Music for Healing Show to open July 17

Music for Healing is an immersive sound and art experience about how noise, music, and vibration affect our bodies, minds, and emotional wellbeing, especially for people living in busy, loud, and overstimulating environments like Holyoke.

Opening Night & Public Programming

The exhibition opens Friday, July 17, 2026, with an opening-night celebration featuring a live performance by the artist and a reception. Free and open to all.  

Free public programming will run throughout the exhibition, including:

• Live Performance by Angelica Olstad & Opening Reception: Friday, July 17, 2026 | 6-9pm

• Embodied Movement Workshop: Saturday, July 18, 2026 | 11am-12pm | free; advance sign-up required. 

• Piano Masterclass with Angelica Olstad: free; advance sign-up required.  More details coming soon

• Asynchronous Sound Walk: Virtual & accessible throughout the exhibition 

• Closing Reception:  Thursday, August 27, 2026 | 6-8pmOn view July 17 -  August 27, 2026 (check back soon for open hours).

Using music, gentle movement, and drawing, the exhibition invites people to slow down and listen to sound, to their bodies, and to their own inner knowing about how to heal. Artist Angelica Olstad uses EEG technology, a tool that makes brain activity visible, to show how sound and music can shift us from stress toward ease. You don't need any scientific background to take part; this work is about the felt, lived experience of healing.

At its heart, the project treats music and sound as tools for collective care. It asks: 

What if rest, listening, and care were accessible to everyone? 

What if healing weren't a luxury, but something we practiced together? 

Rooted in the belief that self-care and collective care are acts of resistance and liberation, the exhibition centers BIPOC and low-income communities too often denied quiet, rest, and space to heal.

Music for Healing welcomes all community members, no art experience required. Come as you are. This is a space to breathe, feel, and reset together.

Music for Healing is presented in partnership with ArteSana Gallery, Paper City Clothing Company and Arts Equity Group, with support from Northampton Open Media.

About the Artist

Angelica Olstad is a classically trained pianist and interdisciplinary artist whose work spans film, media art, installation, recording, and community programming. A recipient of a 2024 NYSCA and 2025 Brooklyn Arts Council Artist Grant for Music for Healing, her practice is also informed by years as a yoga and meditation teacher and community organizer. She invites audiences to reflect on belonging, care, and the timelessness of shared human experience.