Empathy for mental health through the artsEmpathy for mental health through the arts
All In The Mind
The Big Anxiety festival uses the arts and lived experience to re-imagine mental health. Through creativity and innovative technology, empathy replaces fear and stigma. Virtual reality worlds open up to an optimistic future and offer insight from ancient indigenous stories.
29:09•13 Oct 2019
Empathy, VR and Ancient Stories: Mental Health Through the Arts
Episode Overview
- Arts-based projects can reach people who avoid traditional mental health services by starting from lived experience rather than diagnosis.
- Virtual reality experiences like Edge of the Present aim to strengthen positive future imagery in people affected by suicidality and depression.
- Simple formats such as "awkward conversations" create low-pressure spaces for honest talk with peers who have lived experience.
- The Uti Kulintjaku initiative blends ancient Aboriginal stories with VR to speak to young people about suicide, isolation and addictive cycles.
- The hollow log story highlights that escaping harmful patterns often requires reconnecting with family, culture and knowledgeable elders for support.
“"It's more about cultivating hopeful anticipation or the possibility. It's not saying, look, everything's amazing. It's saying, be open to the possibility of change."”
Curious about how others navigate their sobriety journey? This episode of All In The Mind zooms in on how art and technology can shift the way people think about mental health, suicide, addiction and hope. Listeners are taken inside The Big Anxiety festival, a mental health and arts event that aims to replace fear and stigma with curiosity and empathy.
Professor Jill Bennett explains why so many people never enter the health system and why cultural spaces matter, stressing that the festival "work[s] with communities and people, individuals, to find ways of talking about complex and often very painful, distressing experience." You’ll hear about "awkward conversations" — casual, drop‑in chats with peers who have lived experience — alongside high‑tech virtual reality projects. One standout is Edge of the Present, created with suicide survivors by artists Alex and Michaela Davies.
A VR room gradually transforms as the user opens doors and windows to lush landscapes, gently training the brain towards "cultivating hopeful anticipation or the possibility" instead of being locked into bleak future images. The episode then shifts to the Empathy Clinic and to Aboriginal-led work with the Uti Kulintjaku group from NPY Women’s Council.
Margaret Smith and interpreter Linda Riv/Reeve share the ancient story of the man trapped in a hollow log, now turned into a VR film to connect with young people facing suicide and addictive cycles. As Margaret explains, the log mirrors being stuck in harmful patterns, and freedom comes through seeking help from family, culture and senior healers.
Anyone interested in mental health, recovery, or why creativity can make hard conversations a bit more human will find plenty to chew on here. Could art be the bridge that gets more people talking before crisis hits?
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