The Future Is Our Arts and Mental Health Festival 2025

The Future is Ours festival 2025 celebration is back!

6–22 May | Across Manchester | Free & Open to All
Wed- Fri, 12-6pm & Sat 12-5pm at The Horsfall Gallery

We’re excited to welcome you back to The Future Is Ours - our annual festival of art, creativity and youth voice, running from 6th to 22nd May 2025.

Now in its fifth year, this year’s festival brings together young artists, professional creatives and our wider community to celebrate the power of creativity in supporting mental health and wellbeing.

At the heart of the festival is a new exhibition at The Horsfall created by 5 young artists, from a unique project which links them to a full-time artist together bringing the young person’s ideas to life, and will be exhibited alongside artists in residency and creative work from the wider organisation.

This year’s festival will have artwork shown across the city at HOME, Fred Aldous and on street posters, before culminating in a music and movement finale at the Halle St Michael’s - and will also see the delivery of our second national Arts and Mental Health symposium.

The range of creative work shows individual journeys, collective themes and creative voices of the young people – providing space for the young people to learn new skills, say what they want to say in the way they want to say it and celebrate the power of creativity in supporting mental health and wellbeing.

The Horsfall is a Gallery and creative space which is part of 42nd Street, a leading Greater Manchester young people’s mental health charity, providing access to creativity while offering valuable mental health and wellbeing support. The Horsfall is passionate about providing access to the creative process and active ingredients – allowing young people freedom to create their own recovery recipe, and choose what supports their mental health and taps into their innate potential.

The symposium which sits within the festival will run across two days, Thursday 8th and Friday 9th May - the first looking at how we can better work together and integrate creative approaches into young people's services across Manchester to better support young people in the way they need.

The second day will focus on how we can share our ways of working nationally to bring about the changes needed across the UK and to policy. To advocate for meaningful change and ensure young people's voices are integrated into decision-making so these changes are relevant for young people today and give them tools to support themselves now and throughout their lives.

Be part of the conversation and change. Join us as The Future Is Ours Mental Health and Arts Symposium Online, Friday 9th May, 10.00am-12.30pm.