About
HARBWR is the new Arts on Prescription programme for Swansea Bay University Health Board, in collaboration with local partners in arts, wellbeing, 3rd sector and local councils.
The programme received funding through YLab's HARP Nourish programme to start running creative and engaging arts activities from May 2021, in support of people experiencing mild mental health problems, isolation and loneliness.
We also organise groups for carers, Dance to Health for falls prevention and continuously look at expanding and improving our service where there is a need.
A short introduction to Arts on Prescription
Get in touch
Interested in participating, volunteering, facilitating or just want more information about our service?
Send us an email and follow us online.
All enquiries are handled in confidence
“Art is a wound turned into light.”
Georges Braque
Our Activities
Wellbeing through creativity and community
Rengarific
Every human is an artist
Rengarific is a fun and accessible arts activity that builds creativity, resilience and connections. Small groups facilitated by an artist create pieces of art, using any technique they choose (photography, poetry, sketching, painting, sewing, etc.). Once a week they meet up online to talk about their work and choose someone else's art that they "riff" off the following week. This goes on to create a collective story - a chain of artworks that is exhibited online or in a gallery setting.
Originally developed as part of YLab’s HARP Sprint project, Rengarific aimed to support adult mental health service users in Wales through 2020’s lockdowns. It has developed to provide a wide range of participants with a fun and meaningful creative project in an informal setting.
Dance to Health
A fun way to increase your strength and balance, enabling you to enjoy an active and healthy lifestyle
The Dance to Health programme uses dance to help people improve or maintain their strength and balance. This is important to ensure we continue to get the most out of life. It also reduces pressure on our health system.
We use dance because it is hugely powerful. Not only does it encourage us to build strength and balance. It’s fun, playful and liberating. It can be the source of incredible focus. It also gives us the opportunity to improvise and be creative.
Our dance artists complete the same training NHS physiotherapists receive to build strength and balance as we age. They then receive more training to help them smuggle the strength and balance exercises into dance.