The theme of the 2019 Big Draw festival was #DrawnToLife focusing on the vital role of creativity for health and wellbeing.

GoMA has been leading successful programmes targeting wellbeing for over a year now. Examples of this are: ‘Sketch and de-stress’, which ran until 2019 and the ‘Mindful Art’ programme, currently running. Both programmes aim to provide a safe and calming environment to practice art and engage with our current exhibitions, resulting in many therapeutic benefits for all participants.

Over 1000 regular and new visitors engaged with the learning and access programme in October. The programme was designed to promote creativity and wellbeing through creative art practices such as drawing and painting. We held a ‘Big Draw Extravaganza’ day, led by the artist Gregor Wright, to get people of all ages to try out drawing activities.

All of the artwork produced by the participants was collected and curated into a large-scale kaleidoscopic installation re-shaping the centre balcony space within the gallery. Participants commented that they were inspired and emboldened to see their artwork hanging in the gallery.

We also worked more closely with groups such as the Glasgow Association for Mental Health. The outcome of this will go on display as the next COMMONSpace exhibition in February 2020.