Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival
113 episodes listed below
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Mental Health Arts is a year-round arts programme led by the Mental Health Foundation Scotland, built around the annual Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival (SMHAF). Established in 2007, the festival is one of the largest of its kind in the world and among Scotland's most diverse cultural events, covering everything from music, film and visual art to theatre, dance, and literature.
Based on 4 episodes we listened to · September 2026
It makes mental health legible through the practical, personal choices involved in turning difficult experience into art.
SMHAF Podcast brings artists and makers into direct conversation about mental health, letting their work establish the terms. Nye Russell-Thompson traces how intrusive thoughts became material for theatre and discusses practical access needs.
A colourful children's-show disguise for intrusive thoughts: you'll meet artists willing to make difficult thoughts public.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A calm account of mental health, family, and the awkward work of opening up.
The piece follows a documentary about mental health, difficulty showing emotion, and the decision to speak first with other people before turning to family. It is shaped by a seven-year process that began in 2016 or 2017, and by the film's refusal to rush the hard conversations.
A grounded look at how access, care, and mental health shape the work itself.
This episode is strongest when it keeps its eye on process rather than polish. Nye Russell-Thompson treats access as part of the work itself, not a box to tick afterward, and that makes the discussion of wellbeing feel concrete instead of abstract.
A thoughtful arts conversation about madness, control, and the women at the center of Hysterical.
An uneasy conversation sits at the center of Hysterical. Five clinically mad women meet in a small town hall to perform for a crowd that seems sane enough, and the episode keeps circling the same hard question: is this a play, a warning, or an intervention?
A measured look at how art and mental health care meet, from Kingsley Hall to contemporary exhibition work.
This piece moves cleanly from the asylum era to Kingsley Hall and then to the Rebirth and Revolution exhibition, treating mental health history and arts-based care as part of the same conversation.
Jonquilyn Hill chases one listener question per episode to the experts who can answer it.
Hard conversations, patiently held, with room to laugh.
Fearne Cotton interviews guests like Boy George and Bryony Gordon about mental health and identity.
Dr. Joy Harden Bradford pairs therapy insight with Black TV recaps, maternal health, and history.
Silent Men is a documentary about mental health, emotional expression, and the difficulty of talking to family.
Nye Russell-Thompson discusses creating theatre about mental health, focusing on his show Choo Choo about intrusive thoughts.
This interview features the writer, director, and actors from the play 'Hysterical,' discussing its feminist exploration of women's history in the medical system, the collaborative process behind its creation, and its relevance to modern mental health and patriarchal structures.
This episode explores the revolutionary Kingsley Hall mental health experiment through the story of Mary Barnes, a schizophrenia patient who became a celebrated artist.
Andrew Eaton-Lewis hosts the second Mental Health Arts Network event on using theatre, comedy, film, and visual art to address mental health while safeguarding artists and audiences.
SMHAF Podcast's Reclaiming Our Heritage examines funding for creativity in mental-health care through Helena Refai's interviews with David Cutler and archive testimonies from Brian, Anne, and Keith.
Helena Refai hosts a Mental Health Foundation episode with Wendy Halliday of Scotland’s See Me programme about changing mental-health stigma through oral histories, community work, and the arts.
SMHAF Podcast’s “Reclaiming Our Heritage: Mental Health Over the Generations” uses oral-history testimonies from Hugh, Dougie, and Chris to examine mental-health care from the 1950s through the early 2000s.