West Midlands

The West Midlands Arts, Health and Wellbeing (WMAHW) Arts and Health Awards 2014 are seeking nominations to recognise significant contributions to arts and health work across the West Midlands.

The Courtyard Centre for the Arts in Hereford is seeking an Arts & Older People Project Manager to develop and deliver the arts and older people strand of the organisation’s work. £22,000 per annum. Deadline 12 noon, 13 March

w: www.courtyard.org.uk/about/job-vacancies/general-vacancies

The University of Birmingham School of Clinical and Experimental Medicine is inviting applications for a research associate to join a project examining the ways that creative arts practices can be used to inform health-related policy and service development.

The Orchard Foundation is running a series of short courses exploring the impact of creative writing on psychological wellbeing. The courses offer confidence-building writing approaches, with advice on ways to explore themes and find how exercises could be used with others.

Next courses:

15-16 February in Birmingham - Level 1

12-13 April in London – Level 2

14-15 June in Bristol - Level 3

Cost £140 for 2-day weekend course (£150 London). Early bird discounts available.

The British Association for Music Therapy (BAMT) is holding its first major national conference on music therapy in February 2014. The conference will take place from Friday 21^st until Sunday 23^rd February 2014 at the Birmingham Conservatoire.

w:  http://www.bamt.org/bamt-conference-2014.html

Two care workers have 30 minutes to fill a box with significant objects that will accompany a new resident to their care home. How to know which objects to take? Can you really fit a life into one box? Taking place in real time Welsh National Opera’s thought-provoking and beautiful world première ask these questions.

Dementia Pathfinders is offering a one day course on Circle Dance in Dementia. The training aims to enable staff to provide their own movement and music sessions with their service users. Circle dance can be used in residential and day settings, assessment units, NHS and voluntary organisation groups with older people, people with learning disability, mental health conditions, and physical disabilities.

Quarry Bank Primary School in Brierley Hill is looking to commission a visual artist working in any artform to design and produce a high quality piece of public art for its reception area. The finished piece will be a central focus of the reception area and a health and wellbeing theme reflecting the school’s core values will provide the inspiration for the artwork.

An all-inclusive fee of £2,000 is available for the project (to include artist time, travel and all materials).

Dudley Kick Ash is a youth-led programme using the arts to encourage young people to be smokefree. During the week of 5 August 2013 it is intended to transform a space in Dudley town centre into a temporary installation which will be open to the public the following week.

Five groups of young people across the borough will help to create elements of the installation, incorporating a variety of artforms from music to digital technology. Performing arts could be included as film projections rather than live performances.

Warwickshire County Council is seeking expressions of interest from artists/organisations to showcase projects and to deliver workshops, as part of its keynote conference on Living Well With Dementia on 17 September 2013.