https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8330-9051
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ABSTRACT
Background: Seven adults who attended six or more art psychotherapy sessions explore the role art psychotherapy played in their individual mental health recovery.
Aims: For lived experience voices to speak to the value of art therapy, attending to what is useful to individuals at the time of therapy and beyond.
Methods: A private practice art therapist shared information with service users regarding IJAT’s call for collaborative papers. The art therapist invited interested authors to focus on how one artwork from their time in therapy was useful to them in their personal journey. Authors used their artworks and personal writings to explore the unique ways they used creativity to express hidden and sometimes unspoken aspects of their experiences.
Results: Authors drew a variety of conclusions regarding the impact of their art making. The authors explore using their art as a way of making meaning and gaining a greater understanding of themselves and their lived experiences of adversity.
Conclusions: The impact of art making in the context of art psychotherapy is useful in supporting individuals to create meaning and self-awareness in relation to adverse experiences. Authors conclude that their art had positive impacts at the time of therapy and beyond, creating support and meaning over time.
Implications: The value of follow-up research after a person has attended therapy is implied in the reflections shared by the authors. The relevance over time of a particular piece of artwork or imagery undertaken in art therapy is an area for further research.
Plain-language summary
The authors consist of seven people who attended art psychotherapy sessions and one therapist. The seven authors with lived experience of a range of adverse experiences have contributed personal written works and images; the therapist has contributed research and reflection. Authors have chosen a single piece of artwork undertaken at some point in the course of their art psychotherapy journey with the art therapist. The authors have written about what this artwork meant to them, both at the time of the therapy and upon reflection. The authors explore themes of: making meaning from visual expression, new understandings of life experiences and the long-term role imagery can play in recovery. The authors explore the ways that art making undertaken in art psychotherapy sessions impacted them as individuals and helped them to make meaning in mental health recovery. The therapist has chosen supportive literature from the field of fine art and art psychotherapy that highlights the observations and experiences made by the authors. The contributing art therapist adds discussion about the capacity for art psychotherapy processes to create meaning from adverse experiences.
© 2021 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Elise Ford
Elise Ford based in Brisbane, Australia. Elise is mum to three children and is currently studying drama and psychology practices. Elise found art therapy an extremely useful adjunct in the early stages of being diagnosed and treated for complex developmental trauma as an adult and continues to use creative practices as a source of expression and support.
Nicholas George
Nicholas George grew up in South Africa and immigrated to Australia 15 years ago. He is a working professional in his mid-forties and is married with two children. Nicholas feels that art psychotherapy can support people to explore layers of human emotion that may be otherwise hard to access.
Edith Holland
Edith Holland lives in Brisbane, Australia. She is a Peruvian teacher working in childcare settings and combines her interest in art studies with this work. Edith currently is based at home, busier and happier, spending time with her 8-month-old baby. Edith would like to see art therapy become more popular and accessible for everyone in Australia so they can enjoy and embrace its benefits.
Shane Maher
Shane Maher is in his 30s, from Ireland and has spent the last 8 years travelling and working around the world. Shane has found art therapy to be a really productive means of weeding out the difficult and deep-rooted traumas in his life and feels he is all the better for coming across it.
Leesa Maree
Leesa Maree is a professional consultant and mum to two teenagers residing in urban Queensland, Australia. Leesa grew up in the 70s and 80s in rural and regional Queensland as a first generation Australian.
Kate Naylor
Kate Naylor grew up in rural New South Wales, Australia, is now in her forties and living regionally in Australia. Kate has a background in teaching and is also a trained arts therapist. Kate is in the process of completing her studies in psychology and is juggling this while raising two children and working in a school.
Karen Rossel
Karen Rossel is currently living in Brisbane, Australia, having immigrated from South Africa 20 years ago. Karen has qualifications in town planning (cum laude), urban design, property, project management and has undertaken numerous online courses ranging from psychology to human anatomy. Karen has worked in both the public and private sectors, and more recently has undertaken community volunteer work. Art therapy has for many years remained a stabilising asset in managing clinical depression and PTSD.
Justine Wake
Justine Wake is a family woman, art psychotherapist and practising artist based in Brisbane, Australia. Justine has worked for 21 years in the field of mental health and is currently focussed on working alongside children, young people and adults with lived experience of mental health concerns arising from the impacts of complex trauma. Justine works in private practice and in the Australian education system.