Palais №37

Issue 37 of P L  S magazine addresses the relationships between mental health, contemporary creation, and art and culture venues, in particular through the prism of institutional psychotherapy, a set of practices aimed at disalienating institutions—initially psychiatric ones.
This magazine echoes the awareness of mental health at the Palais de Tokyo which works on various levels, starting with the art centre’s expertise when it comes to cultural mediation, which has allowed bonds to be forged with actors in the social, psychiatric and medical fields, as well as with the people concerned. This has also led to the opening of the hamo, a new space for hosting, practising, researching and for experiences which are especially inspired by the notions of well-being and care. (Re)thinking cultural institutions from the perspective of vulnerability means supporting and valuing differences, and inventing new ways of caring and living together. It is also about politicising and poeticising the relationship with mental health, by seeing it as a lever for modifying society: to challenge an outdated dichotomy between “the healthy” and “the ill,” and to acknowledge a spectrum of sensibilities towards the world. This in turn raises questions about the notion of “normality,” the difficulties to include differences, and the invisible violence of normative systems.