Onward artist!
I'm back after some holiday break and laziness with writing! I have been thinking about this new year and the wide range of potential with this kind of work. This peace work and this healing work.
I am starting to develop the curriculum for this year's Creativity for Peace Camp. I am the new Art Director there, after being involved in other capacities for the past few years. It is an incredibly rewarding project to be a part of: supporting a group of teenage girls from Israel and Palestine to meet, live together, process their pain from the conflict, create art together, and learn to accept and understand each other in a short three weeks. The art part is both crucial and special. The girls get a chance to express themselves creatively in a variety of ways, with the support of art therapists and artists. Those of us involved are committed to art as a process for healing, understanding, self-discovery, and problem-solving.
I have been making an altered book as I think of implementing new art processes at the camp this year. This has been a fascinating process, painting, drawing, and collaging into an old book about a boy's life in the circus. As always, I learn more about myself and the world around me through my own art-making. I had to let go of my art studio when I moved into private practice (less money and more expenses made this necessary). I miss it like crazy, but I have restarted my art process at the kitchen table with this altered book. I was an artist long before I became an art therapist, although I've always used art to process and understand my own life and life's challenges. I can only go so long without making art before some new creative mandate pulses through me and I start making again. I am so grateful for this part of me that is artist.
I am starting to develop the curriculum for this year's Creativity for Peace Camp. I am the new Art Director there, after being involved in other capacities for the past few years. It is an incredibly rewarding project to be a part of: supporting a group of teenage girls from Israel and Palestine to meet, live together, process their pain from the conflict, create art together, and learn to accept and understand each other in a short three weeks. The art part is both crucial and special. The girls get a chance to express themselves creatively in a variety of ways, with the support of art therapists and artists. Those of us involved are committed to art as a process for healing, understanding, self-discovery, and problem-solving.
I have been making an altered book as I think of implementing new art processes at the camp this year. This has been a fascinating process, painting, drawing, and collaging into an old book about a boy's life in the circus. As always, I learn more about myself and the world around me through my own art-making. I had to let go of my art studio when I moved into private practice (less money and more expenses made this necessary). I miss it like crazy, but I have restarted my art process at the kitchen table with this altered book. I was an artist long before I became an art therapist, although I've always used art to process and understand my own life and life's challenges. I can only go so long without making art before some new creative mandate pulses through me and I start making again. I am so grateful for this part of me that is artist.
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