Transference- Countertransference ADHD

Art response for an AR535 Clinical Art Therapy II assignment.  

Shadow Self Collage Box Project

  

This piece was created as an assignment for the 1st semester Master of Arts Art Therapy program at Saint Mary of the Woods College.

The directive was to create a box that reflected both our external and inner or "shadow" self as they relate to our role as an Art Therapist.

Path of Least Resistance Collage

This piece was created as an assignment for the 1st semester of the Master of Arts: Art Therapy program at Saint Mary of the Woods College.  It was created to reflect the style of Art Therapist Cliff Joseph.

It is a collaborative piece created with my family in response to the arson my parents experienced during the summer of 2013.  While my parents were vacationing in Alaska, a criminal broke into their home, stole their car, and burned their home to cover the evidence.  This piece reflects the family unity and support for my parents as they recover from this senseless, destructive, life changing, and violating crime.

The piece is called "The Path of Least Resistance" which is how the path fire chooses was described to me by a Fire Marshall at the scene of the crime.  He described fire as flowing like water.  For the background of the image, I dropped india ink onto wet paper to replicate the flowing quality of the fire.  I also used gray chalks to combine with the wet ink as a metaphor for smoke and fire damage.

Each family member created their own personal figure out of collage materials.  These were placed on top of the destruction, and linked together to represent our unity.

Art Therapy Chronology

This piece was created as an assignment for the 1st semester of the Master of Arts: Art Therapy program at Saint Mary of the Woods College.
It is a chronology of a pivotal moment in the history of Art Therapy - the creation of the Art Therapy Association

Art Therapy Mandalas: Framing My Art Therapist Identity

This was created as part of an assignment for the 1st semester of the Master of Arts: Art Therapy (MAAT) program at Saint Mary of the Woods College.
The piece is a response to 8 questions regarding my own Art Therapist philosophy and identity:
Why are all pieces partial self-portraits, what is the role of the image in the art therapy process, what is meant by "embrace the mystery", why should art therapists make are, what is your personal motivation for making art, as a metaphor what does the image of the "canvas mirror" represent, what does my canvas mirror look like today, how does my canvas mirror reflect my various roles and my motivation for making art?

 

 

 

 

Art Therapy Continuum

This was an assignment was completed for the Master of Arts: Art Therapy (MAAT) program at Saint Mary of the Woods College.
The table reflects components of the Art Therapy "Continuum" - in particular specifying the Healing and Emergent functions of the projects.

Sketchbook Art Therapist Role / Self-portrait Collage

This piece is a self-portrait collage in response to research on the roles of an art therapist for my AR 510 Theories of Art Therapy course at St Mary of the Woods College.   The reading was by Bruce Moon, I think title was Intro to Art Therapy.   A section of the reading talked about the soul, and spirituality in art therapy practice, and used the work Shaman in relation to the art therapist role.  This really struck me, I got online and researched Shamanism a bit and felt the "role" really paralleled my own developing theoretical belief system.  Much of the imagery in the collage is in response to this concept.  Another key element of the text that really struck me was describing art therapy as a Metaverbal (beyond verbal)  practice vs a Non-verbal practice.  Moon stressed it was important to define art therapy by what it IS vs what it is NOT.  

I have often stated when asked to explain my art pieces over the years that it is really hard to put them into words....that is what I love and need about art is it allows me to communicate when words fail me.  Moon described the act of creating art with the client as THE therapeutic process....not the act of verbally analyzing the work post creation.  

taking notes and sketching while doing reading from "Introduction to Art Therapy" Bruce Moon for written paper and self-portrait collage assignment for AR 510 Theories of Art Therapy

Art Therapy Symposium Piece

I created this piece at the Art Therapy Symposium at Mt Mary College (to be University) in Milwaukee. 

It was part of a workshop that addressed recycling and rethinking old works of art we had created.  My original (old) piece was encaustic painting created about 10 years ago when thinking of moving back to Wisconsin from Tennessee.  The figure in the image is my "other" self, the one I'd left back in WI, contemplating a frozen Lake Michigan, looking across to the "me" in TN.  I think the underlying tone was a sense of loneliness or otherness in both places,and ultimately, inside of me, wherever I was.

For the new piece I used water soluble oil pastel on paper.  This was my first time using the pastels, and I really loved them.  Being a mommy and working full time makes it hard to carve out time for making art at all.  Finding media that "works" for me but is also easier to store, set-up, clean-up than oil paint is a goal for me right now.  I loved working with these pastels, but would want to use sturdier paper such as watercolor paper.

As I created the new piece, I wanted to include both "self"s and unite them with swirling lines which represented my spirit.  I also surrounded the lone figures with glowing auras representing spirit or passion.  As I worked, the focus of my current life, my spiritual seeking, began to take over the piece.  The flowing lines became the roots of the lotus plant, vital and powerful in the frozen lake, and blooming on the surface, the lotus blossom, or the reward for all of my searching.  I realized that I did not feel alone anymore, and surrounded the present self with numerous other selves.  The blossom became a symbol for my son, my ultimate reward, which in turn became a symbol for Motherhood.  The "self"s blended into the background, and the journey and the status of Mother, loving, nurturing, caring, became the focal point.  I think this piece represents above all, the treasure of my heart that is getting to be a mother to my son, the joy I experience in my current spiritual seeking, and the peace I am beginning to find within a service minded attitude.