National Museum in Kielce

Museotherapy refers to art therapy in the broadest sense, which – thanks to the properties of the creative process – has a healing power. This term is used to describe the contemporary role of museums – their therapeutic effect on audiences struggling with various ailments of civilisation.

Museotherapy can provide an incentive for museum professionals from museums all over Europe and even the world to use their experiences in this area.

National scientific conference “Museotherapy – A way out of difficult emotions” (available online) which was divided into two days with a few lectures around experiences of art and nature as an empowering activity for people in various mental crises; the second day focused on museotherapy as an aid to emotional disorders.

As the new roles of 21st-century museums extend far beyond the previous fields of activity of cultural institutions in society, a transformation is taking place in their activities. It is geared towards harnessing the emotional potential of museum collections, narratives, spaces and exhibitions to have a therapeutic impact on audiences struggling with ailments of civilisation, in collaboration with the community of psychologists, psychotherapists, educators, doctors and museum professionals. The aforementioned conference is an excellent example of an activity that promotes the advantages of such an approach to the museum space.

National Museum in Kielce (Muzeum Narodowe w Kielcach)/National scientific conference "Museotherapy - A way out of difficult emotions"

Poland, Kielce

Museum

Temporary

06/11/2023 - 07/11/2023

Physical with digital elements

Anyone interested in how contact with art/or museum exhibits can help to confront and deal with difficult emotions (e.g. people with refugee experience, dementia illnesses).

Available online transmission

Speakers (besides the workers of museum): e.g.

• Paulina Broniewska – art historian, educator at the Education Department of the National Museum in Poznan
• Dorota Folga-Januszewska – art historian, museologist, critic
• Magdalena Gawrońska – head of the Education Department of the Cracow Saltworks Museum Wieliczka, accessibility coordinator
• Justyna Rutkowska – psychotherapist, psychologist, trainer
• Olga Michalik – museologist, art historian, cultural animator. In the years 2011-2023, she implemented the author’s project Museum Accessible at the Royal Lazienki Museum, as part of which she organised cyclical workshops ‘Out of the frame’ for people in mental crisis.

Funded by the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage

Museotherapy demonstrates that various other aspects of culture can benefit from their therapeutic activities (e.g. through theatre, film, street art).

You can read about the museum’s activities in the field of music therapy and the conferences organised by the museum on this topic in: Robert Kotowski, The museum as a space for health and well-being, “Museology” 2023, no. 64, pp. 119-125. (article available in English). https://bibliotekanauki.pl/articles/27725213.pdf

“First and foremost, I would like to emphasise that it is not a case of going to a museum instead of seeing a doctor and already being healthy. Muse therapy is not an autonomous form of treatment, but an adjunct to it. And it can be considered on various levels. One of them is the use of museum visits by psychotherapists and doctors”.

pioneer of museotherapy in Poland, prof. Robert Kotowski