Inverness Creative Academy celebrates five years of delivering support to people struggling with anxiety and isolation
Inverness Creative Academy (ICA) has been celebrating five years of bringing art and connection to the city.
Since its £6 million redevelopment the Category-B listed building has enjoyed a new lease of life as home to artists and creative professionals in the heart of the city.
Now the ICA is much more than a studio and creative space, as resident artists have been delivering help and support to local people struggling with loneliness, anxiety and isolation through free creative sessions.
Cecila Mann, 68 and Jacqueline Briggs, 29 are two ICA residents changing lives by offering art with a focus on mental well-being.
For both artists the opportunity to support and connect those who have been born and bred in Inverness as well as those new Scots making the city their home has been a privilege.
“I know personally the importance of art and being free to express myself on my own mental health, so I wanted to be involved,” said Jacqueline an artist facilitator for Open Arts, and project coordinator, for the Open Hearts programme which offers art to refugees, asylum seekers and new Scots.
As an art facilitator on the Open Arts programme, which opened in 2022 Cecilia added: “We have people from all walks of life many who are dealing with a trauma or anxiety.
“The art sessions allow them to relax, and I think some of them see me as their granny, I show them the new techniques and we just get talking.
“But I can see from the way people hold their pencil and from the colour they choose how art makes a difference, how their choices change as they relax by being creative and doing that with other people.”
Both the Open Arts and Open Hearts sessions offer people a couple of hours away from their day to day.
To celebrate five years of ICA an exclusive exhibition was launched on October 11, and it features over 70 pieces of art inspired by the location.
Visitors attending the launch of the exhibition heard speeches from a variety of people including Wasps’ chief executive Audrey Carlin.
ICA is managed by Wasps Studios, Scotland’s provider of creative spaces, founded in 1977, charity supporting the arts community across Scotland for over four decades.
Audrey Carlin said: “Over the last five years Inverness Creative Academy has exceeded all expectations. It’s great to see some many people accessing and engaging arts and creativity inspired by this space in the heart of the Highlands.”
The exhibition celebrating ICA at 5 is open to the public Monday-Friday 9am-5pm and Saturday 10am-3pm a now until November 11.
