of black and Asian descent. Today it’s one of the most prolific commissioners of new and critically acclaimed ballets here in the UK. The journey in between however, has been huge. Racist barriers in the...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Described as “an obscenely talented man.” Matthew Todd is a multi, award-winning writer, playwright, broadcaster and sometime performer. He was also the editor of the UK’s best-selling gay magazine, Attitude, for 8 years. During this time, Matthew interviewed countless celebrities, idols and icons, including M...

Can Art Save Us? – Conversations on Arts, Mental Health, Social Justice & Wellbeing. Musa Motha is an outstanding, world class dancer and a master of making the impossible, possible. Despite a leg amputation at the age of 11 due to cancer, Musa's dance techniques and innovations exceed all ideas of what we typically think able-bodied means. Musa Motha has won the hearts and minds of thousands...