TISICA

Weaving Innovative Social Interactions through Artistic Creation

The Project

The TISICA project aims to develop creative artistic activities for elderly individuals particularly at risk of sensory loss and sociocultural isolation. It involves organizing expressive workshops focused on tactile grasping and triggering sound events.

These workshops allow individuals to develop play and interactivity through gesture and touch, incorporating musical sounds and natural environments. The goal is to stimulate imagination, memory, and creativity through the use of innovative technologies, particularly those involving sensors, allowing for very spontaneous and intuitive access to sound manipulation and promoting autonomy through interaction with others, cultural mediation, and self-relationship.

TISICA's originality lies in its reliance on multidisciplinary artistic creation workshops, utilizing expressive and emotional power and art in a process of social inclusion. The uniqueness of the artistic approach is to use tactile and sensory grasping as a vector. This situation allows for reliance on the unfolding of a real situation where artistic, sociological, and technological research progresses in parallel.

The Workshops

Creative workshops are organized by Césaré-CNCM within the EHPAD–USLD Pole of the CHU de Reims. These workshops take place as part of the PASA (Pole of Activities and Adapted Care) of the Roux residence, and within the Wilson residence and its Alzheimer Day Care supported by the PARAF (Platform for Support and Respite for Family Caregivers). They are primarily intended for residents but can also be open to an external audience.

Three types of workshops are organized:
– creation of woven objects and painting workshops with Armelle Blary, visual artist, offering an initial approach to gesture;
– sound workshops with André Serre-Milan, musician artist, relating gesture and contact to sound;
– body work and relaxation with Milena Gilabert, choreographic artist.

The autonomy of elderly individuals is a challenging theme regarding the acceptability and use of technologies improving well-being. The TISICA project adds significant value as it allows for experimentation directly in a context of real usage with the end users of these technologies, such as elderly individuals, healthcare professionals, establishment service professionals, caregivers, or visitors.