Foundational Research- Sacred Spaces, Creative Places: The Role of Art in Healing
- Krista Heide
- Feb 26
- 3 min read
Written by Sheryl Reimer-Kirkham, Dean and professor of nursing at Trinity Western University in B.C., Canada, and Sonya Sharma, associate professor of sociology at University College in London, UK . Sheryl and Sonya are both inaugural research team members in our Art and Spirituality Research.
An Introduction to our Field of Research
We (Sonya Sharma and Sheryl Reimer-Kirkham, together with interdisciplinary teams) have been conducting research in the space of spirituality and health in both Metro Vancouver and London, UK—as the SPIRIT program of research. Our interdisciplinary collaboration as a health researcher and a scholar of religious and gender studies has fostered intersectional analyses that are theoretically rich and practically oriented. Since 2007, we have studied how religious plurality is negotiated in hospital and community-based settings, and how the sacred can be a relational bridge, even when very different beliefs and practices are at play.
Whether in publicly administered or faith-affiliated organizations, approaches of responsible pluralism celebrate and balance the expressions of a wide range of spiritual beliefs and practices, with the boundaries that they not bring about harm or imposition. In our book, Prayer as transgression? The social relations of prayer in healthcare (2020 McGill-Queens Press), we explore how healthcare provider-recipient encounters are mediated by organizational practices, spatial arrangements, and the arts.
Art was Ever-Present
Upon entering one hospital space while doing field work in London, art was ever-present. On one weekday we visited, there was a free classical music concert happening. In response, we sat to listen before an appointment. On another day we sat in the chapel space in front of an Italian renaissance painting. The presence of art on the walls, public performances and classes and workshops offered to hospital constituents’ engagement with creativity and participation in what London is renowned for – its arts and culture. As researchers, a lot of work can happen at a desk in front of a computer. In the field, a researcher can see many things and be part of the fabric of social life. Excitingly, art was embedded and enlivened the research context.
It also aroused questions:
How do they bring the arts in?
Who funds it?
Who has access?
How does it affect staff, patients and local community members?
What is it like for the artists involved to bring their practice to a clinical setting?
Exploring Approachability, Accessibility and Equity
Sometimes art and performance houses can seem far away and costly to attend. But in this hospital where all walks of life dwelled for a time, the arts and creative practitioners came to them. Worlds of imagination could be accessed and enabled in the institutional space of cure and illness. And thus, stumbling upon the art in this space raised our curiosity as researchers about if and how art speaks to all. This led us to write a chapter included in our book that explored how art has often been tied to social class and--because of this--how they mapped on to approachability, accessibility, and equity of funding across constituencies.
We noted that in some hospital spaces, arts were present but more kitsch and hands on via crafting, sing-alongs, and dance performances. Other settings had art installations equivalent to those found in modern art galleries and were present alongside those that signalled culture and heritage. Despite the questions the arts raised, hospitals without art would be more clinical and as such the arts have a way of softening the edges and making the institutional space more welcoming.
Ongoing Inquiry
The SPIRIT program of research, along with building foundational knowledge about religion and health in Canada, gives tribute to the partnerships of health organizations and researchers over time. One project flows into another, new initiatives are envisioned, new team members join, practice changes. Conferences are co-hosted, books co-written, students co-mentored. This new Arts for Equity project, co-led by Kendra Rieger, Anne Tuppurainen, and Sheryl Reimer-Kirkham, arises from such decades-long partnerships.
References:
Reimer-Kirkham, S. & Cochrane, M. (2016). Resistant, reluctant or responsible? The negotiation of religious and cultural plurality in Canadian healthcare. In S.Sharma and D. Llewellyn (Eds), Religion, equality, and inequalities (pp.65 – 76). Ashgate.
Reimer-Kirkham, S., Sharma, S., Brown, R., and Calestani, M., with Beardsley, C., Beaman, L., Bramadat, P., Collins-Mayo, S., Corcoran Smith, B., de Bono, C., Quinn, B., & Todd, A. (2020). Prayer as transgression? The social relations of prayer in healthcare. McGill-Queens University Press.
Sharma, S., & Reimer-Kirkham, S. (2023). Exploring racism and racialization in the work of healthcare chaplains: A case for a critical multifaith approach. Journal of Healthcare Chaplaincy (Published online), 29:3, 307-319.
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