Insidethisissue - aha Creative Ink

Combining art, psychology to facilitate healing
The Expressive Arts
Therapy Program at
Prescott College began
in 2001 with two students. Now
in its third year, the program has
grown to 13 full-time students.
The Expressive Arts
Therapies Program combines
the disciplines of psychology
and the arts and stresses the
therapeutic and healing power
of art within one’s life. Art is
one of the oldest forms of visual
communication that supports
one’s desire and right to communicate
thoughts and feelings
and to tell one’s story.
The art therapist helps
clients reconnect with their primary
creativity, play with unresolved
conflicts, and find new
solutions and meaning to see
new possibilities in one’s life.
The art therapist also facilitates
the development of the imagination
and creativity, necessary
aspects of the identity in order
to reclaim a whole self.
The Program trains students
to become expressive art therapists
and licensed counselors
meeting the educational standards
of the American Art
Therapy Association Inc., the
International Expressive Arts
Therapy Association, and the
state of Arizona. Through theoretical
and practical experience,
students acquire in-depth
knowledge of human development,
personality theories, and
multicultural considerations, as
well as gaining an understanding
of applications of art within
the therapeutic process.
In addition to the academic
coursework, students attend
two Art Therapy Institutes,
where they spend two weeks in
classes at Prescott College
working with visiting faculty
who are experts in the field of
expressive art therapy.
These classes include handson
experiences in dance, drama,
writing, and visual art. Students
learn how to work with clients in
the therapeutic environment.
Throughout the Institute, students
also do their own work to
cultivate an awareness of their
personal creative process and
provide insight into themselves
so that they may work more
effectively with clients.
Some of the activities at the
summer 2004 Institute included
looking at slides of artwork
to learn to “read” drawings that
offered direct clues pointing
toward the psychological issues
that might challenge a client.
After an extensive session looking
at slides with facilitators,
students completed their own
drawings to practice reading
the drawings within small
teams comprised of three of
their classmates.
During another learning session,
students wrote and illustrated
fairy tales, which were
ultimately dramatized in two
groups. Through the dramatization
of these tales, students witnessed
the power of story in
bridging universal themes within
the arts to life.
The culminating project took
place on the last day of the
Institute and offered one more
essential connection among the
group. The group prepared for
the final event by making gifts
for all Institute participants during
the last week of the afternoon
material class. These gifts
were exchanged after the group
made an outdoor mandala of
twigs, stones, wildflowers, vines,
and assorted other natural materials.
The mandala provided a
ceremonial space for the gift
exchange, closing the experience
with small tokens to take away as
a symbol of the time spent
together, commemorating the
profound learning that occurred.
Students also became aware of
the healing power of the arts
for the environment and the
earth.
The overall experience of the
Institute was best summed up
by one of the students in a paper
reflecting upon her learning.
“The Institute was professionally
driven so that we could take
away tangible tools and theory to
utilize with our field of study,”
the student wrote. “And it was
experienced on an emotional
level due to the investment one
had to make into the process of
receiving information from the
presenter, and trying it out on
oneself or the other group members.
Additionally, it was felt on
a physical level because mind
and body work was incorporated
into the daily partake of information.
Mostly, it was a spiritual
experience because the facilitatory
of this whole experience
had the ability to incorporate
her heart into the creation of
this Institute. Real connections
were made, which are now slowly
transforming my life at the
colloquiums because that great
energy is flowing over to our
experiences in the workshops
and seeing each other around
Prescott and the school.”
Fall 2004Transitions
by Cappi Lang Comba
and Ellen Greenblum
Photo by Ellen Greenblum
Shown above around the
mandala made out of things
from the environment for final
circle and closure at the 2004
Summer Art Institute are,
from left, Betsy Odman, Cappi
Lang Comba, Paul Comba,
Trish Haskey, Kasey Grissom,
JoAnn Garay, Siobhan Danreis
and Ellen Jordon. The idea of
the mandala is to create a
group project that is
restorative and healing for
both the group and the
environment and to make
meaningful connection with
each other and the
environment.
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