Mindshare South Australia is an online community that shares stories through a variety of creative mediums. After launching nearly a year ago, mindshare has gone a long way towards broadening the perspectives of the general public and destigmatising the subject of mental health.
Discussing mental health is often a social taboo in our society. People often find it difficult to discuss mental health issues with family, friends, and colleagues. The mindshare project seeks to provide a voice to those living with or affected by a mental illness.
The creative works on mindshare include short films, digital stories, blogs, creative writing, art work, photography and original music.
The steps to recovery for many living with a mental illness generally involve a period of reflection. Part of this reflection is quite often expressed through the creative arts through films, writing, blogs, poetry, music, art and photography or even just through talking it over with friends and family.
Tracey Davis - mindshare.org.au
Freerange Future developed the mindshare website, and ran workshops and training in the lead up to the launch. The workshops covered blogging, running a website, and the use of social networks and video on the web. Many of the attendees at the workshops went on to help manage the mindshare website.
Coming up towards the one year anniversary of the launch, this feels like a good time to recap the success of the project in it’s first year.
Even after a year mindshare is still getting over a hundred visits a day, mostly from within Australia but also from other parts of the world.
In the time since the official launch last October there have been many additions to the website. Most recently a podcast feed and a forum have been added. The forum allows for even more communication and engagement between the mindshare users.
The creative content sections of the site have been a hige success, with nearly 300 pieces of creative work on the site and many more on the way.
The opportunity to express creatively is a cathartic transformation for many, allowing them to recover from being un-well. Feeling acceptance from others as part of this process is a strong step in rehabilitation therefore assisting the individual with their health and wellbeing just as taking medication, visiting their doctor, exercising or a health diet would.
Tracey Davis - mindshare.org.au
A huge milestone came for mindshare last week, when the program won the South Australian ABAF Arts and Health Foundation Award. The award was given to the Media Resource Centre, Mental Health Coalition of SA and Messenger Press.
This is hopefully just the first of many awards, with mindshare also being nominated for a national ABAF Arts and Health award, a Ruby award for community arts, and a Dr. Margaret Tobin Award for excellence in health. These are all being announced in October, so keep your fingers crossed. It would be great to see mindshare win any of these awards so close to the project’s first birthday.
The Mindshare Program was developed as a partnership between the Mental Health Coalition of SA inc and the Media Resource Centre.
Be sure to visit mindshare.org.au to learn more about the project.
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Topics: Events
