Meet the Allentown Art Museum’s first Art + Wellness Fellow

Meet Christina Campbell, the Allentown Art Museum’s summer/fall 2026 Art + Wellness Fellow! Christina is currently working toward her master’s degree in art therapy at Cedar Crest College. Her background also includes facilitating our Art Can program and working with the Inside-Out Prison Exchange Program. You can learn more about her HERE.

Christina’s primary role as a Fellow is managing our new Community Art Circles program, which was developed in partnership with the Art Bridges Foundation. AAM staff traveled to the Art Bridges campus in Bentonville, Arkansas, in October 2025 and again in April 2026 to plan and then present the Art Circles concept to Art Bridges staff and colleagues from other U.S. museums that are exploring the art/wellness connection. The aim of these two convenings was to consider and implement ways that museums can address social, emotional, physical, and cognitive well-being concerns in their communities.

Community Art Circles, designed by the AAM’s Manager of Accessibility, Margie Makowski, is a collaborative art and wellness program that takes place both onsite at the Museum and offsite at community partner organizations. Each session begins with a discussion centered on an artwork from the Museum’s collection. Facilitators guide participants using Visual Thinking Strategies and open-ended questions about the idea of “wellness.” Participants will then create art in response to the specific wellness theme of the session and the thoughts shared. The program ends with a guiding question relating to wellness and an open invitation to share artmaking and their personal discoveries with their friends and community.

The community organizations that are participating in our first series of Community Art Circles, running from June through December 2026 and led by Christina, are Daybreak, Haven House, and Ripple Community.

“The Art + Wellness Fellowship will help expand the AAM’s understanding of how museums and art therapists can work together to make art as therapy more accessible to all of our visitors,” says Makowski.

Thanks to essential support from Art Bridges, the AAM will welcome a total of four Art + Wellness Fellows who will work with an estimated 360 participants in the Community Art Circles program over the next two years.