Joanna Young, Saffy Setohy, Aya Kobayashi and collaborators have been working at Dixon Community Day Care Centre in Govanhill since early 2022. Working with older adults aged 60-91 living with Alzheimer’s & Dementia, participants describe the workshop series as “better than my medication.”
The project is art-led, co-created and provides opportunities for connection, creativity, self-expression and relaxation.
The project has been supported by Creative Scotland through Culture Collective, the Participatory Arts and Mental Health Fund as well as support from the Glasgow Wellbeing Fund for Adults and the Greggs Foundation.
We are actively fundraising to continue this project in 2026, if you are interested in supporting this project, please do support or contact us.
The older adults’ group and the staff at Dixon Community have adored the sessions, receiving a range of positive feedback:
- “It lifted my depression and sadness. It helped better than my medication”
- “I feel relaxed and a lot better now. It stops my aches and pains that are normally very bad”
- “I often feel invisible and unappreciated. Here I feel seen.”
- “I love looking at the stars and moon each night now. It brings me a happy feeling.”
- “It’s just so relaxing.”
- “The live music is magic, it really takes you somewhere – you just focus om the sound and forget everything else that’s going on, forget all your worries.”
- “Loved everything about it, very glad that you’re coming back, I just want to keep going”
- “It’s done my body good, moved circulation around”
- “I appreciate the company” and staff have said:
- “It’s good for everyone’s wellbeing, especially mental health. You can see people are more relaxed after the session.”
Between 2022-23, Joanna led a multi-sensory workshop series inspired by our relationship to water and the sea.
Each workshop took place around a table and grew from exploring sensations and imagery around our relationship to water. The workshops were multi-sensory, working with tactile objects such as shells, stones, sand, seaweed, clay and ice. We found ways to dance, move and relax together by exploring imagery of watery weather, the beach, and our bodies being made of mostly water. We listened to sounds of water, to sea shanties, music and poems relating to water. We created music as a group with composer and musician Niroshini Thambar and explored singing, voice and breath work with sensory artist Kirsty Biff Nicolson.
The workshops responded to what emerged in the room and gathered imagery and references contributed by participants to include in the following sessions. The key values of the workshops have been around presence and connection. The work has been about sharing and creating an experience in the moment, working with what’s in us and in front of us on that day, with what floats to the surface and offers an opportunity for connection. It’s been about celebrating being here, together, now and valuing our sensing bodies.
A very short film that includes footage from the workshops is included here alongside feedback from the participants.
Participants: Nasim, Agnes, Anne, Betty, Kauser, Mary, Abdul, Nasim, Olive, Betty, Siraj, Miller.
Lead Artist / Choreographer / Facilitator: Joanna Young
Co-facilitators / Co-creators / Peer support: Saffy Setohy & Aya Kobayashi, Kirsty Biff Nicolson, Hannah Imlach, Niroshini Thambar
Producer: Nina Doherty
Camera & Editor: Lucas Chih-Peng Kao
Thanks to Sonia and Mary and all staff at The Dixon Community for hosting and supporting this project.
This workshop series has grown from a collective work Joanna was involved in called Bodies of Water, made with Saffy Setohy, Aya Kobayashi and Nicolette Mcleod, and her time spent at Dixon Community Day Care Centre in Govanhill, working creatively with participants there to co-create the workshop sessions with Sensory Collective artists Kirsty Biff and Niroshini Thambar.
Joanna Young is a socially-engaged dance artist, choreographer and facilitator based in Glasgow. She is influenced by somatic and sensory art, Yoga and Mindfulness, and by our interconnecting relationships with each other and our environments. She is passionate about creating and facilitating in ways that are responsive and inclusive and that value and celebrate our sensing bodies.
Joanna collaborates with other artists and participants to create performances, exhibitions, films, installations and audio walks. She facilitates inclusive workshops in a range of education, community and health contexts. During the pandemic she worked for two years with Govanhill Baths, leading their Arts, Health and Wellbeing programme.
Joanna was originally engaged as part of Independent Arts Projects Sensory Collective, funded by Creative Scotland’s Culture Collective programme. She is researching and co-creating sensory art and dance experiences for people living with Dementia and Alzheimer’s. http://www.joannayoung.co.uk/about/
During 2025, funding from the Glasgow Wellbeing Fund for Adults and the Greggs Foundation supported the project to deliver over 20 sessions for the elders at Dixon.
During 2024, the project was funded by the Participatory Arts and Mental Health Fund (a collaborative project between the Baring Foundation, Creative Scotland and the Scottish Mental Health Foundation). This allowed the older people at Dixon Community to connect with young people from in their local area through a partnership with Big Noise Govanhill. You can read about this in our blog, “I’d forgotten how playful the older participants can be.”
Sensory Collective was a 22-month long project taking place between 2021-2023 supporting six artists to co-create new, multi-sensory arts projects made with, by and for Autists, people with PMLD/complex needs and folk living with Dementia across Scotland. It is produced by Independent Arts Projects (IAP) as a Culture Collective project, funded by Scottish Government emergency Covid-19 funds through Creative Scotland. https://www.independentartsprojects.com/category/sensory-collective/
Photo credit: Erika Stevenson
You can support our winter fundraiser at
justgiving.com/page/sensory-workshops-for-elders