ELDER ARTS PROGRAMS ARE THRIVING FROM CALIFORNIA TO THE N.Y. ISLAND

When I began my artistic work with older adults 25 years ago, both members of my family and professionals in aging were perplexed. At that time, most Americans assumed that the last stage of life was one of inevitable decline. My belief that the arts promote self-discovery and growth, even in the last years of life, felt at that time both revolutionary and absurd. For years, I nurtured Elders Share the Arts, a community-based organization dedicated to linking generations and cultures through the arts, in a virtual vacuum.

Roberta Jones is one of the Pearls of Wisdom storytellers at Elders Share the Arts, based in New York City.

Only in recent years, as the boomers began nearing retirement, has the concept of creative aging gained currency. Suddenly, professionals in healthcare, social work and the arts developed interest in the theory and practice of arts programming for older adults. In 1998, when the National Endowment for the Arts asked Elders Share the Arts to create a national database and serve as a resource center for the "creative aging" community, I understood how profoundly the climate had changed.

MODEL PROGRAMS
Since 1998, I have had the opportunity to visit outstanding model programs throughout the country, such as Stagebridge and The Dairy in California; the Naropa programs of the Boulder Council on Aging in Colorado; projects of the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts in collaboration with senior centers; Roots and Branches Theater Company and the Pickney Players in New York City; and programming at the Cummer Museum in Florida. This article will detail four exemplary programs, each chosen to illuminate a distinct organizational model.

SAN FRANCISCO'S ARTWORKS
San Francisco's Institute on Aging is a multiservice organization that sponsors Artworks, an artist-in-residence program. It provides workshops and performance opportunities for more than 600 older adults in senior centers around the city. Artworks offers a variety of residencies, many promoting traditional art forms. For example, when I visited the Chinatown nursing home facility of On Lok, famous for creating the PACE model, or Programs of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly, I observed the extraordinary, culturally sensitive work of Artworks' Asian American resident artists. Elders at this site had produced exquisite Chinese brush-paintings for an exhibit at the center.

Artworks stipulated that On Lok designate wall space for this exhibit, a requirement it makes of all the senior centers where it conducts residencies. Each painting in the On Lok exhibit was professionally framed and displayed with the name of the artist, a photo and a statement of artistic vision. Such professional touches are a hallmark of Artworks. They impress upon viewers an understanding that old age is no barrier to artistic mastery.

PHILADELPHIA'S CENTER
Philadelphia's Center in the Park is one of only a few senior centers in the United States that has undertaken quality, professionally implemented arts programming. This community-based center primarily serves African American elders who live independently in Northwest Philadelphia. The center's curriculum incorporates traditional painting and sketching, pottery, collage and multimedia. Roughly 125 older artists currently participate.

Center in the Park has departed from the arts-and-crafts busywork offered in most U.S. senior centers and replaced it with a challenging, multifaceted arts curriculum. Participating elders are encouraged to explore new art forms. One example is Ed Droughn, who never had a visual art class until he became a member of the center. A musician until arthritis rendered his hands unable to play guitar, Droughn found a new artistic outlet in pottery class, where he was able to sculpt a delightful figure of a guitar player. This work, "Fast Eddie," was included in an exhibition of work by the center's artists at Philadelphia's African American Museum.

In order to promote the role of creativity in healthy aging, Center in the Park staff have played a key role in forming the Creative Arts and Aging Network (CAAN), a group of artists, activity directors and social workers throughout greater Philadelphia. As an affiliate of the National Center for Creative Aging, CAAN sponsors trainings, workshops and special events in creative aging throughout the greater Delaware Valley.

NEW YORK'S ESTA
In 1979, I founded Elders Share the Arts (ESTA), which focuses on living-history arts, a way of synthesizing oral history and the creative arts. ESTA staff work with both old and young people to transform their life stories into dramatic literary and visual presentations that honor diverse traditions, connect generations and cultures, and validate the worth of lifetime experience.

Each year, ESTA runs about 25 programs throughout the New York City area, reaching approximately 500 participants a week, and also reaches thousands of New Yorkers at the Living History festivals it offers each spring. These events culminate yearlong partnerships in communities throughout the city with performances and exhibitions. (See "Finding Stories" on page 9) Through its training program, ESTA also educates thousands of service professionals in using the arts in their work with elders.

One program is Pearls of Wisdom, a multicultural touring ensemble of elder storytellers whose members emerged from ESTA 's community-based activities. For example, at age 85, Myrtle Cavelho shares the deep pride her father instilled in her for her African roots. In her story "Pharaoh's Daughter," she recalls that although her father was born into slavery, she became the first African American woman to integrate the nursing staff of a Midwestern hospital. Among other ESTA programs are Generating Community, which pairs senior centers and schools, and Legacy Works, in which teenagers, home health aides or adult volunteers use oral history interviews to elicit stories from elders.

NEW WORLD IN MIAMI
Miami's New World School of the Arts initiated River Walk: An Intergenerational Multicultural Art Project in collaboration with the University of Florida and Miami Dade Community College, along with area public schools and nursing homes. Participating youth and seniors translated images of their ethnic heritages--Jewish, Cuban and African American--onto ceramic tiles in textured relief, and painted in brilliant colors. These tiles formed "memory thrones" that were installed at the entrance of Miami's River Walk along Biscayne Bay. This exquisite public arts project, which offered college credit to participating students, is a moving example of intergenerational collaboration.

In contrast to the apathy I encountered a quarter century ago, the recent growth of the field of creative aging thrills me. Also, in 1998, I started the National Center for Creative Aging
(NCCA), in partnership with the American Society on Aging, to develop programs that foster an understanding of the vital relationship between creative expression and healthy aging and to nurture the emerging diversity of approaches to creative aging. NCCA provides professional training; supports the replication of best-practice models; develops and disseminates resource materials through a national database, an e-mail newsletter and a website; serves as a clearinghouse for information exchange; and supports research, policy and advocacy in the emerging field of creative aging. For information, please join the Arts and Aging National Resource Directory by filling in the form on our website (www.creativeaging.org), or contact the NCCA, 138 South Oxford Street, Brooklyn, NY 11217; (718) 398-3870; e-mail: elderarts@aol.com

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