The Odyssey House Art Project’s visiting artist series continued with a two-day workshop by Nancy Nowacek, a research-based artist, designer, and educator working in visual art, public art, social practice, and socially-engaged contexts.
The workshop, (Between) Islands, was held for women at the George Rosenfeld Center for Recovery and was specifically designed to bring different generations together to reflect on life challenges and explore new coping methods. Clients began the workshop by experimenting with clay and learning the history of strength training. The final goal was to support mental health and build new relationships.
“I’m very grateful for the opportunity to bring (Between) Islands to Odyssey House. For a program about mental health and creativity, the clients were amazing participants: they were as open to the ideas of the project as they were about themselves,” said Ms. Nowacek. “As an artist whose work is participatory by nature, this project was special for me because the participants got something really special from it. Their engagement with the project inspired a third session to photograph their portraits with their sculptures, and their pride shows in the resulting photos.”
