Why Art Therapy Matters
There is a third person in the art therapy room. It’s neither a client nor an art therapist. It is the art itself.
The art is meant to stand in the gap. The process of being in art therapy is about processing, exploring, identifying, and addressing what that gap is. I look at the gap as something that makes itself known to you. An insight, a realization, a perspective, an understanding, or intuition. Sometimes what is known cuts deep.
Pain, wounds, suffering, none of those things were meant to be an identity. The experience of pain and suffering is meant to be released, integrated, or resolved. What cannot be released does not serve, and what cannot be integrated or resolved no longer benefits.
The felt sense of pain and suffering is too all-consuming and compounding in its prime. The question I often come back to is this: do pain and suffering have a purpose, are they meaningful? Nothing needs to be made out of pain and suffering as a given, but it is a reality we all live in and with. Sometimes pain is pain, and suffering is suffering. There is no pressure to make pain and suffering known, yet being made known is about being seen. A witness is important in validating the experience. Witnessing and validation are about testimony, a living embodiment of living, not the end of living.
We have inner worlds and conflicts that often collide. Carrying them is just as burdensome as holding space for them. Art is not solely about the value of aesthetics, as art therapy is not solely about creating beauty, though it’s often a beautiful process. It’s about revealing the truth, finding the root cause, being curious and open about patterns, and learning to live with answers and mystery. That is a beautiful process.
The art therapist witnesses you, but so does your art. Your art will speak to you because it’s an expression of you. Your beliefs and values, your experiences, what you know now, and where you may be going.
The groundwork is already set with simple tools and basic principles, and some guidance from a professional who cares enough to see, to guide you towards what you see, feel, and know, and is trained to understand this process well enough to help you carry and hold your load lighter and with more ease.
Art contains multitudes; the process of making art is about making the inner world real and tangible. Expression is the process of making yourself known; making your thoughts, feelings, and experiences alive and continue to be. That’s being seen.
Seeing means believing reality is worth pursuing and truth has value, even in its darkest and ugliest, and those truths offer clarity. When clarity thrives, so does healing.
