One big room was full of people banging on inverted buckets on chairs, simulating the experience of playing the taiko drum, a large traditional Japanese instrument that engages the player's whole body in movement and rhythm.
In another room, a circle of people danced animatedly — arms linked, heads bobbing, legs kicking — to familiar tunes like "The Sunny Side of the Street."
And in classrooms all throughout the sprawling buildings of the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum in Chaska, professional artists discussed teaching older people art techniques including tissue-paper collage, quilt making, storytelling, children's books and playing the dulcimer.
The occasion was the 2015 Midwest Arts and Aging Conference and Showcase, an event held in June by ArtSage (www.artsagemn.org), a Stillwater-based nonprofit that works to involve older people in the arts — not as audience members, but as creators. ArtSage trains artists to teach older people and helps match them with organizations that serve them.
The idea is that creating art benefits the aging in numerous physical and emotional ways, offering an opportunity to stay active, engaged and social.
Of the approximately 200 attendees at the ArtSage event, the majority were program or activity directors in seniors residences, said Tammy Hauser, who became executive director at ArtSage in 2012 (though recently left for another position). ArtSage works to encourage those professionals to recognize the value of engaging in art.
"We already have Bingo. We already have Joe the accordion player who comes in once a month," Hauser said. "We're trying to get them to see older adults as creative beings, and not just passive participants. What we believe and know from science and anecdotal evidence is when people make art, when they're creating their own music, when they're writing their own stories, when they're singing their own songs, it's far more beneficial for them."
That idea is supported by research conducted in the early 2000s. The late psychiatrist Gene Cohen divided 300 people averaging age 80 into two groups: Half attended participatory art programs and half didn't. Even two years later, the group that engaged in art reported better health, fewer doctor visits, less medication usage, more positive responses on mental health measures and more activity overall.