Arts
Candoco Dance Company - Dancers: Welly O'Brien & Jurg Koch - www.candoco.co.uk - Photographer: Anthony Crickmay
Tracey Jones (Amunet) Arabic dancer, belly dancer, & Egyptian dancer.
Participation in the arts, be it painting, photography or dancing can have a positive impact on a disabled persons self-confidence, self-worth and self-esteem. A great sense of achievement and fulfilment can be gained from participation in the creative arts. Dance can promote a great sense of freedom, which is something often lost to a newly disabled person.
The creative arts can and do enhance our experience of individual, social and communal life on a number of levels:
- building self-confidence and self-esteem
- promoting a sense of freedom
- improved social and psychological wellbeing
- access to social interaction
- as a way of improving communication skills
- giving a voice to marginalised groups in the articulation of issues
- providing a source of employment
- acting as an agent for creative thinking
- entertaining and delighting
LimbPower, a registered charity specialising in organising sports and arts events for amputees and other ambulant disabled adults and children offer relief to the physically disabled by aiding rehabilitation and improving the quality of life through the medium of recreational and competitive sports and arts.
“We mustn’t lose sight either of how difficult it can be for people with disabilities to develop artistic initiatives themselves, to access the arts, to participate in them, to enjoy them fully as of right and without reserve. There are still far too many barriers to involvement within the arts infrastructure”
ROSEMARY KELLY, ARTS COUNCIL CHAIRMAN.
Disabled people, for example, are 25% less likely than the general population to have attended an arts event. (Research by the Scottish Arts Council)
