The page as place: how we enter into images as place

ABSTRACT

Background

Entering into an image is a familiar yet undefined term. In this art-based, heuristic enquiry into how we enter into images as place, the author considers what meaning the concept of place has in art psychotherapy and how we explore and express our inner worlds through imagined places.

Aims

Spatial ideas and metaphors are routinely used in art psychotherapy to conceptualise internal landscapes and relational space. The author aims to provide a complementary enquiry into the phenomenon of place on the page, and how this is entered into.

Method

The research involved the creation of sixteen images partnered with reflective writing following spatial, locating, and sensory prompts. The author’s artmaking involved heuristic ‘self-dialogue’ on place, adopting a meditative frame of mind, creating two-dimensional artworks on paper and reflective writing. The dataset was analysed through response illustration and ‘revisiting’ via the prompt questions.

Results

Entering into was considered comparable to active imagination, dialoguing and suspension of disbelief. Themes of connection and solitude, expanse and enclosure and sensory experience illuminated the experiential nature of place and the page as a site of experience.

Conclusions

Entering into an image is shown to involve imaginatively engaging the senses and reflection on the felt sense. A place must exist to be entered into and it is found that imaginative experience creates that place.

Implications for practice/policy/future research

As an imaginative process, entering into has significance to art psychotherapy through the page experienced as place into the potential space.

Plain-language summary

Entering into an image is a familiar yet undefined term. The author enquires what it means to enter into an image as an imagined place on the page. This research uses art-making, self-inquiry, and personal reflection on the topics to answer this question. Art Psychotherapy uses metaphor and imagined places to describe how we explore and express our inner worlds and the relationship between psychotherapist and client. The author explores what this means if the page, and images on it, are a place.

Sixteen images were created and reflected on by writing. Images, on paper, were made with the intention to explore the phenomenon of place, without specific plans for composition, so that themes and ideas could freely emerge from the self-inquiry and artmaking to inform the research. Themes from that process were chosen by looking again and further reflective writing and illustrations were made on those themes. Through this process the core themes were narrowed down and selected.

Themes of connection and solitude, expanse and enclosure and the sensory experience were identified. This showed that place and space are linked to relationships and growth and that a place is somewhere we experience. When we imagine these experiences, both visually and in imagining our senses, we are entering into an image. This may help art psychotherapists and those in therapy by giving us understanding of how we use imagination and access unconscious ideas, and about how we create space for growth in the therapeutic relationship.

KEYWORDS:

• Art-psychotherapy
• art-based research
• entering into
• heuristic
• image
• landscape
• place

Acknowledgements

This research was undertaken as part of my MA Art Psychotherapy at the University of South Wales. I would like to thank my supervisor Dr Jo Kelly as well as Ali Coles for her introduction to heuristic research. Thanks also to Dr A A Piccini for feedback provided.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Zuleika Gregory

Zuleika Gregory qualified as an Art Psychotherapist in 2020. She previously studied at Dartington College of Arts and has worked in mental health since 2005. Zuleika currently works as an art therapist with children and young people in Wales.