On Wednesday 1^st November the Sidney De Haan Research Centre held an event to showcase Arts for health and wellbeing as part of Canterbury Festival. The event started with a warm welcome from Centre Director Professor Angela Pickard and went on to showcase the variety of art forms the Centre works with. This included dance choreography which depicted themes of hope, and the challenges of the artistic process, a screening of the Elegy by Ash Mukherjee which explores the theme of grief, and CCCU’s gospel choir. One of the Sidney De Haan Centre’s researchers, Sonia Price, also gave a presentation on how the Centre’s research can help train future Arts facilitators, and a short overview of a new project which aims to evaluate the impact of music in an intensive care setting.

The showcase was followed by ‘DISCONNECTED’ an exhibition by Centre Research Assistant, Charlotte Grainger. The exhibition explored the lived experienced of depersonalisation and derealisation disorder (DPDR) through photography, film and spoken word. DPDR is a type of dissociative disorder that usually occurs as a result of extreme stress or trauma. Symptoms include feeling robot like, distortions in perception of time and distance, not feeling real and feeling disconnected from parts of your body or voice. The exhibition illustrated the way Charlotte perceives life and the world around her, while also raising awareness of this often-misunderstood condition.