Not female-to-male but shadow-to-human: an exploration of body tracing in terms of embodiment and identity definition during gender transitioning

ABSTRACT

Background and context

This paper wishes to help heal the lack of trans people’s representation in art therapy research that coincides with the lack of art therapy literature theorising body tracing.

Approach

Supervisor, art psychotherapist and service user have come together to offer a research process that questions power dynamics and uses lived experience to explore an approach of body tracing that differs from body mapping and so contributes a further approach in this field for working with people whose identities question the status quo of power.

Outcomes

Specifically, we wish to demonstrate the relevance of body tracing as a tool for facilitating the gender transitioning process. We explore how it offers a lived experience in the here and now that promotes agency and an internal locus of control over what is to be modified and what is to be maintained.

Conclusions

It creates an embodied space for a new identity to be shaped. We examine how the contextualisation of creative process modalities (sensory experience, formal decision-making and symbolic meaning) within the resulting body-space aids the integration of states of self and bodily awareness and connectedness.

Implications for research

We hope to inspire further research in this field that can support an institutionalised adoption of body tracing within an art therapy setting for gender transitioning service users.

Plain-language summary

Art therapists have only written a little about working with trans people. The same is true of the technique of body tracing. This paper speaks about both of these areas. The service user has taken the role of lived experience author in order to work together with the art therapist and her supervisor, so that all three voices can talk on equal terms about their experiences in these areas and explore a way of using body tracing that they believe can empower people who are gender transitioning. A technique called body mapping already uses body tracing to help people who feel disadvantaged because of their identity (for example, their sexual orientation, the colour of their skin, religion, nationality etc.). Our research offers an additional approach with some distinct features. The lived experience author describes how the act of drawing around the body and then being able to modify this outline promoted a sense of control over his body, leading to a feeling of greater control over his life. This helped him reclaim ownership of his body at a time when other people were deciding the hormones he took and the options available. Our method integrates bottom-up and top-down processes to help a person feel more connected with their body. Working on the body tracing involves many physical sensations that vary for each of the four stages of the process. Memories and thoughts may also come to mind connected with lived experiences and fantasies. The physical feelings in the body can be filtered thanks to the images and colours in the representation of the body on the paper. We hope that other people will join our research so that institutions supporting trans people can offer this service to their users.

Video Abstract

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© 2021 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group

KEYWORDS:

• Body tracing
• transgender
• body image
• empowerment
• LGBTQI
• social justice
• body mapping

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Rivkah (Rebecca) Hetherington

Rivkah (Rebecca) Hetherington is an HCPC (UK) registered art psychotherapist who trained at Art Therapy Italiana in Bologna (Italy) where she lives and works. She also practices as an artist, having a BA in Fine Art (Winchester School of Art) and MA (Wimbledon School of Art) in the UK where she grew up. She has a private practice in Bologna where she sees both children and adults, individually and in groups. She has a special interest in treating trauma that has led her to study bilateral drawing (Institute for Sensorimotor Art Therapy) and is currently involved in bringing ‘The Changing Room 11’ trauma-oriented project from USA to Italy. Her interest in social justice has led her to work in Bologna’s women’s prison as well as in projects with unaccompanied minors and vulnerable teenagers. In collaboration with Bologna’s LGBTQI centre, she set up the first art therapy group in Italy dedicated specifically to LGBTQI clients and has published her research in this field (The Arts in Psychotherapy). Her international identity also finds her working with Third Culture Kids through International School. She is a member of research groups in the fields of Adoption & Foster Care and Prison Work.

Mimma Della Cagnoletta

Mimma Della Cagnoletta, doctor in Philosophy, certified psychologist, art therapist and psychoanalyst, is co-founder of Art Therapy Italiana (1982), the association that developed the first art therapy training in Italy in collaboration with Arthur Robbins, Diane Waller and Andrea Gilroy amongst many. Former professor at the University of Milan, she has been teaching and supervising for three decades. She is now director of advanced studies in art therapy for Art Therapy Italiana. She runs art therapy groups for users and professionals in many health services and private institutions. She works with dance movement therapists in order to integrate art and movement into teaching and practice. She is in private practice in Milan, working with adults. She is supervisor of a research group on adoption and foster care. She is author of an art therapy handbook and co-author of a book on group art therapy and many articles, both in Italian and English. She is a member of the editorial board of the journal ‘Creative Arts in Education and Therapy: Eastern and Western Perspectives’, member of the Application Review Committee and of the Research Committee of the European Federation of Art Therapists. She is a dedicated abstract painter.

Fabrizio Minghini

Fabrizio Minghini graduated in Anthropology from the University of Bologna and is continuing his studies with a Masters in Psychology. His ambition is to train as a psychotherapist with the specific desire to help other trans people in need during their transition. He has lived in Bologna for eight years, after spending most of his life in his hometown, Mantua. He’s involved in human rights movements and has lately developed a particular interest in death positive and death acceptance movements. He’s a talented actor, having pretended to be a woman for 25 years, even managing to convince himself before realising that wasn’t the case.