Objective: To describe a contemporary artistic educational program based on photographic cyanotype techniques and to present the results of the program carried out with older people with early dementia. We determined whether these people could participate in the program, their viewpoint about it, and what this program could contribute to their experience.Method: 21 people diagnosed with mild or moderate dementia participated in a series of artistic education workshops. While conducting the workshops, participant observation was carried out, and the participants' engagement was assessed. Upon completing the series, five focus groups were carried out with the participants with dementia, and another focus group with their professional caretakers.Results: we observed the participants' high level of commitment to the activity and their interest in learning new things. We also observed the participants' satisfaction during the creative process and with their results. The artistic activities not only reinforced the feelings of capacity of the participants with early dementia but also transmitted a positive image of them.Conclusions: Dementia was not an obstacle to participate in the program, which was an opportunity for creativity, learning, enjoyment, and communication of people with dementia. In the authors' opinion, facilitating access to art and artistic education to people with early dementia can contribute to enforcing their rights and to improving the care system. Keywords: early dementia; creativity; artistic education; art; psychosocial intervention 4
Contributions of an Artistic Educational Program for Older People with Early
Dementia: An Exploratory Qualitative StudyArticle 27 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights acknowledges that every person has the right to take part freely in the cultural life of the community and to enjoy the arts. However, in practice, dementia can imply a considerable reduction of the opportunities to make effective use of this right because it has been shown to be a factor that is negatively related to people's participation in cultural and artistic activities.(Paillard-Borg, Wang, Winblad, & Fratiglioni, 2009). And this occurs despite the fact that diverse studies have revealed a positive relation between participation in this kind of activities and health and well-being throughout the ageing processes (Cohen, 2009;Cohen et al., 2006;Fisher & Specht, 1999;Wikström, 2002).Limiting the cultural opportunities of people with early dementia is unjustified, because this pathology does not imply any obstacle to art-related behaviors. Besides the therapeutic settings of art therapy or occupational therapy, there are few investigations about art-related activities in people with dementia who have no artistic trajectory prior to their disease. However, the few documented experiences agree that dementia itself is not an obstacle for cultural artistic consumption such as visits to art galleries or museums (MacPherson, Bird, Anderson, Davis, & Blair, 2009;Ziesel, 2009). Likewise,...
