Pamela Whitaker, Territories of Art Therapy

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Territories of Art Therapy is written by Pamela Whitaker (info@groundswell.ie) and has been produced for multiple purposes:

  1. A series of topics related to a course entitled Public Relations: Art and Social Enactment at the National College of Art and Design, Dublin.
  2. A collection of posts entitled Raw Material were produced to explore fibre arts in art therapy for the Northern Ireland Group for Art as Therapy Summer School (2016) and for art therapy students attending Emporia State University (Kansas) on their visit to Ireland (2016).
  3. A listing of discussion topics for MSc in Art Psychotherapy students at the Centre for Psychotherapy in Belfast, affiliated with the University of East London (2013-2014).
  4. It was a journal of art therapy headings to accompany a talk entitled Territories of Encounter: The Art Therapy Assemblage (March, 2013) at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (Masters of Arts in Art Therapy).

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This journal elaborates upon areas of art therapy practice which involve innovative art materials, indoor and outdoor art environments, practices of embodiment, cultural theory, and methods of generating contemporary art (installations, assemblages, conceptual art, performance art, etc.) within art therapy.

Art therapy can expose a personal narrative, but equally it can be socially engaged, an acting out upon the world. Art therapy is a form of personal and social animation, it ignites thoughts, sensations and agency into new territories or experience. Art creates a landscape, a distribution of images, which collectively assemble a series of lived and potential life spaces. An art therapy assemblage is an accumulation of territories, which are generated in the making of artworks. Equally an art therapy assemblage is interactive, an engagement with the world around us.

Each section of this journal will propose a series of ideas for discussion. It will highlight theory, practices and materials, and act as a catalyst for research and methods of creating an art therapy model that is interactive, interdisciplinary, and socially relevant.