Art Therapy

Expressing oneself through a drawing, painting, sculpture, or collage makes our thoughts, feelings, and ideas tangible and communicates what we sometimes cannot say through words alone, this is very important and we can do it in a therapeutic way called art therapy.

Even if you believe you can not draw a straight line, you have the capacity to use the creative process. Art therapy uses simple art activities to help people express themselves and develop a sense of well-being; additionally,  the main idea of this therapeutic process is the creativity that you have and the product, but we need to emphasize that art therapy is also an avenue of communication of feelings, thoughts and experiences.

This kind of therapy is commonly used on children and also, it is confused with play therapy because the specialist on this two types of therapeutics process mix the activities to created a special and dynamic relationship with their patients.

The product that art therapy produce are tangible in most cases and this is used for the therapist to help and to understand visually express and record experiences, perceptions, feelings and imagination, among other; they use their vast knowledge of arts-based approaches to enhance young clients’ ability to communicate through creative expression.

Art therapy “works” with the following principles:

• Non-Verbal:  its simplest definition, art expression is a form of non-verbal communication. For children who may not be able to articulate thoughts, sensations, emotions or perceptions, it is one way to convey what may be difficult to express with words.
• Sensory-based:  means that it allows the children to experience themselves and communicate on multiple levels (visual, tactile, kinesthetic, etc.)
• Growth and Development: as we say before art expressions provide useful information on development in children, especially young clients who are 10 years or younger, because differences in artistic development can help us understand something about a child’s emotional experiences, cognition and sensory integration.
• Self-Regulation: Some sensory characteristics of art making seem to be effective in improving mood, sensory integration, and calming the body and mind.
• Meaning-Making: the patient can express metaphor or experiences through art expression, so with the guidance of a specialist, these narratives can tell us about some traumatic experiences or disorders on the patient.
• Right-Hemisphere-to-Right Hemisphere: It is about the patient-specialists´ relationship.

There are some simple art activities that anyone can do:

• Try to draw something on a sketchbook or sheet anytime you feel stress or anxious, (using colors, shapes and lines to describe how you are feeling today).
• Simply doodle or draw whatever comes to your mind.
• If drawing does not stimulate your creative juices, collect magazine pictures, postcards and photos that are soothing to you. Using scissors and glue, make a collage of your images on a large sheet of paper or cardboard.

Curiosities-on: