The Lowe Art Museum is exploring the intersection of the arts, health, and well-being through a series of programs and University of Miami research initiatives. Our programs and research integrate art forms to a variety of healthcare and community settings for therapeutic, educational, professional development, and creative purposes.
Fine Art of Health Care
“The Fine Art of Health Care program unites students from a variety of disciplines in honing their skills of observation, collaboration, and ultimately of appreciation for each other’s views and expertise, to make all participants better patient caregivers.”
- Dr. Mikkael Sekeres, Professor of Medicine Chief, Division of Hematology Leukemia Section, Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Founded in 2009, the Lowe's Fine Art of Health Care is a nationally recognized inter-professional program for students and professionals in Medicine, Nursing, Physical Therapy, and Mental Health. Using art and discussion as tools with the Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS) methodology, participants fine-tune their observational, analytical, and communication skills, all of which are important in clinical settings. They also learn about self-care, as they are encouraged to slow down and unwind in the Lowe's galleries.
Creative Nursing The Fine Art of Healthcare: Visual Thinking Strategies for Interprofessionalcommunication skills development in Graduate Nurse Anesthesia Education. By Greta Mitzova-Vladinov, DNP and Hope M Torrents, BA
General Resources for Museums, Art + Health + Well-being
University of Miami M.D./Master of Arts in Medical Humanities and Bioethics The Master of Arts in Medical Humanities and Bioethics is an interdisciplinary graduate program designed to educate medical personnel on the legal, historical, ethical, and cultural contexts of medicine. Medical Humanities uses the perspectives and tools of humanities disciplines to study the human contexts of healthcare. Graduates of this unique degree program obtain a multidisciplinary understanding of medicine that can robustly influence their ethical decision making and patient care.
Health Humanities Consortium Syllabus Repository. This site is comprised of curriculum materials from academic, professional development, and public education programs in the health humanities. The repository is a resource for health humanities educators to share specific ideas and models for course topics, readings, assignments, teaching methods, student and professional development learning outcomes, and public engagement.
RX/Museum Art & Reflection in Medicine. Developed by a consortium of educators and physicians at Penn Medicine, the University of Pennsylvania, and leading museums and arts institutions across Philadelphia, the RX/Museum features a curated series of artworks and reflections that discuss the intersection between museums and medicine.
The following resources have been collected from participants in the field by the University of Texas (2020).
Bibliography Sources of research articles, studies, and books relating to the field.
Program Descriptions List of more than 125 art museum and medical school-partnered programs.
Sample Syllabi Selection of syllabi from art museum and medical school courses.
Mindfulness
indful Looking - Slow down, be present, and spend time with one work of art from the Lowe's collection while enjoying a guided mindful looking exercise led by the Lowe Art Museum Education staff.
The Art of Mindfulness - Recharge, refocus, and reclaim the day with a short guided meditation. This program is co-sponsored by UM's Mindfulness in Law Program and Mindfultime.
Click on this link for resources about mindfulness and the research that supports it from University of Miami.
Testimonial for Mindful Looking:
"Mindful Looking" at the Lowe Art Museum turned me, a skeptic of mindfulness, into a believer. What they do sounds so simple: spend roughly an hour looking closely at one or two works of art. But it's the mindful direction that makes the experience so rich and restorative. One day the focus is on all the lovely, life-filled wrinkles around artist Georgia O'Keefe's eyes, and on a different day I am directed to slowly follow the perimeter of a sculpture made of wire and shiny pieces of metal. The art and artistry become distilled into component parts and as a result I become more observant, peaceful. The chosen art is always interesting and appealing, but most of all, the museum staff who run the sessions are really good at what they do. When I am unable to attend, I miss it."
Theresa Brown, BSN, RN, works as a clinical nurse in Pittsburgh. Her most recent book, The Shift: One Nurse, Twelve Hours, Four Patients' Lives, was a New York Times Bestseller and is available everywhere books are sold.
