28 • Introduction to Art Therapy
As in any work that touches people’s lives, often when they are most vulnerable, learning
to be a better art therapist is a lifelong task, one that cannot be mastered without continuing
education, ongoing guidance, and constant self-inquiry.
Art Therapy and Art Education (DVD 2.2)
There is naturally an element of education involved in art therapy, because the work includes
helping others to create. But teaching is secondary to the primary aim, which is therapy. In
other words, if an art therapist teaches techniques, it is not for the sake of the skill itself, but
rather in order to help the person to achieve, for example, a more articulate expression of a
feeling, a higher level of sublimation, or an enhanced sense of self-esteem. On the DVD you
can see Edith Kramer teaching color mixing (A).
Similarly, there are therapeutic aspects of art education (Figure 2.3). The very best art
teachers are growth-enhancing individuals, who nurture a student’s feeling of competence
in a broadly beneficial fashion. And there is no question that art activities can be conducted
so as to promote social and emotional growth. Art is intrinsically healing for many reasons,
such as: discharging tension, experiencing freedom with discipline, representing forbidden
thoughts and feelings, visualizing the invisible, and expressing ideas that are hard or impos-
sible to put into words. On the DVD you can watch a teacher working on color mixing with
children in order to deal with identity issues (B).
Invisible Differences
One reason why it is so important to distinguish among art for different goals is that the art
activities themselves may not appear different to an untrained observer. An individual art ther-
apy session can look like an art lesson, and an art therapy group may appear to be a class, like the
one on the DVD from a psychiatric hospital (C). The materials are the same, and approaches in
both art therapy and art education range from open-ended to highly structured. Even the words
of the therapist may be indistinguishable from those a friendly teacher might use. The primary
distinctions are invisible—inside the mind of the art therapist and of the participant(s).
Figure 2.3 Viktor Lowenfeld, therapeutic art educator.