“ClowNexus – Creative Encounters for Mental Health” is a transnational project implemented by a consortium of ten European partners over the course of three years, from March 2026 to February 2029. The project is co-funded by the European Commission’s Creative Europe programme.

Across Europe, increasing numbers of children and adolescents are being hospitalised for mental health conditions, highlighting the urgent need for innovative and holistic approaches to care. Young people possess remarkable resilience and capacity for recovery, but they also need environments that recognise them as whole individuals rather than focusing solely on their diagnosis. ClowNexus is built on the belief that humour, arts and meaningful human connection can play a vital role in supporting mental health alongside clinical treatment.

Growing evidence demonstrates the positive impact of healthcare clowning on the well-being of hospitalised children and adolescents. However, there remains a clear need for specialised artistic methods and humour-based care approaches specifically designed for young people receiving psychiatric care, as well as for evidence of their measurable impact. By combining artistic innovation with research and interdisciplinary collaboration, ClowNexus seeks to address this gap.

The primary audience of the project is children and teenagers hospitalised for psychiatric conditions. The secondary audience includes healthcare professionals and healthcare clowns, whose collaboration will help ensure that these new approaches can have a lasting impact on mental healthcare practices across Europe.

The project will contribute to improving youth mental health by developing new healthcare clowning methods tailored to psychiatric settings and by supporting healthcare professionals in integrating humour and creativity into everyday patient care. Through these efforts, ClowNexus aims to foster moments of connection and emotional expression that complement clinical interventions and help create more supportive healthcare environments. In addition, the project will strengthen healthcare clowning organisations, which often face limited access to training, professional exchange, and recognition. Ultimately, the project seeks to promote a more holistic understanding of mental healthcare – one that values creativity, empathy, playfulness and human connection as essential elements of healing and recovery.

ClowNexus will also respond to the growing need to support the mental health of healthcare professionals, recognising that the wellbeing of staff is closely connected to the quality of care they provide. Healthcare workers will have the opportunity to strengthen their resilience, improve teamwork and explore practical ways of using creativity and humour in their daily work with children. By supporting healthcare professionals in this way, the project will help create more positive hospital environments and contribute to better paediatric care.