Art and Health: A Personal and Professional Intersection
When Daisy Fancourt’s daughter Daphne was born prematurely, she was placed in an incubator, battling multiple infections. Restricted from touching her baby or fully entering the room, Fancourt remained just inside the door, clad in full personal protective equipment, singing lullabies amid the constant noise of medical devices. These songs soothed her and potentially benefited Daphne as well. Studies indicate that singing to infants in intensive care can lower their heart rate, improve breathing, and encourage feeding.
This experience marked a convergence of Fancourt’s personal and professional worlds. As a professor of psychobiology and epidemiology at University College London, she investigates how social behaviors and connections influence health. In her first book aimed at a general audience, Art Cure, she presents a scientific argument that the arts—including music, theatre, and painting—are not merely aesthetic pursuits but are fundamentally linked to mental and physical wellbeing. This connection extends from cellular and molecular processes to cognition, memory, and mood. Given current reductions in arts funding and pressures on healthcare systems, her message carries urgency. Yet, how can one rigorously prove the benefits of something as holistic and seemingly unscientific as art?
Deconstructing Art into Active Ingredients
Fancourt proposes analyzing artistic activities by breaking them down into their fundamental components, or “active ingredients.” She suggests that, theoretically, these could be translated into binary code if computational capacity allowed. For example, singing to sick infants combines elements such as noise buffering, neurological stimulation, human contact, and stress reduction. These components activate biological mechanisms that influence health outcomes. According to Fancourt, these mechanisms can be studied, refined, and prescribed similarly to pharmaceutical treatments. Using this framework, she reviews evidence supporting art’s medical benefits, including enhancements in wellbeing, brain health, chronic pain management, and longevity.
Scientific Evidence and Limitations
Fancourt carefully avoids endorsing unsubstantiated claims, such as the idea that classical music exposure can kill cancer cells. However, she demonstrates that creative engagement, when used alongside conventional medical treatments, can yield significant benefits. These include stress and pain reduction, improved balance and coordination in Parkinson’s disease patients, and assistance for ventilated patients in regaining independent breathing. Different artistic practices operate through diverse pathways, such as enhancing self-esteem or influencing gene expression. For instance, by stimulating the vagus nerve, art affects the heart, facial muscles, and gut, functioning simultaneously as “a form of beta blocker, Botox and antispasmodic.”
Human Stories and Broader Medical Perspectives
Fancourt incorporates personal narratives to illustrate clinical findings. One example is a mother suffering from depression whose life improved after attending an “art for wellbeing” class. Another is a 94-year-old dementia patient who briefly regained clarity and animation upon hearing a recording of Singin’ in the Rain. In each case, Fancourt emphasizes the importance of shifting medical inquiry from
“What’s the matter with them?” to “What matters to them.”
Economic Implications and Declining Arts Engagement
The argument for regular participation in the arts extends beyond clinical benefits to economic considerations. Improvements in wellbeing are estimated to be equivalent to a £1,500 salary increase, while delaying dementia onset could save the NHS and social care systems approximately £1.5 billion annually. Despite this, arts are increasingly marginalized. In 2022, UK schools allocated only £9.40 per pupil per year for arts funding, and in 2021, government support for creative degree programs was halved. In the United States, when adults were surveyed about their arts engagement the previous day, 95% reported zero minutes spent. Fancourt warns of a growing trend toward
“artistic passivity”and calls for a
“seatbelt moment,”a collective acknowledgment that deprivation of the arts has serious public health consequences.
Philosophical Reflections on Art and Medicine
The book raises challenging questions. Art is not a fixed set of ingredients applied externally but an open-ended interaction experienced uniquely by each individual, possessing a power that exceeds the sum of its parts. Does reducing art to measurable mechanisms and outcomes diminish its essence? Furthermore, what does it imply about society that art must be justified through scientific validation?
Art Cure does not provide definitive answers but offers a compelling and empathetic argument for expanding the definition of medicine. It advocates for a holistic approach that includes people and communities, recognizing that creativity, identity, and purpose influence biology as profoundly as pharmaceuticals.
