Statements in support of Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition & Arts as Advocacy
What organisations, people and the Planning Group say in response to threat of cuts.
From organisations
See Me
See Me: Statement in support of continued investment in CAPS and Arts as Advocacy.
Their Arts as Advocacy projects have a proven track record of breaking down barriers that people who experience mental health problems face, alongside other forms of marginalisation and discrimination. Through creativity they platform individual and collective experiences of marginalisation; sharing the reality of prejudice, stigma and discrimination and the impact it has. They challenge the status quo, rebalance power and make a clear call for fairness, equity and human rights for all.
Engaging people with diverse lived experience is central to public service delivery and reform, without effective advocacy the voices and contribution of those most marginalised will be lost.
CAPS Independent Advocacy, and collective advocacy is a lifeline for many people in Edinburgh and the Lothians. Continued investment in CAPS is critical to ensure people who face the most challenging inequalities are engaged, heard, supported and empowered to contribute to community and influence policy and practice change based on diverse lived experience.
Wendy Halliday, Director, See Me
Museums Galleries Scotland
Out of Sight Out of Mind is a hugely valuable and rare project which centres people with lived experience of marginalisation and allows them to tell their stories and communicate the truth of their lives. In museums and galleries there is a growing recognition that the organisations are not doing enough to provide accessible and inclusive experiences for disabled people. There is low representation in the workforce and even lower in positions of management and leadership.
Disabled people are a valuable part of society, museums and galleries should represent their lives and histories. The work of Out of Sight Out of Mind team is an exceptional example of creating a truly accessible space and experience. They have a lot to share with the museum sector and it would be a huge loss to lose this vital work and project.
Museums Galleries Scotland
Royal Edinburgh Hospital
OOSOOM is a valued experience for our inpatient group to engage in sharing their art and stories with the local and national community and an opportunity for them to be a part of Edinburgh's cultural calendar of art. The patient group has a wealth of skills in creating a wide range of artworks; from drawing and painting to mixed media and the use of sewn images/embroidery and while this art is celebrated and shown on site there are less opportunities to show within the wider community. OOSOOM supports the patient group and the wider community to view the art in a gallery setting out with the hospital.
Additionally in preparing for the exhibition individuals can also benefit from a range of additional experiences from; collaborating in the framing process, attending the opening night and visiting the exhibition with peers, families, carers etc. OOSOOM is a highly valued opportunity and we are keen to support it in seeking funding to continue its work."
Isla Lockie - Team Lead Occupational Therapist for Psychiatric Rehabilitation and Addictions, ADC Basement, Royal Edinburgh Hospital
University of Edinburgh – Social Work
Out of Sight, Out of Mind has become an important moment in the yearly arts calendar in Edinburgh for so many people. It raises awareness and connects people, helping people to empathise with themselves and others around themes of mental health, mental illness and stigma. The way the exhibition is curated is also ground breaking – using peer advocacy as an approach to co-creation means that there is a congruence between how the exhibition is made and the themes it explores. This means it really reflects the values that people with lived experience feel are important. For my students at the University of Edinburgh it has been a privilege to learn from the Out of Sight, Out of Mind Team over the last three years as they have provided a guest lecture on my course Creative Social Work and the Arts. Students are challenged and inspired by the work of the project and it grounds their theoretical learning with a successful and inspiring real world example. This project has such an amazing history and so much local support and love behind it, we cannot loose this, if we do it will not be easy to re-create. And now, more than ever, these conversations and connections are needed.
Dr Autumn Roesch-Marsh (she/her), MSW, PhD, SFHEA
Senior Lecturer in Social Work
Mental Health Foundation
We are very concerned to hear that the future of CAPS’ Arts as Advocacy programme is under threat, including the annual Out of Sight, Out of Mind exhibition. Ever since it began in 2013, the exhibition has been a vital part of the Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival (SMHAF) programme.
The exhibition supports, champions and empowers hundreds of artists - many of whom have gone through very challenging experiences - to make and exhibit powerful work about mental health.
As one participant expressed, 'This is a place where someone who feels as inconsequential as me can have an impact.' It is hard to imagine another event that so effectively captures what we aim to do as a festival – through sharing beautiful artworks, important mental health content and stories that inspire, uplift, and challenge us. Out of Sight Out of Mind powerfully aligns with our mission to promote mental health awareness and inclusivity.
Gail Aldam, Mental Health Foundation
Redhall Walled Garden/SAMH
Redhall Walled Garden – SAMH is in its third year of facilitating submissions to the Out of Sight Out of Mind Exhibition (OOSOOM).
For our Service Users, creating their own piece or contributing to a group submission is more than creating art, it is a tangible, structured project. From the earliest planning stages, they learn to work to a deadline, commit to a shared vision, collaborate with others, and manage their time effectively. These are the same skills that help them progress toward personal goals such as employment, volunteering, or education. The grounding they receive through our community garden of collaboration, attention to detail, and care for a shared space, transfers naturally into the commitment and teamwork of preparing an exhibition piece.
More than half of our core cohort of Service Users have not only contributed their own artistic expression to the exhibition but have also visited the gallery together as a group. This shared experience is a celebration of achievement, a moment of pride, and a chance to see their creativity valued by the public, often for the first time.
When people living with mental health challenges lose the chance to express themselves through art, the impact is felt across the whole community. Art projects like this help to create a safe space to establish trust, confidence and awareness that learning a new skill is possible. Without this creative showcase for our organisation and to share with other an ability to explore emotions can remain bottled up, isolation deepens, and opportunities for skill-building and empowerment are lost. Society also misses the rich perspectives and voices that challenge stigma and inspire empathy. Our cultural landscape becomes poorer, our sense of community weaker, and the cost to health and social care services greater.
OOSOOM prevents that loss, turning lived experiences into powerful works that connect, heal, and enrich us all. Without funding, this unique opportunity for healing, skill-building, and self-expression will vanish, and the people it supports risk becoming invisible again.
In a city celebrated worldwide for its festivals, galleries, and creative spirit, how can we fail to fund an art project that gives people living with mental health challenges a voice? Edinburgh’s cultural identity is built on expression, diversity, and the sharing of human stories. To withdraw support from OOSOOM would be to silence voices that embody these very values.
Fiona Hartree, Employability Practitioner
Redhall Walled Garden – Scottish Action for Mental Health (SAMH)
Edinburgh Headway Group
Edinburgh Headway Group is a charity supporting adults who have acquired a brain injury later in life. The work that 'Out of Sight Out of Mind' does to highlight the importance of mental health has been invaluable to our community. Many of our members face significant mental health challenges, and having safe, open spaces to talk about these issues and see or hear from others with shared experiences is profoundly beneficial. By raising awareness and increasing visibility around mental wellbeing, the project helps ensure our members feel less isolated and more understood. Losing funding for such a vital organisation would be a devastating blow to many who could be suffering alone, not to mention our members. We're very grateful to the work done by 'Out of Sight Out of Mind' and would hate to see it disappear.
Tash De Salis, Rehabilitation Lead, Edinburgh Headway Group
Contact Point Edinburgh
As Team Leader of Contact Point Edinburgh, I am on the front-line supporting individuals with their mental health. I see firsthand how services make a difference to their lives, including services provided by OOSOOM. Year on year, we have multiple individuals compelled to exhibit their artwork at Summerhall, and this year is no different. It is a service which means so much to so many people, and should - without question, be included in talks for recommissioning. The hard work and dedication that goes into these events is testament to how successful they are, it would be a huge shame if this were just to stop.
I urge the EIJB to reconsider their stance and to include Out Of Sight, Out Of Mind in any recommissioning process.
Paul Hawken, Contact Point
NKS
NKS is delighted to be part of the Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition. It is giving our clients the chance to showcase their talents, feel heard, and gain real self-satisfaction. This project plays a vital role in boosting confidence, reducing isolation, fostering recovery and unites organisations across Edinburgh in support of mental wellbeing. Ending OOSOOM would silence a vital voice our community cannot afford to lose.
Nazia Majid, Autism Coordinater
From OOSOOM Planning Group
Group statement from Out of Sight Out of Mind Planning Group
We are a group of people who have experience of mental health issues. Together we plan and deliver an open call exhibition for people who have mental health issues. It is the biggest mental health exhibition in Scotland. It is a unique exhibition, and a unique support for people with mental health issues.
Out of Sight Out of Mind is open to anyone with a mental health issue. It is welcoming, diverse, inclusive, accessible, accommodating and flexible. It is non-hierarchical, non-judgemental, validating. It doesn’t question us or provide opinions. It is accountable, free from conflicts of interest and is not bound to a particular treatment method or philosophy.
We spend 11 months each year making it happen, and we deliver the kind of exhibition that we want to take part in. This exhibition has an impact on our lives, others’ lives and leads to change.
Voices that art institutions might not be interested in platforming
We want everyone to be allowed to express themselves using art if they would like to.
Mental health can prevent us from having many wonderful things. Some of us also experience physical ill health, neurodiversity, disability, not being from Scotland, having an ethic minority background, different social backgrounds, and/or gender identity struggles. This can all come hand in hand with housing and financial issues, a lack of resources, education and other opportunities.
This can mean we lack art experience, knowledge and networks, art CVs and art degrees. We may not meet cultural ideas of what an artist is (a certain kind of ‘attractiveness’, have an outgoing personality, be the right kind of ‘weird’). For people who already have arts experience, this exhibition is place where they and their artistic voices can be freed of such expectations and demands.
Out of Sight Out of Mind gives us all, whether we have these things or not, an opportunity to take part in art, as equals.
As a Planning Group we ensure that our group and the exhibition are welcoming, non-hierarchical, accessible, supportive and fair. Our exhibition is free of art jargon, our application process is simple, we offer support, we offer art materials grants, we aim to meet exhibitors’ requests, to meet accessibility needs where we can, participation is not dependent on art experience, and we are not concerned about perceptions of artistic quality.
We produce an exhibition of the highest professional standard that we can. We carry forward 12 years of experience, we visit other exhibitions to learn more, we spend a year planning, months curating, weeks installing and invigilating. The love, care and professionalism we give is shown in the feedback from the community.
When words are not enough
In mental health services, work, social and family settings, speaking about our mental health can feel risky, unwelcome and even taboo. Self-confessed mental health issues are a definite demotion in society. We don’t always feel that we are taken seriously because of stigma. Conversations can be uncomfortable. Even trained professionals can find it hard and complicated to say the word ‘suicide’. It shouldn’t be this way.
This exhibition is a rare space. It is just for us. We don’t have to get the words right, we can say what we want, we can be as we are, we can be sad, happy, honest, scared, angry, political, funny, loud or quiet. Art is one of the places a person is allowed to indulge in their distress (or their appreciation) that might seem trivial to others, and people are used to seeing taboos in art.
The act of sharing what we want to say in a room with other people’s thoughts and opinions can be empowering, and really is advocacy.
In some ways the exhibition is the opposite to social media: we can speak out loud, and people can listen or move on, but we cannot be disagreed with, and we do not need to defend ourselves.
It is a space where our voices can be seen as beautiful, important, normal and shared.
Our exhibition is an unconventional method to engage with the public, our community and people close to us, about mental health. People are more likely to have empathy. We bamboozle people out of being judgemental.
When services are not enough
Out of Sight Out of Mind is for our mental ‘wealth’.
Mental health support needs to happen before someone becomes mad. The industry needs more routes for contact and Out of Sight Out of Sight is one of these within a scant, threadbare, precarious, and often ineffective set of supports, which leave us in a worsening state.
The exhibition is one solution to helping people. It appeals through not being a conventional method. It is safe, welcoming and sometimes a first step to engaging and speaking about important things.
As well as the act of communicating something difficult being empowering, the creative process is unique way to channel thoughts, emotions and energy, and is a proven and legitimate tool that we can use to improve our mental health.
Having Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition in our calendars is a catalyst and an encouragement to make art. It gives many of us the structure we need to complete something: a theme, a deadline, support and the solidarity of a collective. Just making and showing an artwork might be a single step we can take, which might lead to future steps.
The work of the Planning Group work is task driven and value based. It gives us meaning, purpose, confidence, reassurance, skills and experiences and it can give us the courage to tackle other projects. We have a purpose for our day, and it can help us get out of bed. We can put Out of Sight Out of Mind on our CV’s, refer to it at job interviews, and go on to work and study because of being involved. We share our knowledge with others who are inspired by our work.
Having a mental health issue can result in our isolation. The Planning Group are a found family. The exhibition is a way for us to connect with our city. Out of Sight Out of Mind is a community of hundreds of people: exhibitors, volunteers, audiences, supporters, workers and us. We all belong. We are all seen.
A place where someone who feels as inconsequential as me can have an impact
We want everyone to have a space where they get a chance to say something about decisions being made. In organising Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition we learn that we can speak up, that we have good ideas, that we are resourceful, and that we can make a difference.
Part of the stigma and self-stigma that comes with mental health issues is a perception of ‘lost time’ and ‘lost potential’. Here a small piece of positivity is possible, a sense that ‘what I have been through is not wasted’. Involvement brings some meaning to our struggle.
What has been built over the past 13 years is unique and powerful. People tell us that they would like to have an exhibition like ours in their city, in their town, or in their country. We think that Out of Sight Out of Mind could be a template for all kinds of services, where people know they are welcome, accepted, valued, equal and where people can take part in decisions and where their agendas matter.
Please value our voices, the difference that we have made and that we will keep making. Don’t take our exhibition away.
From Individuals
OOSOOM exhibitor
Around the time of my difficulties back in 2022, I got involved with Caps Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition. This was something that helped save my life. I channelled all my energy into creating a sculpture which encapsulated a lot of dark and unpleasant things from my past, and I found being involved in this allowed me to shred those layers, and transmute them into something I could see. When I did this as part of the exhibition, I saw over 1000 more pieces of art work, created by others who had experienced mental health. Knowing I was part of that collective process, and that other humans around me were finding the courage to create the art, then choose to exhibit it to others, helped lift me up inside in a way that no other kind of therapy could do.
It was part of the process of getting to the other side of what was holding me back. It helped me release and realise that when we find that colour, shape, perspective and we don’t judge ourselves for what we create, we connect with ourselves and find how our hearts want to express what needs released. I hope thousands of others experience the process of creative healing.
OOSOOM exhibitor & Planning Group member
Since 2018, I’ve been involved with Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition (OOSOOM) in many ways — as a visitor, exhibitor, planning group member, and as the exhibition assistant.
And yet, I sit here now struggling to find the words to explain what this exhibition truly means to me. How do I summarise something that has been a job, a creative outlet, a lifeline, a place of growth, a community, a family? It is all of those things — and so much more. And that’s exactly the problem.
I’m autistic, dyslexic, and live with long-term health conditions and mental health challenges. Words are difficult. I struggle to find the right ones, the ones that fit, the ones that carry the weight of what I feel. They often slip away, get tangled, or fall short of expressing the depth of my experience.
And yet, here I am — trying to use words to save the one thing that saves me.
Art.
This exhibition gives me a voice in a world where I often feel voiceless. It’s not just about creating or showing work — it’s about being heard. OOSOOM gives space to the kind of expression that can’t be forced into neat sentences or diagnoses. Here, I don’t need to explain myself in ways I can’t. Through art, I speak. Through this exhibition, I am understood.
Without it, I spiral — into silence, into isolation. Art is my connection to the world. OOSOOM is the only place where that connection feels safe, supported, celebrated. In this space, I’m not just tolerated — I belong.
It’s a window into lived experiences that are often overlooked or unheard, but that matter. Experiences that hold value, beauty, insight, and truth — and speak to the universal human need to connect and be seen.
Nowhere else have I found a community like this. Nowhere else have I felt so wholly accepted. Here, I have friends. A mad, loving family.
OOSOOM is the only place I feel able to be my full, authentic self. It gets me out of the house. It brings meaning to my days. It gives me something to look forward to, to work toward, to hold on to.
Please don’t take it away.
This exhibition doesn’t just support artists — it saves lives. It saved mine.
OOSOOM audience member
I visited the Edinburgh In-Visible exhibition last year and found this to be a very inspiring experience. My mental health problems have isolated me somewhat, yet after my visit, I felt I was not alone. There was so much to view and read, and many meaningful testimonies to relate to.
It was interesting and uplifting to see all the different ways people chose to express their issues and feelings, and it was thus such a positive experience. Seeing sometimes quite negative experiences turned into creations, and therefore something positive, it seemed like it didn’t much matter how skilful the use of the medium was, it was more about heartfelt expression.
OOSOOM exhibitor: Redhall Walled Garden
Creativity can be a powerful force for mental health
Gardening is a journey where an empty plot becomes a living sanctuary, tending and nurturing seeds brings colour, life, and transformation to bare soil, creating a space of rest and renewal. Painting offered me a similar refuge; it was a way to escape into shapes and colours when words failed me, to give form to feelings I couldn’t express otherwise. Through these acts, I realised that even the smallest gesture of creation, like planting a seed or laying down a brushstroke, can spark positive change.
Based on notes provide by 'K' for his artwork entitled 'Spark'
OOSOOM exhibitor & Planning Group member
I’ve been involved with CAPS Collective Advocacy groups since 2011. I first joined Much More Than a Label, then helped found the Out Of Sight Out Of Mind exhibition through the Oor Mad History project. I then joined the Trauma group and Lothian Voices. I’m currently involved in the Much More Than a Label, Oor Mad History, Arts As Advocacy/Out Of Sight Out Of Mind exhibition, Minority Ethnic and LGBTQIA+ groups. CAPS is now a major part of my life. My friends know not to ask anything of me in September and October because I’ll be effectively living in Summerhall working on the Out Of Sight Out Of Mind exhibition and I love every minute of it.
What benefits do you get from Collective Advocacy?
I’ve gained confidence, self-esteem, a sense of self worth, a sense of belonging, a found family, and a safe and supportive environment to talk about what’s wrong in the world mental health wise and come up with ways to make it right for everyone not just myself. It’s given me the confidence to do many things I thought I’d never do. I’ve volunteered to give speeches in front of hundreds of people without a script! I’ve done several video interviews and as someone who used to have panic attacks and run away at the thought of doing that, that’s a big deal! I’ve learnt how to organise an exhibition from start to end. I’ve delivered lectures, presentations, workshops and events. I've presented a poster at a large mental health research event. I’ve been involved in delivering consultations and conferences. I’m treated like an equal by everyone involved. There’s no hierarchy.
What will be the impact on you if CAPS’ groups end?
I’m terrified by this prospect. CAPS is my life and saved my life. I’ve gained and continue to gain so much from being involved in multiple groups all of which are now being threatened. I feel like I haven’t done enough, or what I have done wasn’t good enough for you. Please tell me what more I could have done to make this be a good enough return on investment to be saved. I need to know so I can do better in the future as my current input obviously wasn’t enough. But that’s not true. I’ve given so much to and received so much from CAPS as a result of my involvement. I will lose so much if they all end.
My self-esteem and confidence will be negatively affected. I’ll meet fewer and fewer people who will stop me in the street to tell me that a workshop or lecture or presentation I delivered has helped them in their work. I still get approached by people I taught over 10 years ago who say our workshops were the highlight of their course and they still use what we taught them.
I’ve exhibited work every year at the Out Of Sight Out Of Mind exhibition since the first one in 2013. Every year, people with similar experiences to me who have interacted with my works tell me, or leave comments saying they feel seen, validated, less alone and better able to talk about or explain their experiences to their loved ones and/or healthcare professionals. All of this will be lost and while those people won’t know what they’re missing out on, I will. I’ve also had comments from friends and family of people like me who say my work has helped them understand their loved ones better. I’ve had people cry on my shoulder because my art meant that much to them. And that’s just one artwork out of over a thousand over the years.
I’ll meet fewer people like me and may become more isolated. I’m disadvantaged and marginalised in many different ways, e.g. ethnicity, sexuality, gender identity, mental health, physical health, neurodivergent, that make it difficult to find people who understand it all. The emotional labour of explaining how these all intersect to people who don’t have my experiences is exhausting. The people I’ve met through CAPS, volunteers like myself and staff, continue to make a huge impact on my life. I’ve learnt so much about myself and been introduced to some novel but good ways of coping. Without CAPS I’ll miss out on any future connections because there’s nothing as safe as CAPS groups out there. While CAPS’ Collective Advocacy groups aren’t support groups, they are supportive. We’re a very close, but still open and welcoming, community. I use the term family. We’re a “found family”. That’s how safe I feel in these groups. As someone with mental health issues and several other disadvantages, I find it very hard to socialise by which I mean more than just arranging things. I often struggle with understanding cues and context. CAPS gives me a way to socialise with a purpose which makes the rest of it easier. We’re making life better for ourselves but mostly for everyone else one workshop or artwork at a time.
The Out Of Sight Out Of Mind exhibition is the most social I am all year. It’s safe because we have a group written document that informs how we work as a collective. It’s trauma-informed thanks to the work of our trauma collective advocacy group who helped create those materials. It’s not overwhelming and it’s accessible as tasks are set depending on what you can and want to do with whatever support you need.
If I lose this and my found family I don’t know how I’ll cope. CAPS Collective Advocacy saved my life, gives me purpose, self-esteem and confidence in a supportive environment. I thought I was beyond help in those areas. Neither university nor NHS services were able to help me but CAPS did. They also gave me the courage to challenge my previous mental health diagnosis which proved inaccurate. At the age of 41 I was finally officially an autistic ADHDer, the medication for which has changed my life. I worry about the people who could have but now never will have the positive experiences I’ve had because of CAPS.
Ever since I learnt of the intent to cut all of the Collective Advocacy groups I’ve ever been in and then some my mental health has been very precarious. Just the thought of losing something that has and continues to help me and so many others has massively increased my suicidal ideation. I’m getting self-harm urges too and I haven’t had those since my mother died years ago. I cried almost non-stop for days after finding out and then started dissociating again. Thinking about CAPS now brings up this pre-emptive grief. Something that once was, and, I thought, always would be a comfort is now disturbing me.
I’ve not had to use crisis services since being involved with CAPS’ Collective Advocacy but just the threat of losing this is causing my mental health to deteriorate. I dread to think how much worse it will be if I do lose every single CAPS group I’m involved with. I suspect I may end up using front line services again. I worry about the impact this increase in use, because I won’t be the only one, will have on NHS services. Will they be harder to access? Longer waiting times? Less compassion by burnt out staff? All this will impact me. That’s not the only impact that will affect me. Staff will no longer have access to the many varied Lived Experience workshops that CAPS Collective Advocacy group volunteers deliver free of charge. Personality Disorder, Trauma, Minority Ethnic, LGBTQIA+, Eating Disorders, Arts As Advocacy for example. People who have attended our workshops or exhibitions overwhelmingly find them useful. I once gave a police officer a copy of a book I wrote for the 2014 Out Of Sight Out Of Mind exhibition after an interaction I had with them. I’d been explaining to him the best way to approach someone like me who was in crisis. He took it and a few days later he phoned me to say he’d read it and found it informative. He’d been called out to someone with bipolar disorder who was in crisis. He told me he’d used what I’d written in an attempt to de-escalate the situation and it worked. I fear for myself and everyone else with a mental health condition because, if these cuts go ahead, all this learning will be lost.
There’s nothing like CAPS’ Collective Advocacy groups out there. I’ve looked and tried some. They weren’t right. I could join the Edinburgh Collective Advocacy group but that’s having its funding reviewed too. So is that even safe? How will that one project cope with an influx of all the other group members? Especially given how different we all are. We won’t have the same level of understanding because it will be so diluted. And there will be much more emotional labour required again. We won’t be able to do all the things we’ve been doing. All that educational material and expertise will be lost.
As someone who is in five different CAPS Collective Advocacy groups which are all under threat, I’m feeling an overwhelming amount of what I can only describe as grief. I feel like I’m about to lose everything that has helped keep me well.
OOSOOM Planning Group member
Evidenced-based protective factors against suicide for those without dependents and not accessing healthcare services include having something to look forward to, something scheduled in the future and a social network of friends, family and colleagues (O'Rourke etc al., 2023, Suicide Screening and Prevention).
These are factors that are provided by community centred mental health collectives such as Out of Sight Out of Mind (OOSOOM). It is not a healthcare service. Which is why it is effective in improving long term health and wellbeing.
What OOSOOM offers participants, are the fundamental components of what it means to be well. It is a safe space where people can find community and connection as the person they want to be, beyond a label or a diagnosis. It a space where meaning is created through art and meaningfulness occurs through being seen and heard. These evidence based components to wellbeing are what community centered health delivered by grassroots organisations excel at creating.
A short summary of my analysis of how OOSOOM creates health and is a health asset is in the link below. The analysis brings together academic evidence with what the exhibition means to people
https://www.outofsightoutofmind.scot/what-does-it-mean-to-you-2024
From the article....
"Seeing the exhibition as a constellation rich in relationships provides a way of describing why the accounts of what the exhibition means to people are so diverse and why some are deeply personal. People relate to different parts of the constellation and reassemble the relationships that they connect to into their own constellations of health and wellbeing. Some meanings are fleeting, where it is another exhibition and have a temporary effect on health and wellbeing. Some meanings become part of identities, built up from multiple encounters over time, becoming a steady source of health creation. In this way, how the exhibition becomes a health resource or asset can be seen"
My experience highlights the long-term impact of a preventive health asset like OOSOOM.
Seven years ago, I was well and looking to share my evaluation skills. CAPS offered me a different opportunity and asked if I wished to volunteer on the planning group for OOSOOM, assuring me that having no knowledge of exhibitions or art was not a barrier. I gained benefits from volunteering which directly led to being accepted on a post-graduate programme to study community centred health and start a new career as a social researcher. Having a job you enjoy, has been shown to be a key component to wellbeing.
During the pandemic, lockdown and other life events occurred that pushed my default coping mechanism of passive suicidal ideation towards the active. Suicidal ideation makes you feel like the world is an unfriendly place that is not meant for the likes of you. The activities that gave me purpose and the communities I tried hard to be part of disappeared. Only my dog and OOSOOM kept me from withdrawing from the world. The community OOSOOM creates means you feel safe turning up to meetings as your worst self. There is no judgement for not being able to contribute, it's safe to not fake being fine, people were genuinely glad I was just there. This was something I hadn't expected to experience in my life and was powerfully impactful on my wellbeing. Continuing to turn up to meetings, having scheduled dates, and just knowing OOSOOM existed and always accessible, kept me tethered to the world. The online launch of our exhibition during the first lockdown was unexpectedly emotional as I was not the only one for whom OOSOOM was a source of joy and comfort at this time. To be part of something that meant so much to other people made me feel like that maybe I had something to offer to the world.
There is no service for when I am unwell as I don't have diagnosis. And I don't feel my issues are as serious as other people's as I still function. I do not have depression so I would not go to a GP and receive a medical or social prescription. Therefore all the improvements these cuts aim to make to services would not reach me as I would fall past services and crisis and straight into not being here.
OOSOOM provides the protective health factors of activities that are purposeful and meaningful, that is scheduled all year round to look forward to. Enabling participants to develop another protective health factor, as over time, the connections created through meaningful activity, naturally turn into a social network. For me OOSOOM are friends, family and colleagues combined.
I didn't know I needed CAPS and OOSOOM. I didn't know that it was possible to be the person I am today thanks to being part of their collective. They are more than healthcare services, they keep people not just in this world, but with the best parts of this world and being human.
OOSOOM supporter
As a historian of medicine and mental health based in Edinburgh, I’ve had the immense privilege of working with members of CAPS Independent Advocacy over the past several months on a deeply meaningful project exploring mental health-related archival collections at Lothian Health Services Archive (LHSA). This collaborative journey culminated in a powerful exhibition curated by lived experience experts. The archival sessions leading up to the exhibition were very much led by the curators, who selected materials based on topics and themes they were particularly interested in. This included women’s experiences and treatment in nineteenth century asylums and in more recent mental healthcare systems, the ways in which different illnesses were diagnosed and conceptualised or talked about in the past and the legacy of art as activism and advocacy in mental health. Everyone brought their own perspectives, expertise and experience together to explore, interpret and ask questions about the materials and to talk about the stories contained within them.
This project was grounded in a belief that participatory, inclusive research, an engagement with archives and the past and an acknowledgment that all forms of expertise- including lived experience – are valid and equal. Participatory research is not just academically valuable—it is essential. It challenges conventional hierarchies of knowledge, centring the voices of experts by experience. Through their insights, we can access deeper truths about the complexities of care, identity, and advocacy, past and present. Participatory projects like this matter because they foster inclusion, build community, and open up space for constructive dialogue and change. They show how engaging with archives and history can support healing, understanding, and empowerment. This work has shown me that lived experience brings emotional nuance, cultural context, and narrative depth that traditional research methods often overlook.
CAPS’ work—whether through projects like this recent collaboration, or through their annual Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition—does more than support individuals with lived experience. It enriches the broader cultural and academic landscape. Personally, attending a CAPS exhibition in 2015 sparked the entire trajectory of my academic career, from my undergraduate dissertation to my PhD exploring creativity in psychiatric settings.
The value CAPS brings to individuals and society cannot be overstated. They create opportunities for people to be seen, heard, and meaningfully involved in shaping how mental health is understood—historically and today. Their work fosters equity, informs better policy, and drives social change.
That is why ongoing, secure funding for CAPS Independent Advocacy is not only justified—it is urgent. If we care about inclusive research, social justice, and transformative advocacy, we must invest in the organisations that make it possible.
OOSOOM exhibitor
1. My involvement with Caps has now been five years, plus. They have supported me with Collective Advocacy in my whole time with them. I’ve been involved in many critical and peer lead projects that encourage engagement through peer sharing in a safe space. I’ve been involved in the publication of “Oor Mad History” book with many of my own lived experience quotes that have resonated with others, which was very important for me during my own mental health crisis and feeling my own identity whilst processing my own trauma. I’ve submitted Art to Caps “Out of Sound Out of Mind” exhibition, had opportunities to present to wide audiences throughout Third Sector mental health events and develop relationships with institutions such as University of Edinburgh (leading me to be involved with training of Clinical Psychologists). I’ve been involved in Policy reviews which bridges engagement between peers and service providers. And a whole lot more.
2. Collective Advocacy has been an integral part of my own recovery journey. The importance of peer reflected spaces are integral for those who experience challenges and difficulties of a familiar nature. Collective Advocacy is allowing others to have shared space that ultimately gives them an opportunity to share, listen and contribute if they choose. These are crucial in developing the models and understanding of creating trauma informed pathways. A peer sharing a similar experience eg. issues accessing mental health services or benefit and social security challenges. Peers benefit from others lived experience and at points in life where trust may be low and anxiety may be high, peers create space for others to relate. A space of empathy when they may not have it from home/work/family/friends and mental health professionals.
3. Collective Advocacy is an important opportunity for those with lived experience to connect. Meaningful, insightful, purposeful and inspiring conversations happen when peers share, hold space and work collaboratively. Personal experiences can leave people feeling captured. These groups create connection through the said, unsaid and perspectives of how and why we can create better. A collection of voices is stronger than a single voice and these types of groups revitalise individuals through safe and overseen engagements. If you take that away, you demolish pathways to collective hope, solutions, reflective spaces and common resources that people pull together. When we find it difficult to hold ourselves together, the relatable voices in the room, or through a computer/phone if online, seals gaps and creates reassurance. We volunteer our time and energy because we care.
OOSOOM exhibitor & Planning Group member
I have worked as a volunteer on the Planning Group of OOSOOM, as well as exhibiting.
This maybe counts as my first and most solid piece of evidence that this is a worthwhile activity. I am willing to invest time into this.
An art space dedicated to showing the unfiltered work of people with Mental Health Issues in their lives offers both a chance for them to communicate and a window into their lives. This is important, as it is hard to talk about mental health.
Mental health issues and the seeking of help with regards to your mental health come with a host of hurdles and even threats.
There is huge stigma related to mental health issues and opening up comes with the risk of eroding the respect or trust of those around you, or even infringing upon your rights as an individual.
There also may be things that either you or the support networks around you (family, doctors) may not know where to place on the gradient between trifle, concern, and emergency.
Getting these thoughts out in art, and displaying them in a non judgemental art space within the community where the mundane and the fantastical are given equal attention provides a voice, a conversation that might not have taken place.
That "silly thing" gets airwaves, or maybe you get to cry for help without a set of references and hospital visits.
Equally, you get to stand in and with a crowd.
My personal exhibit last year was a collection of my own work crowded and cramped together. This had a purpose. I wanted all thoughts out there, the good, the bad, the relatable and the strange all mixed to give the whole. In a collective exhibition it also had the thousand equally interesting, confusing, triggering, and beautiful thoughts of many others. A majority of the non-unanimous, a crowd of non-consensus.
We need places, particularly for the sufferers of mental health, where people are openly invited to be the "whatever the hell they are" in a safe, supportive, but public facing environment.
From my involvement in the group, I heard of and witnessed many instances of conversations and explanations manifesting themselves by discussions of the artwork, including the discussion of artwork by complete strangers.
Then for another group, the opposite achieved. People who are not burdened but overwhelmed by their mental health issues who are just showing us that they are still human, and still capable of creating beautiful objects, still there, even.
Every chance we give for someone to express themselves stitches up another hole in the net that so many people fall through.
It also encourages art making, which has long been accepted as a mode to therapy, as well as healthy discourse both inner and outer.
Art is an interesting place to drag your thoughts into. Slow and deliberate, it often allows a new level of focus, giving the creator the choice of how much to reveal in a thoughtful and measured way.
Conversely, but equal in value, surprises in the making process, and in the gradual manifestation of said thoughts on the page can often lead to a new understanding of the topic. I personally love it when a grievance or fear hits the page and becomes something beautiful.
Art is frequently seen as an optional extra, and I'd like to argue that here that is not the case. The voice of mental health sufferers is a fragile voice. Hard words in the throat, and easy words to stamp down.
It needs every stage that it can get, and art has always been one of the most vital and accessible of these stages to many that would otherwise have found themselves silenced.
OOSOOM exhibitor & Planning Group member
I’m one of the artists who has been supported over many years by CAPS, Out of Sight Out of Mind (OOSOOM), and Pam and the wider team. I was genuinely shocked to hear that their funding is under threat — and I want to be absolutely clear that I believe this would be a serious and damaging mistake.
Without OOSOOM, I know my mind would convince me there’s no place for me in the Scottish arts world — that I’m too crazy, that my work is too intense. OOSOOM is, for me, an annual reminder that I’m not alone — not by a long shot.
I’ve exhibited with OOSOOM most years since 2018 and was part of the planning group in 2022. Being involved with OOSOOM led me to participate more actively in the Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival, where I was shortlisted twice for their writing awards and won the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow’s ‘The Prescription’ creative writing prize in the hybrid (art and writing) category.
Having my work about mental health taken seriously and supported has opened up so many doors: paid artistic commissions from Birds of Paradise, Sanctuary Queer Arts, Dash Arts, and others. It gave me the confidence to keep going.
In 2023, as part of the Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival, I received funding from Thrive Edinburgh to curate an exhibition asking: How do we show ‘difficult’ art without re-traumatising the artist or harming or triggering the viewer? I exhibited my own work alongside artists Carys Reilly and Chandelle Waugh, and we continuously reshaped the exhibition in response to the audience’s and facilitators’ wellbeing.
In 2024, I received a CAPS Thrive Arts Fund grant to develop a project called the Befriendable Black Dog — small ceramic sculptures designed to offer comfort during moments of distress. With that support, I was able to test, develop, and begin selling them successfully.
Honestly, even the threat of losing OOSOOM — or any of CAPS or Thrive’s services — has made me feel deeply anxious and unwell, especially alongside the looming cuts to disability benefits. OOSOOM has been a lifeline. The very first time I took part, I exhibited a painting I’d made in a psychiatric hospital, during a time when I believed I would never recover or be released.
As I told The Scotsman in 2022:
“ The painting I exhibited in 2018, Oma’s Cardigan, was one I had painted in a psychiatric hospital the year before. At the time I painted it I was sure that my career was over, as well as deeply afraid I was going to spend the rest of my life in institutional care. The painting is in Teeline shorthand, but a particularly garbled/abstracted version of it, and the text itself reflects how unhinged my mind was… it’s very much a visual proof of how ill I was at the time. It also isn’t immediately accessible to the viewer, which meant that the nurses and other patients didn’t really know how to respond to it and I felt incredibly unsure of its worth. Being able to display it at Out of Sight Out of Mind allowed me to see its artistic value and helped me in working towards going back to art college to do a masters in painting. It was the springboard to a whole new body of work there and it was the confidence and reassurance I got from Out of Sight Out of Mind that made that possible… It’s really the 2018 show that sums up, for me, what Out of Sight Out of Mind is about – I needed someone to take that painting seriously, to really look at it and see the confusion and pain and fear that I was feeling and I felt Out of Sight Out of Mind really held it and held me. I’ll forever be grateful for that.”
Of all the exhibitions I take part in, OOSOOM is the one that means the most. It’s a space where mental health is not just discussed — it’s central. It’s a place where I feel artistically and emotionally understood. I’ve loved working with Pam, whose kindness, clarity and belief in me has shaped so much of my artistic development post-hospital and post-art-college. She listens and encourages and shows genuine enthusiasm and care — not just for me but for so many artists navigating life with mental illness. Lauren, too, has been a huge part of that community of care and feeling of genuine peer-to-peer understanding.
When I feel like giving up, I think about OOSOOM, and it helps me keep going.
I honestly can’t believe anyone would consider taking money away from people like Pam and her team. If anything, they deserve more support, not less. Without OOSOOM, CAPS, and Thrive, artists with mental illness will receive the message that we are not worth investing in. Many of us won’t be able to make sense of the policy rationale — we’ll just feel rejected, silenced, and afraid that our worst fears about being too much, too chaotic, or not valuable are being confirmed.
I urge you — please — reconsider these proposed cuts.
Sincerely,
Artist & Writer
OOSOOM exhibitor & Planning Group member
I was introduced to the exhibition when a local art group I’d joined put a group submission into the exhibition a few years ago, then have put in an individual submission a few times and have helped with the volunteer Planning Group the last couple of years too.
As many people experiencing mental health issues can find it difficult or impossible to communicate or express themselves through conventional means such as spoken or written language, being able to be part of an exhibition which showcases the artwork and creative output of a diverse group of people from varied backgrounds and walks of life who have/do struggle with their mental health issues is incredibly significant. It highlights their struggles and personal stories in a way that I’ve never encountered before. It is hugely valuable as a means for others to peer into the turmoil of what living with severe, long term mental health is like for some people, and I think without that then too often people are stuck with often unhelpful labels, terminology, concepts and theories, but those things barely scratch the surface of what it means to live with these struggles, and yet they say “a picture paints a thousand words” for good reason! The OOSOOM exhibition literally gives these marginalised people a voice through creative expression. It is distinct, unique and trailblazing in its approach!
It is blatantly obvious that with all the cuts going on in the health, care and charity sectors in particular, that there will inevitably be a significant increase in loneliness, isolation, and an exacerbation of various symptoms for many people. We will see an overall decline in people’s health. Some are bound to need more care via their doctors, community psychiatric team. Some may end up needing hospitalised. Tragically, I have no doubt, that if all these cuts go ahead as they have been proposed, then some people will take their own life as a result.
You who do not know or understand the reality of mental ill health, who have been lucky to never experience the overwhelming darkness, the despair, the pain, the misery, the fear, the draining of energy, of joy, of hope, should recognise your own good fortune and give others who have drawn the short straw a chance! You may not understand that in many cases mental ill health is caused by huge traumas in people’s lives, horrific experiences that often precede their decline in health and the horrendous aftermath of living with these things. Constantly trying to pick up the pieces, but finding it’s like sand falling through your fingers is endlessly draining and frustrating. You have no idea how important community groups are, including many charity organisations and their activities. Shame on you if you are ignorant and have no heart for those who have endured suffering you cannot imagine!
OOSOOM supporter and audience member
I am aware of CAPs work because my twin brother has been involved with the Out Of Sight Out Of Mind exhibition that is on yearly at Summerhall for the past 4 years and I have attended every year, and was hoping to also make a piece to put forward myself. The OOSOOM exhibition is literally the most moving exhibit I have ever been to, i will never forget the first year I went and i cried my way round the whole thing, it is so rare to see humanity on full display in its most painful, real, tender and vulnerable state - just so special! words really cannot express what it means. All the peoples art, every piece is so unique, SO special, so breath taking! I struggle every single day with my mental health and have for decades at this point and getting to see this exhibition every year is so important to me and for my twin brother to be apart of. He too has struggled for decades and i know being apart of this group has been one of the best things in his life, he has struggled to socialise or make art, and he is really an artist at heart - so this exhibition really pushed him to try! in a way he hadn’t in many years. So this is how i know about CAPS.
The benefit collective advocacy brings is that it allows us to know we are not alone, because struggling with our trauma is so isolating - so to have a place where you can come together with others is the most important thing around. It brings people together, creates community, it empowers people, inspires people, challenges people, brings awareness and helps others to get involved who maybe wouldn’t. It also just gives us a space to exist in a world that basically wants to pretend we don’t.
I think the impact could be truly devastating, people with mental health and trauma are struggling desperately and for some people this is the only thing they might have that helps them cope or feel like their life has meaning. Taking that away from people is very dangerous. One of the major feelings of being unwell is feeling completely powerless, hopeless and oppressed - and to take this space and these groups away from people could be detrimental to people who are already hanging by a thread. The world is an extremely difficult place to be, we need groups like this now more than ever. There is NOTHING more important than helping each other, and that’s what you do, and whoever is in charge of funding should be doing everything in their power to support you.
OOSOOM exhibitor & Collective Advocacy member
Collective Advocacy is the useful path for people to take. Collective Advocacy brought me opportunities and dignity when I couldn’t see a way through. When I saw others like me were struggling and they kept going, that encouraged me. I’ve had the opportunities to speak with MSP’s, attend cross-party parliamentary groups in local government, engaged with services at local level, encouraged my absence of confidence in myself to submit personal art to Caps Out of Sight, Out of Mind Exhibition, having my lived experiences quotes in a book they published, working with University of Edinburgh through their experts by experience panel leading to my third year involved in supporting in the assessment of clinical psychology students. The list goes on… ALL because of Collective Advocacy. Please keep building these paths for people, they need them when they’ve hit rock bottom.
OOSOOM exhibitor & Collective Advocacy member
I am involved in CAPS collective advocacy Experiences of Trauma group (EOT) and Arts as Advocacy events, like the OOSOOM exhibition. I connect some of the time with Oor Mad History, for example taking part in interviews; attending Discovery Session. I took part when the EOT group was being consulted on the redesign of the Rivers Centre.
When CAPS developed the (EOT) ‘Here and Now’ Education as Advocacy workshop, delivered by people with lived experience of trauma, I was able to have a say in group discussions about what themes are included, like ‘attachment’ and this was taken on board. Trialling workshop ideas with ‘Critical Friends’ groups and responding to feedback helped me to build confidence and skills to share some learning from what had been unspeakable as a child. I also used part of my artwork for OOSOOM to illustrate what some of my experience of recovering from trauma has been like. Hearing back up and learning from EOT group members, support from CAPS staff, awareness of Independent Advocacy principles and standards, the careful preparation to make delivery safe for everyone present, receiving constructive and encouraging feedback have all helped to make this kind of challenging work possible, through which I evolve and grow too.
I believe CAPS plays an important role in helping us all to say what we mean and mean what we say, knowing that we are all different and we live in a fast-changing and often increasingly complex world. By sharing views and ideas I believe we have helped to strengthen what works and come up with new ideas and perspectives too. CAPS, as an independent advocacy organisation has built trust and confidence for us to share our learning from experience, often hard won. We look critically too at how we can all find new ways to be effective in future. This can take time, yet we also see opportunities and highlight issues quickly through CAPS connections, seeing gaps and reaching out at grassroots and beyond. To me, knowing CAPS is independent makes it easier to speak truth to power and hold people accountable. As an organisation with a strong track record, in my view, CAPS has also been able to persist where continuity and persistence are needed and trust takes some time to build.
CAPS had a vital role in bringing the right to access independent advocacy, collective and individual, through mental health law in Scotland. CAPS led in developments such as Art as Advocacy, as a platform for ‘showing’ what we know and might wish to express, sometimes unconscious and unspoken, alongside the chance to have our say and be part of a creative process. The OOSOOM exhibition at Summerhall is, in my view, a fantastic miracle of curation where all of us, from different lived experience groups and perspectives, including paid worker roles, volunteers, informal peer support and as creative individuals can come together and respond/or not to the annual themes, like Comfort & Disturb (2025). A moving place where we can reflect and reveal depths of emotion and insights, in both the light and the dark, something shifts every year.
Arts as Advocacy pre-dates some of the growing evidence base for potential health benefits of being involved in creative processes, alongside challenging stigma and sometimes moving hearts and minds in powerful ways. Having a say in some of the collaborative conversations that Thrive has supported has also helped to challenge conventions, promote shared understandings and build trust in how we can effectively share learning with each other and across the miles.
In my experience, it is not always easy to speak up at the point when I have been accessing services and I generally filter what I say in most contexts. Independent advocacy has been one of the ways I have found more room for my voice moving forward and to be more aware of options and power to make choices. I also know just how powerful listening to personal testimony can be in bringing a sense of personal connection and a chance to be witness. Without the benefits that flow from collective advocacy group members’ learning from experiences and involvement in shaping policies and practice, through co-production, education and art as advocacy, I believe we risk losing important potential for influence in future approaches to early intervention and prevention as well as a sense of connection from lived experience and as peers.
We bring and cultivate many other life skills and gains for everyone through being involved at all stages, when this happens in a meaningful way. Importantly, we bring and reflect original, creative and diverse ideas and perspectives that can challenge structural inequalities, stigma and discrimination. This can influence not just our lives but the life chances for next generations. I hope we can continue with confidence to have our say, to shape and to be visible in the communities where we all live and learn together. Not just for now, but for the future we make.
Supporter of OOSOOM
As a family support worker I have clients who benefit from Minority Ethnic advocacy, and those that are empowered in their wellbeing through participation in the Out of sight, Out of mind exhibit. The service landscape would become less person centered as advocacy informs best practice.
Supporter of OOSOOM
I am writing to express my heartfelt support for the continuation of the Out of Sight Out of Mind (OOSOOM) exhibition.
As someone who has personally experienced psychological pain, I know how difficult it can be to face such struggles alone. Many people suffer in silence, unaware that their pain is not unique or shameful. Art can break that silence. OOSOOM, through its sensitive and powerful exhibitions, helps individuals realise that they are not alone — that others have gone through similar experiences and that there is strength in vulnerability.
Before now, I did not know this exhibition existed. Learning about it made me wish I had discovered it earlier — it could have helped me, as I believe it helps many others. I truly hope more awareness can be raised about this project so that those in emotional distress can find comfort, solidarity, and healing through this space.
OOSOOM is not just an art exhibition; it is a vital platform for connection, expression, and mental health advocacy. Please ensure its survival beyond 2025. We need spaces like this now more than ever.
Supporter of OOSOOM
I recently heard of the potential funding withdrawal from CAPS projects and feel the need to write to express my concern. This would be a devastating blow for many people in the Lothians who rely on or have benefitted from CAPS in innumerable ways. Losing independent advocacy would have direct health and wellbeing impacts on people who are already marginalized and underserved. This risks creating even greater health inequities and runs counter to the aims of international standards such as the new WHO mental health policy and the UN CRPD.
The collective advocacy work that CAPS has undertaken, carefully documented through oral history and archival research and artistically captured in multiple exhibits, is groundbreaking community-led work. I say this as a scholar located in Toronto, Canada who has travelled to Scotland to view the Out of Sight, Out of Mind exhibit, and has cited the work of CAPS on numerous occasions in peer-reviewed journal articles (even one this week!). What they are accomplishing has been laying the groundwork for service user advocates elsewhere, on an international scale, demonstrating the importance of community, individual and collective voice, and the ongoing need for independent advocacy. While essential at home in Scotland, these projects also have much further reach. So, I implore whoever has the power, to please maintain funding for CAPS now and into the future.
Arts as Advocacy Manager, CAPS
I am the Arts as Advocacy Manager at CAPS. I came across the first Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition in 2013 and I was blown away by its strength, beauty and rawness. I could see that its power was driven by the people involved and not by an institution. At that time, I was struggling with my own mental health and work situation. I was welcomed into the Planning Group in 2014, and since 2017 I have been employed as the worker for what is now ‘Arts as Advocacy’.
Having been in involved in several ways, I can attest that Out of Sight Out of Mind’s exhibition’s power comes from providing arts for people with mental health issues, underpinned by CAPS Independent Advocacy principles and approach.
I have had my life changed and improved by this work. I have been included, seen, heard and employed by it. I have had a unique opportunity to develop a method of using arts as a form of advocacy in Edinburgh, and to contribute to the lives of people who struggle with their mental health and who face marginalisation for many reasons. I gain a huge sense of personal satisfaction and achievement from this work.
I have seen over a thousand people speak and be heard through their art via Art as Advocacy and Out of Sight Out of Mind.
I have experienced first-hand what can be achieved by a small group of people with mental health issues when they are given choice and control, and how that can impact thousands of others.
I hear how people are empowered personally, process difficult issues, have improved relationships, and how attitudes towards oneself change. I hear how workers, relatives, colleagues and the general public respond, and how their attitudes and understandings shift. And, how people make change, work, study or undertake their own projects as a result.
I benefit from being part of what is now a large and diverse community of people who have mental health issues, and who face marginalisation for many other additional reasons. From this community I continue to learn and grow as a human being, and as an advocacy worker.
Arts as Advocacy is a unique project and I have dedicated 13 years of my creative and working life to it.
I will be affected knowing that the Planning Group and hundreds of people will lose a project they reply on, invest in and believe in.
I will personally lose my ability and power to use my skills and knowledge, built over 25 years in total, to do meaningful work that contributes to the lives of vulnerable people.
These are challenging times for the third sector which see decision makers devalue the work of staff and volunteers who try to meet the needs they know exist, and which see decision makers promote the narrative that economics define societal success. Therefore, it will be extremely difficult for many workers in Edinburgh affected by EHSCP cuts to find new employment in the third sector.
Arts as Advocacy Supporter
In support of Arts as Advocacy at CAPS:
If Scotland as a country denies access to the arts to empower people to improve their health literacy and health and well-being to prevent inequities in health, the barriers of injustice and inequalities will increase in Scotland and Edinburgh as a City.
Health Justice through the Arts:
The art of the spoken word and the arts, as a form of advocacy, enable people to express their humanity and creativity as both individuals, and as a collective community, and helps to improve people’s health and well-being.