Art Therapy Ideas

Art Therapy is a therapy form I most often use with children but can be used with adults as well. It can have a variety of different applications to other theory bases of psychology and I believe that expressing creativity is itself inherently therapeutic. Here are some of the art therapy exercises I have used with clients. If you like the sound of any of them I encourage for you to try them out for yourselves.

• Create a past, present and future self-portrait.

• Draw yourself as a tree – roots are strength and good qualities and leaves things you’re trying to change.

• Create a Coat of Arms (A fun one to do with Kids – can pick animals they like and learn about symbolism).

• Safe Space: This works around generating a “safe space” with a soothing, comfortable and completely calming visual and sensory environment in your mind’s eye. This can be developed and explored with the use of art therapy. I have found this strategy particularly useful for patients of schizophrenia but it can be used for treatment of anxiety based disorders also.

• Mandala: The image of this post is a Mandala – a form of drawing that the psychologist Carl Jung thought was a very significant symbol of the “Self”. By the self he meant not only our own personal narratives and circumstances but also the condition of humanity in general which expands into a kind of shared unconsciousness at the deepest level. Mandala drawing or colouring in can be great and very soothing.

• Self-Compassion Figure: This is drawn from self-compassion therapy developed by John Gilbert. It describes a process for developing an imaginative compassionate “figure” based on feelings of warmth, security, non-judgement and strength. This figure can then be explored in art therapy and used in the form of narratives, and can ideally be brought to mind to generate feelings of compassion and kindness towards the self.

  Feel free to reach out for more suggestions – remember art therapy has nothing to do with how good an artist you are and can access different regions of the brain and make different associations than talk therapy. It can also involve things other than drawing and painting such as different forms of music, dance, sculpture, weaving, thread-work, digital art etc.