Welcome to the blog for Free Your Mind mental health anti-stigma campaign

This is the blog for the Free Your Mind campaign which aims to battle stigma towards mental illness through the use of music, art, film, and culture.
The blog consists of informative and, hopefully, entertaining articles/posts.
Enjoy! :-)
Showing posts with label croydon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label croydon. Show all posts

Wednesday, 18 May 2011

The FYM campaign took part in it's first public event in April this year...

Last month the Free Your Mind mental health campaign, aimed at helping to battle stigma towards mental illness by being creative, took part in it's first public event, which was an art exhibition called 'Broken Paths' at Croydon's Fairfield Halls.

Broken Paths organised by Imagine mental health charity's Croydon branch, and was also aimed at helping prevent stigma, prejudice and discrimination towards mental illnesses

The exhibition was held in the 'Sun Lounge' gallery at Fairfield Halls in Croydon and consisted of art, poetry, creative writing, and photography, all of which were works from some of the artists within South London's mental health community. Free Your Mind had six poems, displayed as graphic art, featured within the exhibit - all six of the featured poems were written by FYM's Nicola Edwards and can be found in the 'Creative Bank'.















The feedback received from the 'Broken Paths' art exhibition has been, and I know will be, very beneficial to the future plans and development of the Free Your Mind campaign. Over the next coming months our most immediate plans are to see the FYM team grow and develop.

We also hope that Broken Paths is the first of many public events which will include the involvement of the Free Your Mind mental health anti-stigma campaign.

Previous Blog Post: Upcoming 'Broken Paths' art exhibition at Croydon's Fairfield Halls.

Sunday, 13 March 2011

Upcoming 'Broken Paths' Art Exhibition at Croydon's Fairfield Halls

Click above image to see enlarged  version
of the official flyer for the 'Broken Paths'
art exhibit at Fairfield Halls in Croydon in
the South of London.
Between Monday 4th April - Saturday 16th April an art exhibition called "Broken Paths" will be open at the Sun Lounge at Fairfield Halls in Croydon (South London). A 'Main Event' will also be held during the exhibit on Friday 8th April between 2-5pm which will be a 'meet and greet' with all of the artists involved.

The Broken Paths art exhibition is being organised by Imagine mental health charity's Croydon branch and will be showcasing a selection of some of the creative talents of the mental health community in Croydon.

The artists featured in the exhibit are all at varying stages of recovery. And I am honoured to be among those having their work on display during Broken Paths.

Imagine mental health charity want to help those with mental illnesses live independently and improve our social inclusion. Imagine in Croydon has unique service user groups ("service user" being the phrase attributed to those of us who use the community's mental health services) which are service user led.

Broken Paths has been organised as part of the battle against stigma towards mental illness. Which meant Free Your Mind had to get involved with this art exhibition. As I've stated before, I genuinely do believe creativity and mental health effectively go hand-in-hand with one another.

The 'meet and greet' will be the "official" time to meet all of the artists, but I will be available during most of the exhibition promoting FYM. So be sure to come and find me! ((I'll be the short one dressed all in black - pretty much..))


Should you express an interest in buying any of the art on display at the exhibition, please contact Kato, from Imagine, by email: kwalmsley@imaginementalhealth.org.uk.

Join Free Your Mind and Imagine at Broken Paths for great art, to show your support and help us fight stigma and discrimination towards mental illnesses!

We hope to see you there!
(Nicola from FYM)

Directions to Fairfield Halls in Croydon:

Address:
Fairfield Halls is situated next to Croydon College on Park Lane in Croydon's town centre.
Park Lane, 
Croydon, 
Surrey 
CR9 1DG

Trains:
Fairfield is approximately 20 minutes by train from London’s Victoria and London Bridge stations. There are also fast regular services from Charing Cross and Waterloo.
East Croydon station is a 3 minute walk away and West Croydon station is about a 12 minute walk.

Bus Routes:
50 (from Stockwell), 60 (towards Old Coulsdon/Streatham), 75 (from Lewisham), 109 (from Brixton), 119 (towards Bromley North/Purley Way), 154 (from Morden), 166 (towards Banstead/Epsom), 197 (from Peckham), 250 (from Brixton), 264 (from Tooting), 312 (towards Norwood Junction/South Croydon), 403 (from Warlingham), 405 (from Redhill), 407 (towards Caterham/Sutton), 412 (from Purley), 455 (towards Old Lodge Lane/Wallington), 466 (towards Addington Village/Caterham-on-the-Hill), 468 (towards Elephant & Castle/South Croydon).

Trams:
The Tramlink which runs through the centre of Croydon stops at East
Croydon, George Street and Wellesley Road which are all 3 minutes walk
away.


Imagine mental health charity -- http://www.imaginementalhealth.org.uk/
Croydon Imagine -- http://www.imaginementalhealth.org.uk/Croydon.php
Fairfield Halls -- http://www.fairfield.co.uk/

Event Information on Facebook --
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=170194913031578

'Broken Paths' art exhibit Twitter hash-tag: #BrokenPaths

Imagine would like to apologise to both Free Your Mind and you
for allowing incorrect information to be printed in their promotional material.
((Corrections have been made by FYM to this blog post to ammend Imagine's
mistake.))

Thursday, 30 December 2010

Happy New Year from FYM

Well, here at Free Your Mind we hope you all had a good holiday!

The Free Your Mind campaign has lots of plans for the year ahead. We will be heavily concentrating on continuing to establish ourselves in the community of Croydon, as well as continuing to bring you updates on this blog.

Recently, we had a small article about Free Your Mind published in the festive edition of the Hear Us Croydon mental health user group's newsletter. Thank you to Hear Us for that.

Until 2011,
Happy New Year! 
Nicola Edwards of FYM