Melis Taragano Enriquez is a Visual Arts Teacher and Expressive Arts Practitioner based in Istanbul, and an MA Candidate in Cultural Management at Istanbul Bilgi University. Sub-theme: Creativity and Wellbeing.
What helps a young person feel well? Wellbeing is often spoken about as if it belongs only to health, mood, or individual resilience. Yet the World Health Organization’s definition of health as “complete physical, mental and social well-being” reminds us that well-being has always been broader than the absence of illness (World Health Organization, 1948). It is also shaped by whether a person feels safe enough to explore who they are, connected to others, included in their community, and able to imagine who they are becoming.
In practice, wellbeing also depends on whether young people have spaces to explore what they feel and what they are going through, without having to explain everything immediately. In many school and guidance settings, however, words are still the main tool. A student may be asked how they feel, what they need, or who they want to become, even when things are still unclear. My years teaching visual arts in Istanbul schools have shown me how difficult this can be for many adolescents. Not because they have nothing to say, but because emotion, identity, and belonging are often felt before they can be put into words. When a sixteen-year-old goes quiet after being asked, “how are you really doing?”, the silence is rarely empty. Sometimes the experience simply has not found its form yet.
This is why expressive arts matter in a wellbeing context. A prompt does not ask a young person to explain everything at once. It gives them something to do first. Through making, they may begin to sense what they feel, what matters to them, or how they are changing. This connects with Osai et al.’s idea of “well-becoming”: the ongoing process through which young people understand who they are becoming over time (Osai et al., 2025).
Making gives the student another way to approach what is still difficult to say. A drawing, a collage, or a photograph can hold experience that a sentence cannot yet carry. Here is a simple framework shaped by classroom practice and research on art, cultural participation, and wellbeing: Express, Reflect, and Share.
The process begins with making. In response to a prompt, a young person may draw a map of where they feel they belong, create a small collage about what gives them energy, or illustrate a recipe that reminds them of home. The aim is not to produce a polished artwork. What matters is simply to begin. Even a simple prompt asks for decisions. A colour has to be chosen. A memory may be included, or left out. None of these decisions has a correct answer. For adolescents whose days are structured by assessment, this is an unusual experience of authorship. A student once held up a collage and told me it was the first thing that week nobody could mark wrong.
After making, reflection asks the participant to stay with what they have made for a little longer. This does not need to become a formal analysis or a confession. It can begin with one small detail that stands out during the process or after the making is finished. That detail can offer a first clue about what the activity brought up.
Sharing comes last, and it remains optional. Some participants may want to speak about their work, while others may prefer to share only one detail or keep the work private. Wellbeing-oriented creative practice does not force disclosure. When sharing is treated as an invitation rather than a requirement, expressive arts can support emotional awareness and connection.
When the three stages stay light and in order, they protect a sequence young people often need. First there is a form to work with, then a moment to notice what has appeared, and only after that, if it feels right, words may enter.
Much of what gives young people a sense of belonging comes through culture. For this reason, many of the prompts I design draw on everyday cultural experiences rather than asking participants to talk about identity directly. A participant might illustrate a recipe that reminds them of home, trace a pattern from a family textile and let it change, or map the sounds of their street. Through activities like these, identity begins to emerge almost indirectly.
A short period of making can give a young person room to approach an experience before having to explain it. The time to reflect matters too, as does the choice of whether to share. Making does not solve every difficulty they carry, but it can offer a place to begin. At a time when youth wellbeing is often discussed through the language of crisis, these ordinary creative moments are easy to overlook. Sometimes the first step is simply an invitation to make something.