SPOTLIGHT: THE HEART OF SENIOR LIVING
Using Creativity to Combat M
eg LaPorte is a communicator dedicated to reframing percep- tions of aging and older adults.
A former magazine editor, LaPorte earned a master’s degree in management of aging services at the Erickson School of Aging Studies at the University of Maryland Bal- timore County. In recent years, LaPorte’s focus increas-
ingly has turned to ageism, particularly through a recently launched nonprofit called Art Against Ageism (artagainstage-
ism.org) and a blog called Age in America (
ageinamerica.blog) dedicated to spotlight- ing the lives of older adults.
Q. Why is ageism such a powerful topic to you? What about it has captured your attention? A. I became passionate about it when I was getting my master’s degree at the Erickson School of Aging Studies at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. Through my classes and my instructors there, I began to learn about just how ageist our society is and how that has shaped the way that we think about older adults and how we treat them, including in the area of public policy. It really opened my eyes, and ageism became something I thought more and more about.
Q. Could you tell me about the Art Against Ageism program? A. I taught a course about artistic activism, which is the use of art to change minds and create social change, and how you can leverage art to combat ageism in 2018 at UMBC. I stayed in touch with Jordan Evans, one of my students from the course [now a regional recruiter for a long-term care provider], and together we established Art Against Ageism.
Stereotypes About Older Adults By Tom Gresham
Jordan Evans and Meg LaPorte established Art Against Ageism, a nonprofit launched to spotlight ways art can be used to create social change around negative perceptions of aging.
Art Against Ageism is a nonprofit alliance
of creatives, artists, activists, and others— including people who work and live in senior living—who are dedicated to com- bating ageism by identifying, amplifying, and creating artistic endeavors that combat stereotypes and misperceptions about aging, age, and older adults. There are many examples out there of
people who are now utilizing artistic activ- ism to combat ageism. For instance, there’s a woman in Colorado [Jan Golden of Age-Friendly Vibes] who is creating birth- day cards that are non-ageist—that don’t have all those jokes about how you’re over
34 SENIOR LIVING EXECUTIVE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2022
the hill or near death. We’ve created this or- ganization as a way of helping to motivate and educate people like her and to make the anti-ageist movement more effective through creativity.
Q. You earlier created a project called Age in America. What inspired that effort? I was obsessed with Humans of New York, a blog of portraits and interviews with peo- ple encountered on the streets of New York City. I loved it so much, and it occurred to me that maybe I should do something simi- lar that was aimed at older adults.
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44
