 Okay, hello everybody. Welcome to this webinar on well-being mental health and cultural mobility, which is co-founded by the European Union and that we do in collaboration with around that is doing now also the live streaming. My name is Marie Le Sours and I am the secretary general of on the move, and on the move is the main organizer of this webinar for people with visual impairment. So I do a self description. I am a woman with white complexion. I am in my late 40s. I have brown hair and I am wearing a black top with no sleeve because it's quite hot where I am sitting right now. Throughout the webinar, we kindly ask you to turn off your camera and to turn off as well the sound so that we can really focus on our moderator and our street speakers. There will be also live transcription in English that you can activate at the bottom of your screen. And it's not an automatic one. We have Judith from PCR that is really doing the work. And so that also the flow in the English language can be easier for you. Throughout the webinar, please feel free to share any type of resources, any type of information on the subject, and of course to send your question as well that then we will collect and share to the speaker during the last 30 minutes where there will be a Q&A session. So thank you again for joining us for this webinar. And without further ado, I am now passing the word to my colleague Johan Flock with the director of operation at on the move and that will be the moderator of this webinar. Thank you, Marie. And thank you, everybody for joining this conversation. My name is Johan. I'm going to self describe quickly for participants with visual impairment. I'm a white man in my mid 40s. I have brown, green hair, and I have facial, facial hair I'm wearing glasses today to be able to read my notes. So today we are meeting online all together to be able to discuss about mobility, well being and mental health. As you may be aware of the movies investigating a lot of different issues across the year through webinars but also through reports and publications to be able to have a full picture of what are the elements and obstacles of mobility, but also to be able to see what are the latest trends in the culture field in terms of international collaboration. So today we are going to focus on the positive and less positive impacts of international mobility, particularly on the mental health and well being of artists and cultural professionals. As we all know, since the 2010s, we have had a lot of studies demonstrating the positive impact of arts and culture on local communities, and particularly on their mental health and their general well being. We had significant research led at European or international level, and I have in mind one of the latest outstanding scoping review that was done by the World Health Organization, but also the recent studies published by our colleague network, on cultural action Europe. What we see in this research is that many cultural players or health players demonstrate the positive impact of art and culture in terms of their mental health, their health in general, but also the well being of the general population. We have now projects that have established very clearly and very completely the very positive impact on our field and engaging in arts and culture on a lot of different communities and especially vulnerable ones. But what we have been probably less discussing these past years is the well being and mental health of the creative workforce itself. So we are today trying to unfold some of the issues related to the health and well being of our dear artists and cultural workers, which means we are looking at ourselves, our own practices, our own difficulties, and we try to see the issue of well being through different lenses. Of course, as we know, the idea or the concept of well being of artists have been touched upon through many different angles, especially because we were looking at gender based violence because we were looking at parenting issues in the earth because we were looking at disabled cultural workers and their access to work opportunities, also because we feel intuitively that many of the past, many issues related to well being and mental health has raised these past years, especially in the light of the global pandemic we've collectively been through. What I see also is that many colleague organizations start to investigate the topic of well being for artists, cultural workers, whether being freelancers or employees, and I need to put here a couple of initiatives that are for me quite outstanding. First, the transferral initiative on well being hours for the staff members of their members, but also the ENCC paper that was dedicated to the exhaustion and burnout in cultural centers. We also need to quote the rest artists and studies on the impact of COVID on their member residency centers. So, from a very, I would say general focus on health and well being. We are trying to narrow this topic to to the ones of artists and cultural workers, but we are even trying to narrow it further to transnational mobility. And as we know we, we as on the move focus on this particular issue of cross water mobility and international collaboration. And today I'm very happy to welcome three, three distinguished professionals, friends and colleagues that have a particular experience in working internationally, also in studying the practices in our cultural ecosystems. Today, we have with us, Heather O'Donnell, and Heather is the founding director of the green room in colonial Germany. She was a professional pianist, but she's today a psychologist and a therapist, and she's counseling and accompanying a lot of stage artists and arts organization to support, I would say sustainable or good working environments. Heather, I've given a lot of lectures around the globe in America and New York City in Boston, New England, but also in China in Czech Republic, and in many conferences and and institutes. And also today we have with us, Crystal Curry. Crystal is a professional based in Brussels that is working as head professor at the Superior Institute of Arts and Choreographies of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts. Crystal is very famous for being one of the key worker of the Moffadat organization that is a fantastic organization that have been so active for so many years to support artistic bridges between artists based in Europe and artists based in the Arab world. Crystal is a dramaturg, is a committed researcher, and she has worked in artistic capacities on on many projects, along with choreographers, dance artists and many artists. And our third panelist today is also a well known figure of our performing arts ecosystem, Joris Janssen. Joris has been working for many years in the arts. First, I would say, as we met many years ago at Constipunt Flanders Arts Institute, where he led a lot of research and development projects. But four years ago we joined IDEA consult and at this agency, he also developed a lot of strategic guidance and research, both qualitative and quantitative to support the development of our cultural ecosystem. And most recently, Joris also contributed to quite an important pilot action, Perform Europe. That is a pilot action under Creative Europe, led by our colleagues from ITM, the International Network for Contemporary Performing Arts. So with these three speakers, I would like to of course give them the floor and remind that our conversation will be mostly even if artificially centered on cross-border transnational mobility. I think artificially because of course, as we know, they are structural witnesses. We have inequalities, a difference of development and access to work opportunities, to international opportunities, depending on who we are and where we are based. To start this conversation, I would like first to focus on these structural imbalances and try to see at structural level what could be the stresses or the risks that our artists and cultural workers face when they enter their career and they engage internationally. So on this aspect of structural issues that we feel could have an impact on the life of cultural workers, I would like first maybe to give the floor to Joris and to have your general feeling around these triptural issues. Okay, thank you, Johan, for the nice introduction, setting the stage with this urgent topic. First maybe also to self describe. I'm Joris, I'm a white male, a guy, late 40s with curly hair, glasses and light blue hooded sweater. And indeed my experience, it's from a lot of studies, often in co-creation with the sector in the context of the arts performing arts in Flanders, but also in an international context. And this idea of hyper mobility that we maybe first explore, it's really, we saw it already quite some time in our research at the Flanders Arts Institute, but also Institute of the Performing Arts before that we had a good basis and we managed to get a good view on some fundamental shifts in our ecosystem and the way we work together. It really has an impact on the people in the sector and indeed this idea of hyper mobility, it's really, we saw an increased acceleration of hyper mobility that really has a direct relation with the fundamental economic shift in our sector. I can talk about the performing arts for a long time, but we also see it in other sectors that can maybe give examples later, but in the performing arts. Go back in memory, we come from a situation where you would form part of a fixed ensemble of performing artists, you would produce a piece in your local context and then you would go on tour in your own country, depending on the possibilities that you have there. And also internationally, so this was kind of like the model back in the days, but through a number of trends and shifts we really mutated into a transnational system of co-production and presentation right now. A production is really a patchwork of several sources of income. Often as a producing organization you have maybe small batches, small subsidy, but mostly we've seen it in the figure it's really a patchwork of contributions by many parties from many different countries. So there is this fragmentation of resources and it's really that has been an acceleration factor in the mobility of artists and arts workers. Production is really the horizon of our work today. Relationships are really more short term and in order to develop a production you really need to tie together a lot of knots. And we also see in the research that artists have less support, less sustainable support in helping them to do so. So it's quite clear that this really has a direct impact on the situation of people in our sector and that indeed increased acceleration in mobility that it really relates to this increased fragmentation of resources in our sector. This is an impact. It's not a matter of your wish to engage in a more faster way in this internationalization. It's really a matter of survival in this shifting context. And indeed also we see in the research the impact that it has on people, maybe to give you an illustration from another research. We finished research about sustainable career development of circus artists in Flanders, and we asked the artists we did a survey and we asked them, okay, how happy are you in your job and are you considering to drop out. So we had artists survey that had dropped out and it's really all the issues they mentioned there. It's the stress, the emotional pressure to be able to survive in this kind of context, the lack of stability, the lack of insecurity. And also I talk about emotional pressure, but also what happens when there is a physical injury. What's your safety net. So there are so many elements that make it very, very difficult for, for people to sustain work and it really has an impact on, let's say well being a mental health and this kind of argumentation I think you can make it for a lot of other sectors with different value chains, if you would develop an argumentation like that for instance in pop and rock music, different sector but also there you could make a similar argumentation our business model of old have become obsolete and yeah and there's an increase in pressure on everybody to stay active in a very competitive and fragmented environment so just briefly in a nutshell as you can open our business kind of like the issues, how hyper mobility really resonates with its broader economic context and the increasing pressure and the shifts that we see there. So this is very interesting, the way you describe in a way the way the ecosystem kind of dislocate also over time and mentioning that the models are obsolete but in a way still into place. And this instability is in a way constant and it feels it's it's been there for a long time, and at the same time, the models are continuing to destroy itself for many reasons. And because of the impacts, I find it very interesting that you in the study on on on circus you were asking about the happiness, but also the dropouts the potential dropouts and try to measure also the happiness of working and working with other countries nationally as we know the Flemish circus is very good at building bridges with other context and exporting itself also to other countries and continents, but also the idea of there could be an end to to to this situation or this trajectory, which makes me make a link to to you, Christelle, because you have worked in establishing establishing these kinds of bridges among different countries, and between the Arab world in Europe, but also mostly, I mean, also within Europe. And I was wondering if you could observe the same kind of survival mode, being, you know, extended or increasing the stress in in these international project that you contributed to. Yes. Hello. I will briefly also describe myself so I'm I'm Christelle I'm, I'm a woman in my 40s. I'm today wearing glasses I have brown hair, a bit curly wavy, and the kind of light brown shirt. And, and also I speak with an accent. So, sometimes I roll the arts, which is, I hope is okay. Regarding thank you for this introduction and thank you also yours for also pointing out like the structural I think issues that are related also to this notion of health, well being and artistic work and based on my experience. Just to also go back to the question that you have asked you on. I do think that in one like all the, all the inequalities actually are really sometimes at the core of those questions, because having or being a person in between let's say territories. And on the other line actually the different realities that artists work within. And this comes also to be very concrete. It really comes with this notion of on one side some people would talk about hyper mobility, and on the other side people would talk about lack of mobility and lack of opportunities to be able to travel around and so on to cross borders. So, I, I, there is something here like based on my little experience that is interesting to highlight is that the well being is not only related to, I would say financial resources, but also to contextual situations that are sometimes overwhelming, not in the sense of it's overwhelming because we don't have enough financial resources to travel, but also because the realities in which the artists are political and social realities, the art, the artists, and also the cultural workers are living in outside of Europe, make this the mobility itself be also something that is how to say it's an opportunity so this notion of hyper mobility is of course something to take into consideration but also the lack of mobility I think is something also to tackle. And it's not only like how does it influence I think the well being. It's also because it's sometimes a door for in terms of mobility and when you travel, when you are able to exchange with peers outside of a certain context or of a local context when it comes, it brings a kind of well being it can also I think we will talk about it later when it's forced. It's the other way around so it's a very complex and nuanced. I think discussion to have. I do sound you know, a bit of an advocate you know for for cross mobility but I think that we really need to take into account the different realities depending on where you are and what are the different power structures that. Yeah, come with it somehow. Yeah, it is it is very clear and I think what comes in in what I take from from from your words is also the idea of, let's look at the bigger picture and and try to point out what are the intersections between the notion of mental health and well being the structural issues that may have like an enormous impact on on the life of artists and cultural workers, including, of course, the political context, economical context, etc. So, I understand the, the, in a way the very definition of well being is not just mental, it's physical, it's economic, it's emotional. So, it goes way beyond just, just with in brackets the mental mental health. Come back to you, indeed in relation to impediments or obstacles to mobility and enforced mobility in a moment but I would like to give the floor to ever on this issue of structural issues that could lead to a bad mental health and and the absence of of well being artists. You have been an artist and a pianist for several years and you with your peers also were part of, I would say a system of a music industry or music field let's put it this way that was sometimes particularly harsh on talents. And I'm lucky to hear a little bit you about this. Thank you so much for the invitation. I'm also going to describe myself for those who are visually impaired. I am 50 years old. I'm white American woman of Irish descent so very pale. I'm wearing glasses, and I'm also wearing a red blazer. I find it very interesting that you're asking me about something anecdotal I'm listening to the other speakers and I work really on the ground. So I'm a psychologist I work with with people on the ground so the overview of systems in which they engage is not because I'm working with individuals but I of course have done research and I have my own experiences as an artist as you mentioned. So these aspects of carrying over experiences from from one's own life into engaging with others who are experiencing impediments or psychological difficulties is a double edged sword I have to be careful because each person brings their own experience and their own life to to the table, and I had my experience which is of course different. There's many aspects where we we touch each other's experience and where we meet, but everybody is fundamentally different and they're in their approaches and their experiences. As I mentioned just as a maybe helpful framework. Of course we've mentioned to be an artist is inherently. Let me put it this way, dangerous to your health. There's a lot of studies that show that artists suffer more than the general population from physical impairments from psychological impairments from occupational hazards. And then there's another group that we consider right now to to migrate to be mobile is also I'll call it a liminal space. Humans are designed to be kind of habitual creatures and to develop systems of how we interact in the world and when you move and you switch everything and everything is new. You're engaging in a very vulnerable life period, where you're more susceptible to physical psychological social impairments because you're operating on a very intense level with your human capacities so we have these kind of to dangerous zones I think it was very helpful for crystal so mentioned. Of course these situations are potentially dangerous and they're potentially invigorating and wonderful as well it's important to mention that you these two can exist in the same room at the same time. So to be culturally mobile to be an artist has the potential to give life affirming and wonderful aspects of growth. This is this is a given, and it comes with a lot of vulnerabilities and precarities and insecurities and it's not as safe a kind of lifestyle as other fields. Thank you. I think it's interesting also to that you underline the positive impacts of mobility. We always are on the move consider it's a given, but I guess it's always good to remind everybody that mobility is a is a positive thing. And that's, that's probably why we advocate for cultural and artistic mobility every day. Indeed, I guess, and this is also why we, we tend to not dwell upon the positive aspect of mobility is because we somehow take for granted that the entire policy system at least at European level. And for many international organization is that mobility and trans transnational mobility is brings, you know, intercultural dialogue me brings artistic growth, personal growth, learning, non formal learning, of course, but there are so many positive impacts. And they have been studied, you know, for many years now for, at least with the mobility matters studying in 2008. I would say that you have an interesting take on this issue. And I was wondering if you could pronounce a term that we didn't mention yet is the term of care. Do you feel that mental health well being is somehow related to the practices of care in our cultural fields, or the policies around care applied to arts and culture. So how, how is it for you when I drop the word care in the conversation. Yes, I will invite Chris to react to this of course. Oh, it's such an interesting question thank thank you for posing it, because when you think of health care. There's so many levels in which you can engage with it. Yes, there's aspects of personal responsibility individual actions and individual choices. And then there's certain systemic things that contribute to our ability to take care of ourselves so we're cared for by systems this could be a family unit this could be colleagues structures this could be an orchestra theater group this could be a country. It could be a continent. So there's all these layers of systems within with which we engage which contribute to this aspect of care, and at the same time, we're personally responsible so what as I mentioned before I engage at the level of the individual, mostly, it could be false for me to insinuate that the bulk of the care aspect should be burdened by the individual, because if there's not an accommodating system for this individual to take care of themselves. It doesn't work. I think it's interesting just to think about the burnout burnout is not a medical condition burnout is an occupational hazard. When you have an unsafe working environment you're more susceptible to experiencing burnout. So, when I work with clients when I work with individuals. One has the most autonomy with yourself, of course, and that's where you can work the, the, the most, but it's so important to to engage with advocacy and to do the work that both crystal and your research doing to to work on maybe individuals and and try to approach the issues of care on a more systemic and structural level. Yes, thank you for this. I will pass the word to maybe your is on this, the care, the notion of cares in our systems. How do we embed this plan this seed in a way to make it grow, if possible. It's a good question also complicated one because indeed, as persons as individuals, as I pointed out really in a situation where you don't have control of the system but what can we do and indeed it's good also in this room that we're together reflecting on what we can do together. And maybe to to drop some insights from, let's say systems thinking and transition thinking and think a first element that's really important is really create the urgency make this a topic talk about it and both about the negative aspects and the impacts that we already discussed for a little bit. Also look very precisely on in our funding systems in our policy systems also in the policies of institutions, what are really the practices that leads to these kinds of situation and try to be very precise on what makes these things that we already maybe know what makes them quite persistent so this is really part of the analysis the negative aspects, but also develop ideas around care, maybe also hospitality, a number of values that we find important to counterbalance these issues, really values of sustainability and try to okay to see what how they could be translated into concrete practices and there it's important. Many theories or approaches of transition thinking and systemic change they start with the need for experiments, set up concrete experiments to to work around these values and concrete translate them in concrete practices. And I think at this stage where we are right now there are a lot of things happening already in the practices of Heather and Crystal and so many other people in the room I think there's a lot of things going on experiments going on. And what's also important to really translate this into systemic changes connects exchange about this learn together and see what what are the skills that we need to learn what are the skills that need to be learned in the institutional context that we work in. Also engage the mainstream institutions engage the policy makers and try to to make a shift also on that level because that's what we really need to anchor to mainstream to institutionalize these experiments that we have seen popping up for the last couple of years. So I think that's that's maybe a path to go create the urgency set up the experiments but also connects the experimenters learn together and their leadership is also important share the learning and learn together and institutionalized it. We already went through some of these steps, one maybe concrete example is the whole culture moves Europe. Let's say funding mobility funding system after a number of iterations in opportunities, the whole system with the top ups, trying to create a more sustainable mobility on many levels the ecological aspect is there but also this, this aspect of mental health by for instance looking at work life balance I think there are already some shifts but indeed also a lot of work to be done more experienced and more funding systems where but we learned from them can be mainstreamed. I think it is interesting the notion of experiment and learning, especially because when I hear you about the structural change. I remember many stories and recent stories also of burnouts and mental health so well being issues being reported in us consoles in ministries of cultures so the in institution that are, you know, managing or creating designing frameworks and funding systems. And also being impacted by their, you know, the personal capacities to to actually deal with the the mental health and and well being of their own stuff. It's interesting that we would be able to experiment. And I guess also as part of the resources that we will be circulating after the webinar and posting on our website. I would like to be able to point out a couple of very interesting examples, for example of residency centers that created well being guidelines when hosting artists and cultural professionals in their premises. So, before delving into a couple of these examples, I would like to to hear you a little bit also crystal on the notion of care, and how maybe organizers organizations could act upon certain segments, or take up some actions in terms of the way they talk about artists and cultural professionals. Do you have any ideas, experiences of this. Yeah, the thing is I have a lot so I'm just like processing to see what would make sense to share today. So I think I would like to take care and my experience because there was also a request to talk about ourselves and our experiences so like really based on my positionality and also based on my very little experience. When it comes to care. Not talking like on the ground. For example, recently we had to host an artist coming from Russia, and the person needed to acquire visa and then this led to. I was like let's say the person in between. So I was discussing with the artist and then they had to apply for a visa to come to Brussels, and the process was taking long. On the other side. I received as an answer. Are you sure you would like to invite this artist because eventually they will. There's a high possibility that they don't get their visas. So I think the care, I think, played a big role in the sense of telling, we try, and we do. And then we see, we take it step by step, we don't come with this idea of oh it will never happen so let's not do it. The emotional labor was was actually to make sure that while this person is waiting for their visa whether they will get it or not to make sure to be in contact to inform to also try to see, but not to be in this negative position because we don't know you might you might not the artist already knows already is taking a risk. So, to acknowledge actually, and to say okay we're going to try. It's very, it sounds like how to say very simple but at the same time it requires care requires a lot of time. It requires answering messages, whenever these messages come to stay in contact not to because the other person is really living another reality and so on. Eventually this person was able to come. Last minute, and I'm simply minute, I'm simply how to say sharing this experience, because the person talked about care came and said thank you for caring. We're also keeping the person in our minds, knowing that if they do not answer there must be a reason that whenever they answered if you are in a privileged position, we can also take the time also to answer back and so on. Of course this comes with the other side as cultural workers, we are giving a lot of our time to answer all these. We are available and availability is taken for granted. So I think, and I don't know how to do, and I have no clear answer about what does it mean to be how to measure emotional labor. We measure the availability that we are giving to people this was one example. Other examples are also in the way we look at, we had to host at one point also artists coming from Syria. A few years ago, in Germany, and the, the, how to say, there was a very good will and the German reaction at that point was, yes so obviously they will come and those people they will need psychological support and and and and then. And my reaction was like just wait, let us meet. First, let's go for for I don't know for dinner before putting you know psychologist and all this structure. When what we simply need was like a human interaction. Other than anything else so it's very it really varies, but I think that like Heather has mentioned the human side is very important. It's it sounds like a simple word but it comes also with acts and with action and with time and with availability, and with the possibility also and the need actually of listening first. I know imagining and projecting also a lot of stereotypes and thinking that whatever we're doing is great sometimes the artist doesn't need this. The artist needs simply. And I would say like the artist as a peer, you know, simply when arriving to go for a drink. This already is a lot of caring. Like I mean it sounds a little bit crazy but but indeed it happened to make sure that to introduce the system systems are totally different realities are totally different. And it doesn't go also to introduce them through our own experiences. I wasn't born in Europe I came to Europe I had to find my way also I had to navigate all the systems and so many systems actually. I wanted to share this with the others, and is a type of is one way of caring in a way. No no that's very, very good example also on the, on the, how, I mean how, how much effort someone is putting also to be able to, to welcome an international artist and to make sure there is this human and this human centered approach is that the core of, in a way, a project hosting somebody. And the visa issues that you mentioned also make me think back to, I remember earlier this year we were on the move in Tunis, doing the cultural mobility forum. We had sitting in the director of theater, who was mentioning the impact of visa rejections on artists and cultural workers that were willing to actually come to Europe or go to another country and be able to have an experience and mobility or access a residency or be able to present their work or to connect with other art makers. And she was really voicing something that is not very often voiced I think, is how we underestimate sometimes the emotional or psychological impact of visa rejection on artists. And I remember other conversation in Tunis, including with the cultural manager, Muna Belgrini from Morocco also saying and sharing the frustration of young dance artists not being able to access visas to actually explore the world and feed their artistic care, you know, imagination and be able to grow in their dance practice. So I guess also these visa rejections issues are something that are, in a way, another layer in terms of the mental health and well being. Yes, Christelle. I see you unmute. Please jump on this point. So, let's just share also the fact that, of course, we underestimate. And I think that if we have never had a visa rejection in our lives, or we never have been through the process of applying for a visa. We can never understand what it means on so many levels. Because also, when you get a reject imagine the logic of rejection of not being able to go somewhere. Although this lodge, I mean, the planet belongs to everybody in a way of course it doesn't. But, but how to say symbolically, the fact of you not being able to move from one place to the other, going through this hassle, and it's already a big hassle. You need to project. It's a process. It's sometimes it takes six to four months to prepare all the number of papers and so on. And then you receive a rejection. It's not only, it's not only how to say an administrative rejection. It can be lived as a very personal rejection of you having the right to move as much as if, and it's not shared, because other people have the right. You just, you know, we are all equal but some people are more equal than others. I just wanted to like highlight this point because I think it's very important. It is, it is very important. I would like also to, to go towards, maybe even quite harsher issue in terms of mobility. And as we have seen these past decade, I would say many crisis at international level. And with these crisis, a lot of movement of population, including artists and culture workers fleeing some conflicts zone in Sudan in Afghanistan in Ukraine lately, etc. And that is, I would say almost a special mental health and well being issue within the issue of international mobility that is really bear by by forcibly displaced people. I had a two years ago, artists that's risk connection, Pan America, who published a safety guide for artists that is available in several languages, quite an extraordinary document but also the World Health Organization published an interesting very short leaflet on how to support the mental well being of of displaced people, not special, of course, not not focusing on artists and culture workers but all, all displaced people. And I would say together that you have been very committed in a way in supporting also artists that were recently displaced from Ukraine. I would like you to tell us a little bit more about the heaven program that you run. Sure. I just want to back up what crystal said was there are so many valuable things in it. The care is the best care is individual really taking the person before you and asking them what they need, asking them what their impressions are where they're struggling. Of course this is the most resource heavy in our in our very mechanized structure. There's nobody to pay for it. And so, if the individuals on the other side on the cultural worker side engage in this like crystal does. It's very hard on them because they're spending a lot of time they're really taking on a lot of extra responsibility so you see a lot of burnout in the cultural worker part of this equation, because those who really care deeply care about this. These people that they're confronting and really trying to meet them as individuals as humans and trying to give them help. It requires a lot of time a lot of individual thought a lot of it's not you can apply a stamp you can apply a preformed program on this, you have to meet them individually and that's a very resource heavy task. So, this has been a theme with cultural workers cultural workers are very very prone to mental health issues like burnout. Not only you have something like vicarious trauma I know this is sorry. This is not exactly your question but you have vicarious trauma issues. You'll have just riding along with these visa issues if the visa gets rejected of course the major burden of this is on the artist but then also all these steps down the line your whole program may be impacted by this rejected visa you may not get the funding. There's so many aspects of how that can go down the line. So you're really carrying this burden burden, to a lesser extent than than the artist but but carrying it never the less. So the green haven artist residency really came out of just, we want to help artists that's our mission, we want to provide support systems for artists when the Russian invasion of Ukraine started in 2022. It was just clear, we've got to do something. And a lot of Ukrainian artists were coming very quickly to Germany. So, as Crystal was describing you just do whatever you can that at that point involved, sometimes planning housing helping them go to the centers where you have to get your visa and things like this. So it was very, very all consuming I'll say I won't say time consuming just all consuming. I've been trying to structure this in a more sustainable way. And this is then structured into a program called Green Haven artist residency for artists throughout the world. And this question of balance, how do you set up a program that's really helpful for a large number of people, but really stay true to that aspect of individual care that that crystal was was was alluding to. And it's a constant dialogue I have to say there's no definitive answer for that it's really waking up each day and saying, what can I do. How much can I do and how much do I have to kind of stand back and just consolidate right now. I'm sorry to not be able to provide concrete answers but I think this kind of individualities where we need to engage right now we're so much caught up in the world in this kind of mechanistic solutions to problems and they just don't work. We're finding that on so many levels. It has helped us to a certain extent in humanities history but now we're looking to be humans again. I'll just send it. But thank you for this. Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this. But then I'm wondering if, in a way that I mean the human approach is the most important one. And we are discussing how the cultural field could, in a way, answer some of these needs so how do we, you know, help ourselves to better answer, you know the needs of artists and cultural workers. And I'm always wondering where to position ourselves should we say it will, I mean it relies on individuals and our goodwill or availability. Of course the national political structures have their role to play. Plus also as organization. I'm wondering this like, how do we better answer these needs for, you know, taking care of one another in our field. I don't know, do you have a couple of ideas on how do we do that. If I look around me and maybe some reactions or things that have been done here in the context of Brussels and Flanders. What we sometimes see when the situation is really urgent and often it's quite urgent is that cultural houses also indeed share resources in order to listen to the basic human needs open the houses. Just to sleep there. Sometimes we see it when but this is often quite ad hoc not really a structural thing so it's also interesting to think of more structural answers and relations and yeah that's that's quite difficult I remember 10 years ago. I mean, we had a networking organization here in Flanders and Brussels it was called Zebrard, and it was indeed an initiative of flüchtling a very flounder, a broader organization, working on hospitality for all refugees, and they had an initiative to connect artists, refugee artists with the cultural sector here in Flanders, because indeed, the situation of dislocated artists is quite specific there are a lot of issues but the lack of network the lack of symbolic capital the lack of connections is very, very stressful very relevant so that was the point they wanted to tackle and the funding for this organization stopped because it was quite unclear. Where do they fit into funding systems. It was too specific within the broader hospitality policies. Yeah, maybe not enough related to artistic excellence or artistic production and development to fit into the arts policy so that's something that we lost, but still there are still interesting initiatives I think that's very relevant and inspiring here in Flanders is the practice of global aroma which is an art center working with newcomers and indeed in their practice and what they do the human elemental listening taking care is very important they describe themselves as an arrival space, a place where you can come in these kinds of situations or other situations where you are dislocated as an artist art worker or maybe an art slover so it's not that well defined there and what I think is very interesting and also maybe broader is in their approaches they also go beyond to the individual and it's really about strategies that relate to creating a space, a space where you can indeed find this harbor, but also community space where you can find people in similar situations to exchange of community I think it's also important in relation to hospitality and also sharing resources for for development so there is still the need I think also in difficult situations to to be able to further develop on a personal level on an artistic level and also their space and infrastructure and other kinds of resources are important so I think there might be some takeaways here also for the broader sector how can we create these spaces together. It's good that you have places like global aroma but we must not forget what we learned from the zebra initiative is broader connections with with the broader institutional artistic cultural context. That's that's a shared responsibility to to work together to create these connections together in order that these these harbors these spaces and save spaces for shared resources that are not islands but they're really well connected to the broader context in our cities in our sectors, maybe some takeaways to learn from once more. Now what you're right in mentioning these organization there are there are great examples of what can be done but also the limits because of the structural, you know, complexities that we observe in many countries. When I see colleague organization doing a very similar, a very similar action in March in Copenhagen, globe out point Helsinki, you see these organization don't have big budgets, but really try to create this community of international artists relocated artists because what happens once the emergency is gone. So when you actually work in a new country when the, you know, the, the, all the administrative visa issues are in a way solved. What what's happening next in a way for for these communities. Well, I think this is a very important aspect, the community aspect, and how we can reinforce this feeling of belonging to to a community and I guess it works also for well being and mental health to not feel isolated somehow, and and excluded from the circuits and the networks. I would like to ask you if you have a last, you know, a last suggestion for us to better address these mental health and well being needs before open the floor to to the participants. And Kristal, do you have any last suggestion. I was thinking also, you know, because what you mentioned the community. Of course it's important. And I think what is also more important is that the community doesn't stay between the newcomer artists, like it's also there are also artists, or this community always to be in contact with the rest of the artists that are there are that are present actually on a territory and this links it also to the fact that some artists are because we focused a little bit about the artists who are coming to say, but there's a lot of artists who simply would like to come exchange and go back. And, like, just to be aware that it's not only like it's about you know this exchange and this fact of creating alliances, creating a big community out maybe of small communities but not to end up also being tokenized and staying in a small community, because it's not a new comer or because of certain. I mean, I will not open now the whole topic but just to say that it's very important like to keep on opening those doors, and to take into account, again, like you were mentioning what was said in Tunisia that the fact of traveling of connecting and the fact of being able also to have those kind of connections are in another way allow in another way creating a broader community. And I think this is also again something that is crucial when it comes to well being when you feel that you are not isolated or you're not only surrounded by people who are exactly in your situation that are struggling. It brings you a kind. I mean, it contributes actually to a kind of a well being somehow. Absolutely and what you described a very much what we find out when we study mobility for or the access to mobility for disabled artists and culture workers. Access issue is very key. The same for artists and culture workers with parental duties or caregivers that, you know, where their situation is taking into account in the international mobility or the work opportunities the touring etc so the idea of accessing spaces, accessing communities, accessing an ecosystem, accessing different pathways and not being rejected from them or excluded from opportunities really help in the understanding of a more general well being of artists and culture workers. I want to thank you for for answering my candid questions. And I would like to see if we have comments and questions in the chat. I see that some resources were shared some links to to studies maybe I will ask my colleague Marie LeSour to take the floor and maybe share some of the comments or questions that could that were posted online. Yeah, thank you very much, Johan, and thank you, Christelle, Heather and Joris for your she's very rich conversation. And for the moment, what is also very interesting and maybe means a lot in relation to the topic. There are some comments that come to support some of the, some of the saying so, and also some resources that are shared in particular, also from Monica Jorjan from the Commission European Commission about also like a call from the EU and the the WHO call for support of the mental well being of possibly displaced people through art and culture so these documents are very important. I just would like, sometimes it's difficult with the sound because some people don't have the best sound connection, they can hear us but maybe it's more difficult but I would like to ask maybe there is one person that really reacted with a very interesting comment. This is Camilla Isabel Moreno Tapia, and maybe if she can, if she don't mind doesn't mind take the floor because I can read what she said, but I think it's also good, you know, to, for her to to express what she says so there is the comment by Camilla and also there is another comment on food and cultural mobility and health and caring by LOD veterans so if one of you can just share I think it would be much better than to hear my French accent and sharing your thoughts. Camilla say sure. Okay, go ahead Camilla you can put your sound and your camera on. Hello, good, good afternoon I think yes hearing Europe. Hi. Thank you so much for taking in consideration my comments. So basically the first comment that I said that was paying attention to what Crystal said concerning personalized attention, and also the idea of helping people that are in your same situation. So in my case, I am an Ecuadorian living in Spain, which is kind of curious occasion because of the language I feel that I have this cultural approach to Spain. However, I come from the other part of the ocean and we also have this tendency to associate certain perceptions that Spaniards have from the rest of Latin America. The thing is that one of the biggest problems where I think it causes a tension for all of us has been like this vicious cycle between. I need to get a job because I need to get a visa but for getting this visa I really need to get a job. So this kind of puzzle gives brings a lot of tension brings a lot of stress, and also because you are not only relying or you're on your capabilities but also you are relying on external stakeholders, relying on people who want to want to employ you or hire you, you are relying on also the how the system works also in times that do not depend on you. So I think that probably this is one of the biggest causes of tension stress and even of anguish among foreigners that come to work in Europe right. So, when it comes to the idea of personal aid or well taking care of others. I think that is very interesting because it is a way to develop a community, in which sense that sometimes as crystal mentioned many times, you will find people that are in your same situation, or you already have passed through these or people that have already gone through these, and they will give you advice they will give you support, and therefore you kind of know have a certain diet of what which steps to follow further right. And I find it very interesting because I believe that it is not only something that helps you but also helps you to help. I think that once you get to know other people that are incoming and you have this knowledge is something that is constantly transmitted and I think that is very interesting. And it links with another thing that you said the importance of having a community. I think that the feeling of belonging is probably one of the things that helps you the most is probably mental mental health problems, because these belonging or feeling of ownership either you have something that attaches you to the country where you're staying, or you have this feeling that you belong to a certain place or even you have to be appropriate to a certain, I don't know, for example the provision of space I think that is also a very good thing that helps you. I think that having those things are essential tools, either to help yourself and help your mental care, your mental health, but also to help to improve the mental health, or the well being a state of others that are in your current situation. Thank you Camilla for sharing this, I mean your experience and your point of view of this, maybe I have just one question for you actually if you don't mind. Because we hear a lot, I mean there is a bit trends in the pandemic around digital community. And I'm always wondering in our conversation around mental health and well being if this digital connection is as strong as you know the in real life person connection, especially around the issues of building a sense of belonging, being able to exchange tips and advice, etc. And I was wondering if you had an opinion around this digital community idea. And that's a very good question because I actually didn't pay attention to that until now. I think that always when you are on site to say it in a way, it's always stronger because you have the physical perception of someone going through the same thing that you are going, and this is way more shared. However, now I'm thinking about some of my friends and they are living either in Sweden, in Belgium, I'm staying here in Spain. And despite each country has their own policies or their own situations, we all share the idea of being Latin Americans living in Europe and dealing with all the struggle that it comes ahead with all the paperwork, and also for example language barriers can be in some situations, etc, etc. And despite being three different countries because these are the people that come to mind right now, I think that it helps a lot to know that you have an open and also a bigger audience to communicate with, because probably all these may not be the same that I have, but in a way we kind of understand what it is in its core. So, maybe they cannot help you with very specific tasks, but knowing that you are not the only one in this situation of being a foreigner from a country that is basically everywhere. And dealing with, again, people that probably don't want to hire you, because something that has taken my mind about what Crystal said is like, sometimes rejections do not feel like a paperwork thing, they feel personal, and it's very easy for you to fall in this spiral of saying, it's because of my ethnicity, it's because of my origin, all your head starts rolling around, right? So having people that are there with you understanding this situation, despite being in a different place with different contexts, I think also give you some strength and again makes you put everything on perspective. Okay, thank you. I see, thank you very much, Camilla. I see Ada wants to add a word and then I will give the floor to Elodie Vatran. I just want to say a quick response and a tiny little anecdote. When we started the program supporting Ukrainian artists, we sent out, we want to help, how can we help? And a lot of answers came back and I'd like to joke about it. Nobody was asking us what time is your yoga course or how can we get psychological counseling. They were saying, can I exercise my art at your, so one of the big activities that we did was just opening up our space. And so much happened when the people came together and they did their own, I'll put it like as a psychologist, they did their own psychological work, because they had a framework and it's not something that we created, it's something that they created. But we just provided a room for it. And so this is so much a part of it that you can't like a chess master, you can't do these things when people get together and support each other, there's a magic that occurs. And that's really one of the strongest psychological supports you can imagine. So thank you so much for pointing that out. No, thank you so much for giving me this time. So I will leave you now. And thank you again. Okay, thank you, Camilla. And I think we have maybe Elodie, who can answer a question. Hello Elodie, you can unmute yourself. Hello. Hi. Nice to meet you and thank you for this conference that was really interesting. I know on the move is a lot about mobility, but mental health is a core subject for me right now because I'm working on a project about how to prevent mental health issues in the industry, especially in the music industry, as I'm an artist manager and doing artist services, just about the mobility. And my comments was on nutrition, because it's also part of this can be a part of the stress and also have effects on mental health. I'm working just to give an example. I'm working with six dancers, they're all from different countries. And they're all vegetarians. And right now we have a tour in France. And sometimes they just have no option to eat only like a cold salad on the side with a lot of cheese. It has a lot of impact on their performance and also the way they feel considered because they say there's no hot meal with no meat. Or it could be also if you have a special diet, so maybe you don't know something really French is called a fondue. And the dancers, they were from Bolivia, Cyprus, and they had the fondue. And they say, yeah, that's vegetarian, but it's just really weird for somebody is not to don't know this food and for many people traveling equals also be like a real struggle. There's a lot of music too, like especially in reggae where they eat special food with special vegetables they used to eat. And nutrition can really be an issue in the mobility. And of course it's also part of traveling. But I think also the, the partners should be informed that it has an impact and it should be considered is not luxury is part of the machine is the fuel that makes people work. So it needs to be respected too. And that's it about the nutrition and just to talk a little bit about my project. Because I am, as I told you I'm not manager, and I had a burnout last year. So I know exactly what I'm talking about. And as I do a lot of sport you help me out to find to find my balance and working with artists. I'm sometimes the first person they go to when they have they feel depressed or they feel they don't feel, you know, good. A good in a whole way and realize there's like a three way to prevent. It's physical activity, stress management and nutrition. That's why I talk about nutrition. And most of the time people don't know where they should go. Should I see a psychologist? Should I just have a drink? Should I just take drugs? Should I just don't care and do like everything is okay? Should I do like it's okay? And then three years after I stopped my job because I don't know if it's still job. And so this program is a way to connect specialists because there's a lot and they know the industry that knows the industry and the effect on the body and the mental health. And yeah, it's kind of a future marketplace between artists and professional and well being professional that knows the subject of the cultural industry. Because if you go to a doctor and they say you should sleep during the weekend. If you're working in the cultural industry, you know that it doesn't mean anything because you cannot be sleeping in the weekend. And yes. So, so that's the part of the project. Thank you. Thank you, Elodie, for sharing this and your thoughts on nutrition indeed and your personal experience. It was like we go back to one of the first comments you were you were doing, Joris, about, are you happy? And, and will you, do you think you will be, you will be dropping out at some point. And I guess these are also very cool questions. Are you happy in your job in your career in your program profession and trajectory. This is one of the takeaway I will keep having in mind all this human approach that we talked about is how do we as organizers hosts of artists. We can also make sure the people we host welcome and work with are happy. And I would urge it to that, at least happiness. And we care and listen, because also, I mean, many of the stories and examples you provided were really focused on this active listening of the needs of the people being from offering space to actually, you know, doing an administrative process to make sure you know visa issues were dealt in a serious way. It is already for in 20 minutes. So we have very few minutes left. So do any of you have a comment or a question you would like to throw, or an idea you would, you would like to throw the table. I'm asking to ever your recent crystal, but also to the participants, if they have a last comment or question they would like to, to share. No. So the speakers first. No last thought is more related to this notion of well being and hospitality. It might be like the topic of another webinar, but because hospitality also sometimes means something to one side but is totally it's about perception also of what we understand by hospitality. It's something totally different on another side. And it's interesting to see how in arts and culture this notion of hospitality what does it mean and how does it unfold. I mean I have a lot of anecdotes it just brought me to a lot of anecdotes, and I think mission is part of them and is not an anecdote it's really central. Maybe I agree with you. That may be a final reflection it really resonates with what Crystal says, I think take away here is that I need to talk about mental health well being there, several very specific issues related to that, maybe it would be interesting. Interesting for me now but also in in reporting or maybe following up. What is the breakdown of the different topics that we talked about but also what are the concrete practices related to that and I think it would be a good starting point to really look at these practices and, as I already said learn from that and exchange among people, setting up these practices but also with the with the broader sector, and that's a that's a suggestion also for on the move to follow up with this important topic. And I thank you to my co panelists but also everyone in the room I saw there were a lot of projects being shared. I think that's really important that we do this and continue to do so and keep on learning together. Thank you, yours. And also I would say that on the move will publish a report on this at the end of the year so we'll collect as many examples initiatives on top of summarizing this conversation but also also perform a desk research and we will try to investigate further and publish something to to inspire our field. Something that's occurred to me within the last hour and a half almost is the navigation between the individual engagement. So really taking each person that you're in confronting with us as an individual human and engaging in that way. And then cultivating frameworks, creating within your organization or even within your, if you're an artist within your, your colleague network, creating frameworks that support each other and support yourself. Because when you navigate between these two aspects then you can help yourself avoid burnout, because too much on on one end is almost a recipe for burnout. And, and it has a wider reach the creation of framework so I'm really grateful to you all for for this conversation because it's really crystallized, no pun intended crystal crystallized an idea about like how to how to make it spread out. Not not stay here but really spread out so I'm really grateful for everybody thank you so much for your ideas and impulses and, and yeah, let's keep going. Thank you very much really I thank you for, thank you for for for your contribution because I think your experiences and your take on the question of mental health and well being was very at the same time specific, and, you know, you know, digging into or delving on your own pathway so I think it was very generous of you to to contribute to this conversation. I see that in the in the chat some other comments and questions are coming. I see for example that we have Louisa asking or sharing interesting questions in terms of what are the, I mean observing the lack of timely and accessible responses in career counseling and support in the art and she was wondering how we could imagine artistic institution to support the creation of such services. So you know we're very in a way in the in the line of whatever you were describing in terms of support, but I'm sure also we will, we will find in way examples of people that could actually share their views on this very interesting question Louisa thank you for asking this. So I'm going to, I'm going to close this webinar thinking of course again. The three panelists we we had also mentioning that we will of course put online a recording of this webinar with live captioning, both on the YouTube channel of on the move and I think my colleagues already posted the link to follow this channel, and it will be also available that whole round TV here is one of our member and partner to live stream our online conversation. My colleague probably also already posted a link for you dear participants to be able to feedback on this webinar, it is already like five or six questions so it's really it will take you three minutes to to feedback on this don't worry. And then I would also encourage you to stay tuned. So to, you know, subscribe to on the newsletter, it comes in many different languages. You will access many, many, many open calls for participation to travel the world, hopefully, and to access a lot of work opportunities but also funding. And of course to follow all the, the news we have in relation to international cultural mobility. So thank you to all the participants and thank you to the team of on the move. Marie was with us and just patronage for, you know, making sure this webinar went well. Thank you very much and goodbye. Thank you so much.