Activating the Art Museum

Activating the Art Museum: Designing Experiences for the Health Professions, the first book on this subject, offers an argument for collaboration between educators in art museums and healthcare professionals. Through descriptions of teaching practices, the authors bring us into the galleries along with participants to demonstrate the value of art museums in supporting humanism in healthcare for the benefit of both practitioners and their patients.

It includes advice on selecting meaningful and provocative works of art; models of responsive workshop design; compelling descriptions of gallery experiences; references to supporting medical literature; and the voices of medical students, physicians, and other health professionals.

Chapters address key topics including tolerating ambiguity; empathy; interprofessional teamwork; confronting bias; the power of story; caring for the spirit; wellbeing and mindfulness.

This inspiring and practical resource, written by three respected museum educators, is grounded in their experience with multiple individual and institutional partnerships and in designing hundreds of gallery experiences for healthcare trainees and practitioners. This book will be valuable to educators, leaders, and policy-makers in museums and health care. These readers, as well as general audiences with an interest in art and health will be inspired by the potential of art museums to activate our empathetic imaginations and remind us of our shared humanity.