ABOUT ART THERAPY
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Art Therapy combines the sensory and felt sense of art making, (a bottom-up approach to therapy), with talk therapy, also known as psychotherapy, (a top-down, thinking approach), to help people understand their relationships with themselves and others, by connecting to their emotions and challenges through creative self-expression. By combining these approaches, Art Therapy helps clients achieve sustained healing and gain significant personal insights.
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When working with clients, Shylie adopts the most appropriate approach, depending on the the individual and their needs to achieve the most therapeutic benefit. In some situations, where there are communication difficulties or heightened emotions, it may be more beneficial for the focus to be on the art making process, while in others, the verbal psychotherapy element of the session may be what is needed by the client. In all scenarios, Shylie is aware of and attuned to what her clients need in each session and is led by these needs, resulting in the focus being solely on the art making, or on the psychotherapy, or on a combination of the two as required.
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Shylie's role as an Art Psychotherapist is to guide clients with art materials, help them gain meaning and understanding of images created, and respond to these images empathetically. By exploring the art clients make, they may come to a better understanding of who they are and what is troubling them, fostering greater insights about distressing emotions and circumstances, which supports learning how to deal with these more effectively.
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The physical process of art making is considered as it is felt and experienced in the body, which can help clients find meaning, understanding in, and release from what they are experiencing internally as well as externally. Sometimes the therapy and healing are not in the image created, or the talk around it, but in the process of making the art, experienced in the relationship between Shylie and her clients. Understanding an art work happens through actively engaging with it and its relationship to the situation, the client's process of art making and the context of the creation.
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