Dr. art. Melinda Šefčić presented her ten-year artistic and research practice in the field of artistic interventions in hospital environments at international events in New York and Boston dedicated to the role of visual arts in healthcare and patient well-being. Her work encompasses continuous research into the possibilities of rehumanizing and re-aestheticizing healthcare environments, with an important part of this development comprising projects realized in collaboration with the Croatian Association of Fine Artists (HDLU), from her earliest interventions in hospital spaces to the international European project Healing Nature.

As part of UNGA Healing Arts Week 2026 in New York, organized by the Jameel Arts & Health Lab in collaboration with the World Health Organization (WHO), Šefčić participated in the panel Public Art as Public Health: The Role of Visual Art in Hospitals, held at the Museum of the City of New York. She presented ten years of artistic practice and research into murals and artistic interventions in hospital environments in Croatia, with a focus on the rehumanization of healthcare environments and the well-being of their users. The panel was organized by NYC Health + Hospitals Arts in Medicine and brought together artists, researchers, healthcare professionals and policymakers.

More information is available on the official UNGA Healing Arts Week website.

Following her presentation in New York, Šefčić also presented her work at the international symposium Bridging Visual Arts & Healthcare: Impact, Innovation, Research, held from 23 to 25 September 2026 at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. The symposium was organized by the Visual Arts in Healthcare Program at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, with the programme delivered by Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Mass General Brigham and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. The symposium focused on exploring the impact of visual arts in healthcare environments, innovative approaches, and the development of research at the intersection of arts and health. More information is available on the official symposium website.

As part of the Boston presentation, Melinda Šefčić and Nika Šimičić, representing HDLU, also presented the European project Healing Nature – Animation for Health and Well-being in Children Hospital Environments, for which Šefčić is a co-author and artistic director. The project is implemented by the Croatian Association of Fine Artists in international partnership with Universidade Lusófona/COFAC in Portugal and New Bulgarian University in Bulgaria, with the cooperation of healthcare institutions in Croatia, Portugal and Bulgaria. Through murals, participatory processes, animation and augmented reality, the project explores the possibilities of connecting art and nature in the rehumanization of hospital environments and in improving the experience of patients, healthcare staff and other users. More information about the project is available on the official project website.

Ten Years of Artistic Interventions in Hospital Environments

Melinda Šefčić’s artistic and research practice in the field of rehumanizing hospital environments has developed over the past ten years through more than 15 artistic and research projects that have brought together contemporary art, healthcare institutions, research and education. At the time of the first initiatives, artistic interventions in Croatian hospitals were relatively rare, making her work one of the pioneering examples of systematic research into the possibilities of applying art in healthcare environments.

One of the first projects was Aestheticization and Rehumanization of Public Space: Art as Therapy (2017), implemented as part of the European CreArt project, in which HDLU participated as a partner. The project explored the possibilities of transforming hospital environments through art, with the aim of creating more welcoming spaces for patients, visitors and healthcare professionals.

This was followed by the project Aestheticization and Rehumanization of Hospital Space: Art for Health (2019), organized by HDLU, with Melinda Šefčić as its author and project leader. The project expanded artistic interventions to several healthcare institutions, including University Hospital Centre Zagreb, the Children’s Hospital Zagreb, and the Clinic for Women’s Diseases and Obstetrics. Through mural interventions and collaboration with hospital staff, it explored possibilities for improving patients’ experiences and rehumanizing the spaces in which they spend time. It also developed a model of collaboration between artists, healthcare professionals, patients and educational institutions, with the aim of establishing a long-term connection between art and healthcare.

The results of ten years of artistic and research practice were also consolidated and published in the academic paper Walls that Heal: A Decade of Murals and the Rehumanization of Hospital Space in Croatian Healthcare Environments (2025) https://hrcak.srce.hr/file/499682, which synthesizes the findings of research and artistic interventions carried out between 2016 and 2025. The foundations of this research direction were established in Melinda Šefčić’s doctoral dissertation Rehumanization and Re-aestheticization of Hospital Space – An Example of an Artistic Solution for a Hospital Department, defended in 2018 at the Academy of Fine Arts, University of Zagreb. The doctoral research developed an interdisciplinary model combining art theory, her own artistic practice, and empirical research into the effects of artistic interventions in hospital environments. Her artistic and research practice subsequently expanded to penitentiaries and prisons, while since 2020 she has been teaching the course Aestheticization of Public Space through Art at the Academy of Fine Arts, University of Zagreb, passing on the knowledge and methodology she has developed to new generations of artists.

Since 2019, Šefčić has been collaborating more intensively with Dr. phil. Lea Vidaković, expanding their research into mural art towards animation and moving image as new forms of artistic intervention in hospital environments.

The first pilot project of their collaboration, Digital Fauna (2021/2022), explored the possibilities of using animation in hospital environments. The results of the project were presented in 2022 at the symposium Animafest Scanner – Symposium of Contemporary Animation Studies. Their second pilot project, Animated Forest World in the Hospital Space (2023), further developed research into animated environments and the possibilities of integrating them into hospital spaces. These experiences provided the foundation for the development of the Healing Nature project, which combines mural art, animation, augmented reality and participatory processes.

The ten-year continuity of Melinda Šefčić’s work across numerous artistic, research and educational projects demonstrates how artistic interventions in hospital environments can evolve from individual mural projects into interdisciplinary research and international initiatives. Through collaboration with HDLU, healthcare institutions and educational organizations, art becomes part of a broader reflection on the quality of public spaces, the well-being of their users, and the possibilities of connecting culture and healthcare.