15 November 2024
Since 2010, the Arts Council Northern Ireland has run its Arts and Older People programme (AOPP), in partnership with the Public Health Agency and the Baring Foundation, resulting in support for nearly 300 organisations with £2.54 million in grant funding reaching 35,000 people (and still going).
Over the years, the AOPP has reached some of NI’s most deprived older communities and brought a lot of fun, companionship and creativity to older people’s lives, including people living with dementia and their carers.
Dr Una Lynch, long-term evaluator to the programme, commissioned by the Baring Foundation in partnership with ACNI, has produced a new report to highlight the programme’s many successes.
Through the perspectives of 11 funded organisations and five artists, the report demonstrates how the AOPP has helped to reduce social isolation, strengthen intergenerational connections, improve physical health and amplify the voices of older people who often go unheard.
This was much more than a music session: it was a tonic, a joy, a release, a place to be recognised.
Participant, Oh Yeah Music Centre/Paul Kane
I feel that video made them [the doctors] take me seriously about my aspiration to recover and I was worth putting the effort into, rather than treat me as an older patient.
Drew, participant, Streetwise Community Circus
Photo: Echo Echo Dance Company’s Body Wisdom group, photo by Simon Alleyne.
