The National Day of Arts in Care Homes is an annual event that takes place on 24 September. The aim is to champion, promote and encourage arts engagement in care settings and highlight the health and wellbeing benefits for all involved.

Care settings and arts partners can take part by organising an arts activity, big or small, involving any art-form. You could maybe use this as an opportunity to try something new, learning skills and enjoying being creative together. It’s a good idea to involve all of your care home community in the planning of your event. Have a chat about art and what it means to different people and draw up a list of things that your care setting would like to try doing. Your event could involve actively taking part in an arts activity or enjoying watching a performance of some kind. Consider working in partnership with an artist or arts/cultural organisation to develop exciting activities or a more longterm project.

In 2023 NAPA held a weeklong celebration of arts in care provision, culminating in the fifth National Day of Arts in Care Homes. Watch recordings of online NAPA events focussing on different aspects of arts in care provision. The theme for #AICH2023 was Reflections. We looked back at learning gained from the programme so far and tried to identify with care and arts partners what is most needed, going forward, to support this important work. NAPA awarded prizes to selected registered events for The National Day 2023. You can read about all the 13 finalists here.

NAPA will be sharing details of our campaign for 2024 soon.