Author: Kurt Schauer
Anyone who is under a lot of stress and has difficulty winding down develops a series of serious problems. Creativity suffers, for example. Artistic activities and especially working with colours help to give your brain a break, to finally switch off and to recharge your creative batteries. A recent study proves this. Two techniques in particular are suitable for specifically promoting your own well-being through colours.
Study: Artistic Activities Have a Positive Impact on the Brain
A study conducted by the University of Erlangen-Nürnberg between 2010 and 2014 asked whether artistic activities have a positive influence on the brain. Two groups were formed from 150 test subjects: the first consumed art. They attended guided tours and talked about art, for example. The second became active themselves, attended art courses and painted.
The results of the study show that engaging with art has an overall positive influence on the brain. Psychological resilience increases as does personal well-being. Notably: the positive effects are all the greater when you are artistically active yourself. The results were also more lasting in this study group. Creativity, for example, was strengthened more clearly and for longer.
Finding Happiness with Colors: Two Methods
The study results are particularly relevant for the professional lives of creatively active individuals: they show that one can deliberately recharge one’s batteries through engagement with art and thus consistently achieve better performance at work. Two methods are particularly suitable for this. One is „Messpainting,“ which is offered, for example, in many community colleges. This involves spontaneous painting that aims to be understood as artistic brainstorming. Dispersion and finger paints are used on newspaper and drawing paper. A picture should be completed in a maximum of two minutes. Beauty and aesthetics are not required; instead, the impulsive use of colors is at the center of the activity.
Method number two is „Expressive Painting,“ created by Arno Stern in the 1950s. Here, one works standing up with finger paints or a brush. The pure interaction with color creates the form or the theme: right or wrong do not exist. This has a positive effect: the brain’s creative resources are activated. The longer one engages artistically in this way, the more a process of consolidation occurs at this point. The creative part of the brain thus also works better, for example, in one’s job.
Do you have questions?
Anett Auerswald
Agency Director/Director of Arts
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