Arts and Health

The arts are not a luxury or an escape, but a vital tool for thriving physically, mentally, and spiritually. Neuroscience explains how art changes the body, brain, and behavior and practitioners are demonstrating its role in advancing health and wellbeing. Learn about the cutting-edge field of neuroarts from the authors of the New York Times bestseller, Your Brain on Art: How the Arts Transform Us. Moderated by Walter Isaacson, Susan Magsamen and Ivy Ross are joined onstage by legendary jazz musician Fred Johnson to bring home the transformative power of art.

Join Public Health Grand Rounds at the Aspen Institute for a book talk on Your Brain on Art: How the Arts Transform Us, with authors Susan Magsamen and Ivy Ross and moderated by Eric Motley, Deputy Director of the National Gallery of Art. Your Brain on Art shares the new science behind humanity’s evolutionary birthright — to make and behold art and its power to transform our lives. What artists have always known, and researchers are now proving is that arts, in all its forms, amplify physical and mental health, learning and flourishing and build stronger communities.

Join us as we honor and celebrate Marin Alsop, 2022 Harman/Eisner Artist in Residence, who talks about the power of music in conversation with Susan Magsamen, founder and director of the International Arts+Mind Lab at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and co-director of the NeuroArts Blueprint initiative. Award-winning television and documentary producer James Blue moderates the panel.

Science can now explain what many of us have long understood intuitively—the arts can make us healthier and happier. By blending those rigorous findings with more research, well-funded arts practices, cross-disciplinary education, and prudent policy, we can add new tools to the healthcare arsenal. Renée Fleming, world-renowned soprano and arts and health advocate, Francis Collins, acting co-chair of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, and Sheila Johnson, CEO of Salamander Hotels, explore the role of art in health and healing. Jon Hamilton, National Public Radio Science Desk correspondent, moderates the conversation.

Learn how the NeuroArts Blueprint initiative is cultivating the neuroarts ecosystem to advance human health, strengthen communities, and promote culture change. To realize its potential, neuroarts must become a fully recognized field of research and practice, with educational and training pathways, dedicated funding, supportive public sector and private sector policies, effective leadership, well-crafted communications strategies, and infrastructure capacity. A look at how the Blueprint is fostering connections among stakeholders, what success looks like, and how to get involved.

Literary luminaries Michael Lewis (Moneyball, Liar’s Poker) and Malcolm Gladwell (The Tipping Point, Blink), discuss Lewis’s new book, The Premonition: A Pandemic Story. This taut, brilliant nonfiction thriller pits a band of medical visionaries, working under the radar, against the official response of the U.S. administration to COVID-19 outbreak.

World-renowned soprano Renée Fleming, and Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health when this video was made, discuss the power of music and other arts to improve health. After describing initiatives that are driving promising research forward, including Sound Health and the NeuroArts Blueprint, they conclude their conversation with a special musical duet.

Collective tells the story of journalists who uncover widespread corruption after a deadly fire at a Romanian nightclub. Film director Alexander Nanau, journalist Catalin Tolontan, and Romanian Minister of Health Vlad Voiculescu discuss this award-winning documentary at an event hosted by HMS, Aspen Institute Romania, and the Aspen Institute’s network of international partners. Margot Sanger-Katz of the New York Times served as moderator.

Renowned soprano Renée Fleming’s announced the launch of the NeuroArts Blueprint initiative on her webinar series Music and the Mind and interviewed the project codirectors, Susan Magsamen, executive director of Johns Hopkins University’s International Arts+Mind Lab, and Ruth J. Katz, HMS executive director.

A lunchtime performance and discussion with Benjamin Lerner, musical prodigy, piano rap artist and opioid addiction survivor. The great-grandson of Irving Berlin (composer of “God Bless America”), Lerner credits his continued recovery to his ability to use word and song to express his emotional struggle. His novel hybrid genre of music combines piano compositions rooted in classical music theory with rap that journals his experience with addiction. By sharing his personal journey, Lerner hopes to help others who are struggling.