Dr. Nancy Gerber leads the Arts-Based Research (ABR) Global Consortium Study on the lived experience of COVID-19
The Arts-Based Research (ABR) Global Consortium launched a research project to study the lived experience of COVID-19 led by Principal Investigator, Dr. Nancy Gerber, teaching faculty in the Department of Art Education, Art Therapy Program. The Arts-Based Research (ABR) Global Consortium is a group of international scholars who have gathered together for the purpose of advocating for the visibility, accessibility, and valuation of arts-based research approaches in addressing human rights, social justice, and critical global issues. Arts-based research (A
BR) is an umbrella term describing intentional and intensive explorations driven by the implementation of the arts as method, practice, evidence, result, and public engagement. Co-created by Dr. Gerber and a group of distinguished international colleagues Elisabetta Biffi, Ph.D (University of Milano-Bicocca, Italy), Jacelyn Biondo, Ph.D (Drexel University, USA), Marco Gemignani, Ph.D (Universidad Loyola Andalucía, Spain), Karin Hannes, Ph.D (KU Leuven, Belgium), and Richard Siegesmund, Ph.D (Professor Emeritus, Northern Illinois University, USA) this group has been developing and pursuing an ambitious agenda to build international ABR collaborations, publish and disseminate ABR scholarly articles, develop good ABR practice guidelines, and conduct global ABR projects. This year the ABR Global Consortium launched its first global ABR project entitled Sustaining life on earth: Arts-based responses to the lived experience of COVID-19. The purpose of this study is to learn about the in-depth lived experiences of the COVID-19 pandemic as expressed and portrayed in arts-based and narrative mediums generated from a group of global arts-based research scholars. Arts-based research scholars were selected as co-researchers due to their expertise and competence in capturing and articulating lived experiences through arts-based mediums which ultimately may resonate with the larger global community. From the arts-based and narrative responses we hope to 
create an assemblage that will address the questions:
• What is your lived experience of and relationship to the COVID-19 pandemic?
• How would you express and portray and describe your lived experience during and/or after theCOVID-19 pandemic?
As we generate and assemble the data we hope to present the final arts-based findings to the public through various social media and internet platforms. We would like to thank and acknowledge our graduate assistants Madeline Centracchio, MS student in the art therapy program at FSU; and, Lucia Carriera, Ph.D student in the Department of Human Sciences for Education at the University of Milano-Bicocca for their contributions. The study has been approved by the FSU IRB and is currently underway. We look forward to sharing our findings with the community at large. Please visit our website
https://www.abrglobalconsotium.org/