The arts world and social care might not seem like obvious bedfellows but for innovative theatre company Spare Tyre, working with people who need care and support has become a key focus of their practice.
For the last 15 years, the company has worked with people with learning disabilities, people aged 60+ and increasingly people living with dementia.
For artistic director Arti Prashar the basis of this practice is simple: "In the work we do the bottom line is communication. With adults with learning disabilities and the spectrum we work on in dementia where we are moving to the advanced stages, it is about non-verbal communication. It is about how people want to communicate with the rest of the world.
"We provide different platforms for them to tell their stories and to have a moment of connection with us. Often our work is about long-term impact and engagement, but with those with dementia it is not long-term impact, it is about the impact we are making there and then.
"The feedback has been that the people we work with are a lot calmer, a lot more relaxed and sometimes had an amusing interaction with us. It is about opening up the imagination and communicating with people on their level, on their terms."
The company recently toured its interactive workshop programme Once Upon A Time round care homes with support from Skills for Care's workforce development innovation fund, which was created to challenge the sector to think differently about how to deliver services. Spare Tyre presented intimate workshop sessions for up to six people living with dementia and their care workers
"One of the basics is creating a safe environment," recalls Prashar. "It's all very theatrical but it's really moving people from one environment to another very gently and softly.
"It relies on tone of voice, touch and eye contact as we communicate with someone to take them into a different place. Then, using a simple story-based structure we introduce sensory interaction, allowing for pauses, which creates moments of reaction from them, which we have to respond to, even if that happens to be a kick."
The big challenge for the performers is knowing how to use often limited responses to connect with the person they are working with.
"It is about improvising around what the people give you. We use words like meaningful engagement and person-centred care and that is exactly what happens," notes Prashar. "The artists who go in have to be on alert for a full hour so in that way it is very demanding.
"One of the things that drove me was people saying there is no way we can communicate with this individual, and I just thought well you can communicate with anyone if you want to. You just have to understand how they want to communicate so we used lots of the techniques we use with learning disabilities, so a lot of non-verbal, sensory techniques and we transferred them into the dementia world.
"It is a workshop rather than performance. We have moments of interaction where we awaken the sense of smell, taste or touch by introducing food, or visually by introducing paints and flowers, and just see wherever that takes us. Whatever you receive as a gift you then have to respond to.
"This process is profoundly humbling. We are in an amazingly privileged position to get responses and reactions that are so personal."
Spare Tyre also trains care workers to lead sessions by unleashing their own creativity, which might be something as simple as using new music in an interactive session. The support from Skills for Care's innovation fund helped the company evaluate the impact and one of the findings was that care workers appreciated the downtime to create that the workshops provided.
"They come along first of all not quite knowing what to expect, often having been told it is a show they are going to see because we are called a theatre company," says Prashar. "They often ask why we can't take more than the six people to engage with in the sessions. This is simply because it needs to be person-centred to have the right impact on the participants.
"It is interesting to see what their perception of a workshop is, but when they actually experience it, the response is frequently along the lines of 'my goodness how did you manage to get that person to react like that' or 'that person has never said that or spoken or sung'.
"Staff are often feel invigorated after the training sessions, as they begin to see people in a new light. It is easy for all of us to get institutionalised and begin to see someone in the same old way."
For Prashar and her team the connection between art and social care is not only obvious, but strikes to the very heart of our humanity.
"I will always believe that culture and art is important to us as human beings throughout our lives and without it we would be very lost beings," she says. "The world would not make as much sense without culture and arts so just because we're ageing or we have dementia doesn't mean we don't need a cultural activity in our lives.
"Whichever way we want that cultural connection we still need it as it informs us to the very end."
Skills for Care has commissioned research with a focus on exploring the role of arts in the delivery of adult social care, with a particular emphasis of workforce development. To view the report click here.
More information on the opportunities and financial support available through the workforce development fund is available on the Skills for Care website; email info@skillsforcare.org.uk or call 0113 241 1275.
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