Art and Sensory Support on Nicosia’s Green Line
During the summer of 2026, as a Caritas volunteer, I had the opportunity to accompany three sessions of an art and wellbeing workshop at the Caritas Migrant Centre in Nicosia, Cyprus.
Located in the annexes of Holy Cross Catholic Church, the centre sits literally on the Green Line, between North and South Nicosia, next to Pafos Gate and the old Venetian walls. Being there, in a place so visibly marked by division, made me especially conscious of the importance of creating spaces where people can meet, connect, and find common ground. In many ways, the setting itself seemed to speak of both separation and the possibility of overcoming it.
The workshop was designed within a Therapeutic Art Support framework: an approach that uses artistic practice as a channel for emotional regulation and sensory connection, rather than as a substitute for clinical treatment. It does not seek to diagnose or treat mental health conditions. Instead, it offers a structured, supportive space where sensory experiences—through touch, smell, colour, and creative expression—can help participants slow down, reconnect with themselves, and settle more fully into the present moment, often with greater ease.
Bodegas Julian Soler and grape juice
Thanks to the generous collaboration of Bodegas Julian Soler and Ana Soler, who made it possible to send grape juice (mosto) all the way to Nicosia from Spain, we were able to introduce an unusual pigment and edible paint into a children’s workshop: dense and strongly scented, a deep garnet verging on black that opened into shades of pink and violet as it spread across the paper. It was a living material, still unmistakably “of the earth,” carrying its own sensory story before it ever became a mark.
This incredible material was deliberate. Smell is particularly directly connected to emotional memory, and grape juice—unlike conventional paint—especially on its own associations: harvest, home, abundance, and the turning of the seasons. Its sticky, changing texture under the fingers, together with the intensity of the colour and its distinctive scent, invited a genuinely multisensory experience. The workshop therefore brought together smell, sight, and touch, allowing the children to explore and respond to the material through their senses rather than relying on verbal instruction or technical skill alone.
The sessions were open to children and adults with disabilities and special needs, alongside their families and other centre participants. The sensory format meant the work didn’t depend on fine motor skills or the ability to follow complex instructions: each person could enter the material at their own pace, from sponge to bare hand.
There was no finished piece to evaluate, and no aesthetic outcome the children were expected to reach. What stayed with me was the process: one child insisting on covering her whole hand in grape juice; hearts, flowers, and faces appearing spontaneously across the paper; the table itself slowly becoming a shared working surface. I found myself paying less attention to what was being “made”, and more to how absorbed the children became in the material.
The workshop was never intended to measure anxiety or post-traumatic stress—that was outside both its purpose and its scope. What I could observe, however, was something much simpler: for several hours, children were deeply engaged, exploring, touching, experimenting, and staying with the material. Something quietly powerful lived in that sustained presence.
I found this approach particularly meaningful when working with autistic nonverbal children. The workshop did not depend on spoken language or a fixed sequence of steps; they could participate fully without needing to communicate verbally. Instead, colour, texture, scent, movement, and touch became forms of expression in their own right. Watching this made me realise how much communication can happen when we create space for children to respond in their own way, without asking them first to find the words.
Workshop held in collaboration with Caritas Nicosia and Bodegas Julian Soler.