With the participation of delegations from Argentina, France and several South American countries, the 15th edition of the Latin American Festival and Congress “A door to freedom-No to the asylum” ended in Chapadmalal and Mar del Plata, organized by the Argentine Network of Art and Mental health.
The meeting was made up of users from mental health hospitals, and during its development nearly 600 people channeled their potential through artistic expressions, in order to make themselves visible and for their work “to have content,” according to the organizers.
Among the delegations that made up this new meeting were users of mental health hospitals and professionals and teachers from Buenos Aires, Tucumán, Salta, Córdoba, Bariloche, Santa Cruz, Tucumán, Entre Ríos, Chaco, Santa Fe, Neuquén and Rio Negro, in addition to representatives from Paraguay, Venezuela, Chile, Ecuador and France.
In a dialogue with Télam, the social psychologist and coordinator of the event, Alberto Sava, highlighted the “quantity and quality of participation in the meeting, which shows that the task of art in the field of mental health is very important and necessary.”
“In this 2022 edition, a large number of people from Mar del Plata participated, which is more than positive,” he said, noting that “it was a very successful festival and thanks to the meetings we have had with the workshop leaders and the rest of the coordinators, we will in the next month virtual meetings where we will elect regional delegates”.
Sava also spoke of “raising a project to the National Directorate of Mental Health to generate seminars in each province so that those who work in mental health have more conceptual and practical training elements.”
For his part, Pablo Cutrera, head of the Psychiatry service at the San Martín Hospital in the city of La Plata, stated that “this was a very nice initiative to meet specialists from different parts of the country and the rest of the world, where today we exhibited the works that were performed in the art workshop with productions of poetry, stories and paintings”.
Cutrera said that the festival “served to show how important it is to meet and integrate all people with artistic expression in different ways, to relieve pain and connect after the hard work we do in the day hospital that I am lucky to carry forward in La Plata”.
While the users received lunch at their tables served by the waiters from the complex’s hotel buffet, Gabriela Otero, director and founder of the independent theater group “El Brote” from Bariloche told Télam that “for us, art is a trade. We participated 25 years ago in this Art and Mental Health Network because we consider it to be a clear space for militancy and organization.”
“This that we are finishing today here on the Atlantic coast is a space for collective construction in relation to community mental health” and highlights “what is important for art to give. Not only for personal transformations but also for social transformations.” with rights since it is society that must be transformed so that inclusion is real,” he said.
The 15th Festival began on Tuesday the 19th with artistic exhibitions, talks, discussions, debate tables, workshops and performances in the different rooms of the Auditorium theater in Mar del Plata, Chapadmalal and the Lighthouse of Memory.
