242 • Introduction to Art Therapy
of compromising the therapeutic potential of art by “psychologizing” it, recently reflected
in a concern in the United States about the “clinification” of art therapy (Allen, 1995) and a
return to the studio (C. Moon, 2002).
Since my undergraduate work was in art and my master’s in education, when asked to
work with hospitalized schizophrenic children, I wanted very much to pursue further study
so I could do a better job in my clinical work. After presenting my work with a child who
had expressed herself powerfully in art (Dorothy in Chapter 9, DVD 9.3) to visiting consul-
tant Erik Erikson at a Grand Rounds, I asked his advice about what to study. Though I now
disagree, he urged me to do nothing, feeling that it might interfere with the success of the
intuitive approach I was forced, by default, to follow.
So, like many before there were training programs, I learned by reading, by consulting
with the two authors with whom I corresponded (Naumburg and Kramer), from the work I
was doing with the children, and from collaborating with others on the unit.
Learning by Teaching and Consulting
There is no question that informing others, whether through presenting a case, being on
a public television program (as the Art Lady on Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood from 1966
through 1969), teaching art education courses at a local college, and writing articles (which
I began in 1969 for an art education journal and for a local preschool newsletter), is a useful
way to learn. Because art therapy was so young and as yet unformed, I had to organize the
information I was reading and gathering for myself as well as for others.
Like many others, I also learned a great deal by developing programs in a variety of set-
tings. In 1967, I was invited to be a consultant and to start an art department at a residential
institution for youngsters with physical disabilities, the Home for Crippled Children. When
I first met with the administrators, I was shocked by how few children they thought would
be able to participate.
The program itself was modeled on my partly digested understanding of the ideas of
therapeutic art educators (Lowenfeld, 1957; Cane, 1951), but I was probably most influenced
by the program Edith Kramer had initiated at the Wiltwyck School for Boys, which she
described in Art Therapy in a Children’s Community (Kramer, 1958).
Thanks to my experience at the hospital, I was able to design a rudimentary assess-
ment to determine who might benefit from art. As I suspected, everyone was capable of
doing something, though some required creative adaptations. It confirmed a study about
the powerful effect of adult expectations on children’s performance (Rosenthal & Jacobson,
1968), and I am now certain that art therapists’ expectation that everyone can create is a
major reason for our success. The following vignette about Claire, while dramatic, was not
so unusual.
Art Reveals Capacities of a Deaf-Mute Girl: CLAIRE (10)
Claire had just come back from the dentist. Inside she was screaming with the agony of the
encounter, but she had no words, not even gestures, with which to express the impact of
this traumatic experience, for Claire was a deaf-mute, crippled and in a wheelchair.
Before she drew her first picture, she had been withdrawn from school and speech
therapy, since the staff was convinced that she was profoundly retarded.
As it happened, Claire’s art evaluation was scheduled right after a visit to the dentist
(DVD 11.1). She wheeled herself up to the table, grabbed a marker and paper, and drew a
picture which—more eloquently than any words—told what it feels like to be invaded by the
dentist’s tools, to be open and vulnerable and terrified (A). Though helpless, like any patient