By Lia C. Miller, CAN-NC,
Executive Director and Founder
Creative Aging Network-NC (CAN-NC) will bring together thought leaders and innovators in the arts and aging fields at its sixth Annual Creative Aging Symposium on May 6 at The Lusk Center in Greensboro.
The event will open with Garrett Davis, playwright and founder of Winston-Salem’s Gdavis Productions, an urban theater company that has toured the country raising awareness with award-winning stage plays. (Gdavis Productions and Wake Forest Baptist Hospital are in preliminary talks to create a project to raise the awareness of diabetes in the African-American and American Indian communities.)
With the symposium theme, “Aging in a Diverse World,” Davis starts the morning, followed by Brad Allen, President and Executive Director of North Carolina Senior Games, Inc. Allen will share information about SilverArts, a major component of the traditional athletic competition of Senior Games which unites the athlete and artist. SilverArts provides a stage for the creative talents (visual, heritage, literary, and performing) of older artists. A performance by elderly Korean drummers will follow the morning sessions.
Highlight of last year’s symposium was a panel including (l-r)
Mac Sims, President, East Market St. Development; Tom Philion, President,
Arts GSO; Tim Carpenter, Founder and Executive Director of EngAGE;
Heather Burkhardt, N.C. Division of Aging and Adult Services; John Fugo,
Montgomery Development; and Dan Steffey, housing developer.
Afternoon workshops will feature model programs from the N.C. Museum of Art, Duke University’s Nasher Museum, and Asheville’s Geezer Gallery. (Once you learn about it, you won’t be offended by the name!) Experiential workshops will be offered in mixed media collage, dance, and music therapy. Additional workshops will address cultivating compassion, engaging older non-English-speaking immigrant/refugees, and best practices for the LGBTQ elder community.
Christina Soriano, an associate professor of dance at Wake Forest University, will lead a workshop, IMPROVment: Brain and Body Health, to address how we can move confidently to promote good health, regardless of physical abilities. (This workshop will also be a lot of fun!)
Another workshop leader, Ruthie Rosauer, is co-author of Singing Meditation: Together in Sound and Silence. Her volunteer time with a musical therapist in a hospital setting has led to an interest in how singing might help people with short-term memory loss. Rosauer will share information about a new group-singing initiative, Side by Side Singing, sponsored by the N.C. Center for Health and Wellness, for people with memory loss and their care partners to improve short-term memory and enhance overall quality of life.
This year’s symposium will address issues from a 2014 Arts and Aging Survey, conducted in collaboration with the NC Arts Council and the NC Division of Aging and Adult Services. To learn more, visit http://www.can-nc.org/creative-aging-symposium/ or contact Lia Miller at lia@can-nc.org or 336-253-0856. Pre-registration is required.
