Art for healing

Many psychologists have long been aware of the benefit of art, and there has been a recent movement to integrate it into their own private practices, or to become “art therapists.” But what exactly do they do with art that can help their patients? What creative exercises might they use to work with their patients?

In anxiety patients therapists will often have the patient draw their anxiety as a monster. By visualizing your anxiety in this manner patients have the ability to interact with it– to look it square in the face and have a conversation with it. To make it tangible, more real, more visible and conquerable.

Often through drawing or painting patients can either abstractly or concretely recreate and reinterpret their trauma, allowing them to express whatever pain they’ve endured without having to speak explicitly out loud about it, and allowing patients to grapple with it and process it in ways that solely talking sometimes does not allow. For example one child psychologist described to me that one of her patients who had experienced the terror of 9/11 came to therapy and drew pictures of burning buildings, but also included firemen right there, saving him from the destruction. This was useful for this patient because he was able to work through his trauma and fear from this event by visualizing firemen who would be there to save him and take care of him if he ever faced a similar event.

Why art?

Why art?

 

Welcome to Healing Arts! This website was created by a group of Vermont High School students interested in getting involved in our local and global communities. What brought this group together however was our passion and interest in art, and the intersection of art and psychology. We created a documentary, and a website because we believe that across Vermont, and the United States art is often devalued, and not thought of as an integral and essential part of a well-rounded education, or a means of healing for people who have suffered from psychological traumas.

Throughout this project we came to the understanding that the use of art as a method of learning or healing can be beneficial to many groups of people, but has especially clear benefits for children and teenagers. After interviewing many psychologists across the state we heard the same thing over and over; children are not as skilled at communicating verbally as adults. They don’t have the large vocabulary, or clearly thought out points that many adults learn to use. However, verbal communication is not the only means of communicating. Through using the creative part of your brain (weather it be drawing, painting, dancing, playing music etc.) children are able to express emotions and thoughts they never would be able to do without the help of their creative medium. Adults tend to be more focused on the product they’re creating (i.e. is it good? Will people like it? Does it express what I want it to?) and in this preoccupations have more difficulty getting what they need to get out of the process of creating art.

Despite the obvious benefits, arts programs are often the first to be eliminated when faced with dwindling school budgets. We want to change the awareness around the importance of art, and expand the definition of what art is “good for.”

 

“I think that art is important because it is through art that I first got glimpses of how other people live” – Steven Willis