• Led by the Jameel Arts & Health Lab in collaboration with the World Health Organization (WHO), the training programme is the first of its kind in the Kingdom and aligns with Vision 2030’s cultural and health transformation goals
  • Photo courtesy of Art Jameel: Messages from the Road by Ashraf Abdullah, the Hayy Jameel Façade selection for 2025.

JEDDAH, SAUDI ARABIA — The Jameel Arts & Health Lab, a global initiative to improve health and wellbeing through the arts, announced today its delivery of  the “Introduction to Arts & Health” training programme. The training programme, the first of its kind in the Kingdom, is led by the Jameel Arts & Health Lab, in collaboration with the World Health Organization at Hayy Jameel, a dedicated arts complex and creative hub developed by Art Jameel in Jeddah, and will aim to support the development of a skilled workforce able to contribute to population health, community wellbeing, and the creative industries, in line with Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030.

Saudi Arabia aims to generate 300,000 jobs in the creative industries over the next decade, and the training programme directly supports this national priority. By providing certified professional development for emerging practitioners, it equips participants with the skills to integrate arts-based strategies across healthcare, cultural, community, and educational settings, supporting a workforce capable of contributing to both population health and the creative economy.

The four-day course, developed with research aligned with the WHO, will run from 1–4 December 2025, with an opening reception on 30 November at Hayy Jameel. Participants will gain insights into global arts-in-health practice, youth mental health, creative ageing, and staff wellbeing in healthcare settings.

Dr Nisha Sajnani, co-director of the Jameel Arts & Health Lab and professor and director of the arts and health initiative at NYU Steinhardt, said: “At a time of significant transformation in Saudi Arabia's cultural and healthcare sectors, we're equipping practitioners with evidence-based and culturally responsive skills to strengthen health systems and community resilience at scale. This training not only advances professional development but also contributes to emerging career pathways at the intersection of arts, health, and wellbeing.”

Nader Diab, head of programmes at Community Jameel, said: “We are very pleased to support the Jameel Arts & Health Lab as they deliver the Kingdom’s first arts and health training. At Community Jameel, science-based approaches are at the core of our work and we are pleased to support this training in promoting the role the arts can play in enhancing health in Saudi Arabia.”

Yazid Anani, senior curator at Art Jameel, said: “At Hayy Jameel, our exhibitions, programmes, learning and research make space for a plethora of artistic voices that evoke present urgencies and future imaginaries into conversation, prompting real questions about continuity and change, preservation and rupture witnessed across the cultural landscape. Through this training, which extends beyond Art Jameel's own thinking and approach, we hope to equip creative minds and cultural practitioners to be more nuanced and sensitive in understanding the conditions that shape our sense of wellbeing but more so how wellbeing itself emerges from the social and cultural contexts we inhabit locally and regionally.”

The course marks a return to Saudi Arabia for the Jameel Arts & Health Lab, following the Jameel Arts & Health Lab Healing Arts Arabia Roundtable in 2023, hosted by the Ministry of Health, which explored the potential of arts-based approaches to strengthen Saudi Arabia’s evolving healthcare system. The outcomes of that meeting helped lay the foundation for this professional training programme.

About the Jameel Arts & Health Lab 

Launched in January 2023 by the World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Office for Europe, the Steinhardt School at New York University, Community Jameel, and CULTURUNNERS, the Jameel Arts & Health Lab is a global initiative to measurably improve health and wellbeing through the arts. With a focus on overlooked and underserved communities, the Lab leverages scientific evidence, artist-led advocacy, capacity building, and a global Healing Arts outreach campaign to drive the integration of the arts into mainstream healthcare.

jameelartshealthlab.org

About Community Jameel

Community Jameel advances science and learning for communities to thrive. An independent, global organisation, Community Jameel was launched in 2003 to continue the tradition of philanthropy and community service established by the Jameel family of Saudi Arabia in 1945. Community Jameel supports scientists, humanitarians, technologists and creatives to understand and address pressing human challenges in areas such as climate change, health and education. 

The work enabled and supported by Community Jameel has led to significant breakthroughs and achievements, including the MIT Jameel Clinic’s discovery of the new antibiotics halicin and abaucin, critical modelling of the spread of COVID-19 conducted by the Jameel Institute at Imperial College London, and a Nobel Prize-winning experimental approach to alleviating global poverty championed by the co-founders of the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab at MIT.

communityjameel.org

About Art Jameel

Art Jameel supports artists and creative communities. Founded and supported by the Jameel family philanthropies, the independent organisation is headquartered in Saudi Arabia and the UAE and works globally. Art Jameel’s programmes – across exhibitions, commissions, research, learning and community-building – are grounded in a dynamic understanding of the arts as fundamental to life and accessible to all.

Art Jameel’s two institutions—Hayy Jameel, a dedicated complex for the arts and creativity in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and Jameel Arts Centre, an innovative institution for contemporary art and ideas in Dubai, UAE—are complemented by digital initiatives, collaborations with major institutional partners, and a network of practitioners worldwide.

artjameel.org

Jameel Arts & Health Lab Press Contact 
Jemima Lowe
jemima.lowe@eoa.art
Community Jameel Press Contact
Yara Sakr
media@communityjameel.org