ART THERAPY in

MUSEUMS AND
GALLERIES
of related interest

Art Therapy with Older Adults

Connected and Empowered
Erin Partridge
ISBN 978 1 78592 824 6
eISBN 978 1 78450 940 8

Art Therapy with Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Beth Gonzalez-Dolginko
ISBN 978 1 78592 831 4
eISBN 978 1 78450 972 9

The Handbook of Art Therapy and Digital Technology

Edited by Cathy Malchiodi, PhD
Foreword by Dr Val Huet
ISBN 978 1 78592 792 8
eISBN 978 1 78450 774 9

Portrait Therapy
Resolving Self-Identity Disruption in Clients with
Life-Threatening and Chronic Illnesses
Susan M. D. Carr
ISBN 978 1 78592 293 0
eISBN 978 1 78450 605 6

Art Therapy in Private Practice

Theory, Practice and Research in Changing Contexts
Edited by James D. West
Forewords by Joan Woddis and Chris Wood
ISBN 978 1 78592 043 1
eISBN 978 1 78450 297 3

Art Therapy and Substance Abuse

Enabling Recovery from Alcohol and Other Drug Addiction
Libby Schmanke
ISBN 978 1 78592 792 8
eISBN 978 1 78450 774 9
ART THERAPY in
MUSEUMS AND
GALLERIES
Reframing Practice

EDITED BY ALI COLES AND HELEN JURY

FOREWORD BY JORDAN POTASH
Figure 3.1, Figure 3.2, Figure 3.3 and Figure 3.4 are reproduced with kind
permission from Modern Art Oxford, copyright © Modern Art Oxford.
Figure 4.1 is reproduced with kind permission from The State Russian
Museum, copyright © State Russian Museum, St Petersburg.
Figure 5.1, Figure 5.2, Figure 5.3 and Figure 5.4 are reproduced
with kind permission from Ben Uri Gallery and Museum.
Figure 6.1, Figure 6.2, Figure 6.3, Figure 6.4 and Figure 6.5 are
reproduced with kind permission from Newcastle University.
Figure 7.1 and Figure 7.4 are reproduced with kind
permission from Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.
Figure 8.1 Left is supplied courtesy of East London NHS
Foundation Trust, photo © Sheila Grandison, 2012.
Figure 8.1 Centre is reproduced with kind permission
from Tate Images, © Tate, London 2018.
Figure 8.1 Right is reproduced with kind permission from Tate Images, © The
estate of Barry Flanagan/Bridgeman Images, photo © Tate, London 2019.
Figure 8.2 is reproduced with kind permission from Tate
Images, © Cildo Meireles, photo © Tate, London 2019.
Figure 10.1 is reproduced with kind permission from
Graeme Peacock, photo © Graeme Peacock.
First published in 2020
by Jessica Kingsley Publishers
73 Collier Street
London N1 9BE, UK
and
400 Market Street, Suite 400
Philadelphia, PA 19106, USA
www.jkp.com
Copyright © Jessica Kingsley Publishers 2020
Foreword copyright © Jordan Potash 2020
Cover artwork copyright © Philippa Beveridge 2020
Cover photography copyright © Paul Louis 2020
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any
material form (including photocopying, storing in any medium by electronic
means or transmitting) without the written permission of the copyright owner
except in accordance with the provisions of the law or under terms of a licence
issued in the UK by the Copyright Licensing Agency Ltd. www.cla.co.uk or in
overseas territories by the relevant reproduction rights organisation, for details
see www.ifrro.org. Applications for the copyright owner’s written permission to
reproduce any part of this publication should be addressed to the publisher.
Warning: The doing of an unauthorised act in relation to a copyright work
may result in both a civil claim for damages and criminal prosecution.
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
A CIP catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978 1 78592 411 8
eISBN 978 1 78450 775 6
 Contents

About the Front Cover Image 11

Helen Jury
Foreword  13
Jordan Potash
Acknowledgements 15
Introduction 16
Helen Jury and Ali Coles

Part I The Context

Chapter 1 Art Therapy in Museums and Galleries:
Evidence and Research 26
Sue Holttum 
Chapter 2 What Do Museums Mean?: Public Perceptions
of the Purposes of Museums and Implications
for their Use in Art Therapy 44
Ali Coles
Chapter 3 Making Space Safe at Modern Art Oxford  63
Mary Chamberlain 

Part 2 Art Therapists Working with Museums

and Galleries
Chapter 4 From Isolation to Relation: Reflections
on the Development of Museum-Based
Art Therapy in Russia 82
Nana Zhvitiashvili
Chapter 5 Starting with Art: Ben Uri Artworks as a
Stimulus for Art Psychotherapy in Dementia Care 108
Emma Hollamby, Elaine Homer and Jane Landes
Chapter 6 Creative Dialogues: A Journey from Recovery to
Discovery for People Using Drug and
Alcohol Services 133
Simon Hackett, Ruth McGovern and
Fiona Fitzpatrick
Chapter 7 The Caring Museum/Le Musée qui soigne: Art
Therapy at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts 157
Stephen Legari, Marilyn Lajeunesse and
Louise Giroux 
Chapter 8 Expanding the Frame: Developing and Sustaining
a Long-Term NHS Art Museum Partnership
Within a Workforce Development Strategy for
Enhanced Quality of Care 181
Sheila Grandison
Chapter 9 Art Therapy at the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum:
A Gaze Through Emotions, Culture and
Social Integration 202
Karen Lund 
Chapter 10 BALTIC Art Therapy Project: A Collaboration
Between NHS Art Therapists and BALTIC
Centre for Contemporary Art Gateshead 223
Michael Fischer and Whittaker Scott

Part 3 Wider Perspectives

Chapter 11 Further Conversations with Rembrandt in
Space, Place and Time: How Rembrandt’s
Self-Portraits and the Gallery Setting Inform
the Art Psychotherapy Review 244
Helen Jury
Chapter 12 Temporary, Portable and Virtual: Making
Galleries on the France–UK Border at Calais 265
Miriam Usiskin, Bobby Lloyd and Naomi Press
Chapter 13 Art Therapy and Museums in the Colombian
Context: Co-leading Collective Transformations 289
Andrée Salom

Biographies 310
Subject Index 313
Author Index 317

Figures
Figure 3.1 Making Space Safe shelf within
the storage cupboard 71
Figure 3.2 The Project Space (photo credit: Stu Allsop) 73
Figure 3.3 ‘Our’ corner in the Project Space 74
Figure 3.4 The basement space 75
Figure 4.1 Ivan Aivazovsky, ‘The Ninth Wave’ (1850),
oil on canvas, © State Russian Museum, St Petersburg  91
Figure 4.2 Painted sculptures. ‘From monologue to dialogue’
workshop (1997) 95
Figure 4.3 ‘The Shadow’ by patient A (2017) 103
Figure 5.1 Samuel Hirszenberg, ‘Sabbath Rest’ (1894),
oil on canvas. Ben Uri Collection 119
Figure 5.2 Chana Kowalska, ‘Shtetl’ (1934),
oil on canvas. Ben Uri Collection 119
Figure 5.3 Alfred Wolmark, ‘In the Synagogue’ (1906),
oil on canvas. Ben Uri Collection 120
Figure 5.4 David Breuer-Weil, ‘The Edge’ (2007),
oil on canvas. Ben Uri Collection 122
Figure 5.5 Albert, ‘Waiting in Line’, pencil and
pastel drawing 125
Figure 6.1 Doing an Orozco 143
Figure 6.2 Collective collage workshop 144
Figure 6.3 The flyer invitation 149
Figure 6.4 The exhibition 149
Figure 6.5 The exhibition: detail 150
Figure 7.1 Alberto Martini, ‘Self-Portrait’ (1929),
oil on canvas. The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts,
purchase, Horsley and Annie Townsend Bequest.
Photo MMFA, Brian Merrett 164
Figure 7.2 ‘Totem-Muses’, collective artwork by
participants from Le Cap 165
Figure 7.3 ‘Expérience de mort imminente’
(‘Near Death Experience’), part of the contrasts
project. Participant artwork portraying experience
as a patient with traumatic brain injury 169
Figure 7.4 Sharing the Museum (Le Musée en partage)
(Photo: Pierre Arsenault) 176
Figure 8.1 Connecting: Art as a bridge across
site and context 184
Left: Entrance to the Newham Centre for Mental Health.
Supplied courtesy of East London NHS Foundation Trust.
Photo credit: © Sheila Grandison, 2012
Centre: Tate Modern from St Paul’s, 2016, Tate Photography.
© Tate, London 2019
Right: ‘4 casb 2 ’67’, 1967; Barry Flanagan (1941–2009).
Purchased 1976; © The estate of Barry Flanagan/
Bridgeman Images; Photo © Tate, London 2019
Figure 8.2 ‘Babel’ 2001; Cildo Meireles (born 1948).
Purchased jointly by Tate, London (with the assistance
of the Latin American Acquisitions Committee) and the
D. Daskalopoulos Collection, 2013, as a promised gift
to Tate; © Cildo Meireles; Photo © Tate, London 2019 198
Figure 9.1 Participant artwork after viewing
‘The Rape of Europa’ 216
Figure 9.2 Participant artwork after visiting the
‘Messages from the Wall’ exhibition 218
Figure 9.3 Participant artwork after viewing ‘Albia’ 219
Figure 10.1 BALTIC 225
Figure 12.1 Plasticine installation 272
Figure 12.2 Stage-managing the boat 274
Figure 12.3 Postcard exhibition on the table 276
Figure 12.4 Drawing postcards in the shipping container 278
Figure 12.5 Viewing the map and exhibition 280
Figure 12.6 Viewing the map at night 281
Figure 13.1 ‘La Lechuga’ (drawing by author) 294
Figure 13.2 A personal chiva (drawing by author) 304
 About the
Front Cover Image
Helen Jury

Cover artwork: © Philippa Beveridge

Photography: © Paul Louis

‘Lost and Found’

‘Lost and Found’ is a series of works created during my artist’s
residency in France and deals with the concept of collective and
individual identity through the everyday form of a purse: an
object which is often lost, stolen or mislaid, an easily identifiable
form which fits into the hand or a pocket and contains hidden
memories – a testimony to a stage of their life. To create this body
of work, I invited the local residents to visit the studio and show
me the contents of their purses. I then photographed the different
elements and transferred the imagery onto glass which I then
cast into moulds. The images distort as the glass melts, leaving
imprints of the objects and clues, or traces of their owners’
identities. (Philippa Beveridge)

Philippa Beveridge’s work connects to many of the chapters in this

book. Her work questions the idea of temporality and how belongings
that are lost still retain personal memories, using notions of time,
memory and identity. In her artwork, Philippa captures in glass
the ephemeral memories connected with the idea of the lost item.
This bears relevance to the place of the museum and gallery, where

11
12 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

the collections and displays inspire us to engage with our personal

responses and histories and to question anew our relationship with
objects and artworks, revealing emotions and feelings – sometimes
hitherto unexplored. These ideas can be encapsulated in the artwork
and museum objects that, as Philippa has discovered with glass,
can be both robust and delicate at the same time. Through using
memories as source material, she crafts an object that takes on the
character of the memories and emotional stimulus that inspired it.
We are given the opportunity to view the inner world of the person
who might have owned the purse and to glimpse their memories and
identity, made visually and materially permanent. Philippa describes
the ‘parallel between what we want to reveal and what we want
to keep private, intimate or secret’ (Beveridge in Van Butsele 2010).
This is similar to the art therapy practice explored in this book where,
through making artwork, clients discover how to balance a sense
of self and identity with encountering what memories and emotions
reveal to them.
Philippa Beveridge was born in London in 1962. She studied
Landscape Architecture at the University of Greenwich, and then
Glass at the Massana School of Applied Arts in Barcelona, where
she lived until 2018. She received the Jutta Cuny-Franz Memorial
Award in 2003, and in 2006 the Barcelona ARTFAD (Association
of Art and Design) first prize, alongside gaining a master’s degree in
Art in Architecture at the University of East London. She has taught
in the USA and Europe and directed the Syracuse University Visual
Arts Study Abroad programme from 2005 to 2010. Her website is
www.philippabeveridge.com.

Reference
Van Butsele, G. (2010) Catalogue: Philippa Beveridge, Lost and Found/Objets
Trouvés. Conseil Général, Département du Nord, Musée-atelier du verre à
Sar-Poteries.
 Foreword 
Jordan Potash

I am fortunate to live in Washington DC, a city known for politics but

which also has a rich arts scene. Out of the range of available history,
science and cultural museums, I frequently find myself returning to
the National Gallery of Art. Sometimes it is to visit an old favourite
artwork, such as Thomas Cole’s existential ‘Voyage of Life’ series
or Wayne Thiebaud’s inviting ‘Cakes’. Other times it is to wander
through the collection, perhaps for a fantastical escape into Alexander
Calder’s mobiles. Still other times, it is to meet something new. Within
a two-year period, I was introduced to the work of artists Theaster
Gates and Rachel Whiteread (National Gallery of Art 2017, 2018).
Gates, an American black man from Chicago, Illinois, seeks out
abandoned places, deconstructs them, and reconstructs sculptures
that combine original narratives with new ones. Whiteread, a British
white woman from London, casts the negative expanse of rooms and
around furniture to call our attention to the in-between. Gates invites
viewers to repurpose and recontextualise places while honouring
their original purpose, whereas Whiteread offers an opportunity to
contemplate what is obvious about an area but untouched. 
When I reflect on these exhibits, I am enthralled by the intersection
of how they alter conceptions of space in thoughtful and intentional
ways. Like these two artists, art therapists have always found ways
to re-invigorate overlooked settings, such as dark basements, locked
wards, converted broom closets and dilapidated store fronts. It only
makes sense that art therapists have discovered the potential of
high culture forums to transform them from leisurely, art for art’s
sake, educational, or scholarly purposes, into public opportunities

13
14 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

for promoting health and social concerns. Like Gates, art therapists
have mined historical artefacts and celebrated artworks to encourage
clients, students and workshop participants to further personal
insight, strengthen relationships and consider social issues. Like
Whiteread, art therapists have discovered the unseen potential to
benefit health and mental health goals, as well as to foster cross-
cultural engagement.
I have frequently utilised the museums in my work as both an art
therapist and educator. The editors and contributors of this volume
conceptualise how revisioning spaces, both galleries and studios,
can firmly integrate the grand purposes of museums and the noble
pursuits of art therapy. Even though these projects take place outside
the traditional milieu of clinics, hospitals, schools and community
studios, they honour core art therapy tenets. In responding to
exhibits, we find that the creative process furthers meaning-making.
By considering alternative approaches to viewing collections, we
discover that metaphor heightens symbolic communication. In
developing a professional relationship, purposeful structure allows
for meaningful encounters to occur. Museums and art therapy in
partnership unleash vast opportunities for encouraging each of these
distinct fields to discover how their overlooked spaces are creative
grounds for inspiration, imagination and wellbeing to flourish. 

Jordan Potash
Associate Professor, Art Therapy Program,
The George Washington University and Editor in Chief
of Art Therapy: Journal of the American Art Therapy Association

References
National Gallery of Art (2017) ‘Theaster Gates Presents New Body of Work in
Solo Exhibition at National Gallery of Art, Washington.’ National Gallery
of Art. Accessed on 21/2/19 at www.nga.gov/press/exh/4927.html.
National Gallery of Art (2018) ‘Rachel Whiteread.’ National Gallery of Art.
Accessed on 21/2/19 at www.nga.gov/exhibitions/2018/rachel-whiteread.
html.
 Acknowledgements

We would like to thank all the art therapists and other professionals
who have inspired us to explore the potential of museums and galleries
for art therapy, including members of the British Association of Art
Therapists’ Museums and Galleries Special Interest Group, which
was co-founded by Siân Hutchinson and Ali Coles. Thank you also
to all our family members; without their support and encouragement
this book would not have come to fruition.

Helen Jury and Ali Coles

15
 Introduction
Helen Jury and Ali Coles

Art Therapy in Museums and Galleries is a timely book, exploring

emergent and original thinking and practice in international clinical
work in these settings. This is an area of increasing interest to those
in the art therapy profession, and the past few years have seen an
upsurge in cooperation and partnership between museums, galleries
and art therapists, evident in the response to our call for chapters
for this book. We are grateful to all those who responded and are
delighted to showcase some of this work here, as well as theoretical
perspectives that can inform this way of working. This book is the
first to present an international view of art therapy in museum and
gallery settings and is wide-ranging both in its geographical scope
and in terms of client groups; the chapters span Canada to Colombia,
Euskadi to East London, children using mental health services to
adults and minors in refugee camps.
For the purposes of this book, we consider art therapy to be an
activity undertaken by trained art therapists or art psychotherapists. In
the UK, for example, the titles ‘art therapist’ and ‘art psychotherapist’
are legally protected and those entering the profession require training
at master’s level and registration with the Health and Care Professions
Council (HCPC), demonstrating consideration of the unique role
they hold in implementing safe and specialised therapeutic work. It
is art therapists’ specialised skills that are invaluable in partnerships
with settings such as museums and galleries, where community
engagement involves working with people who are vulnerable and
who might have mental health issues or other difficulties. Museum
and gallery professionals are increasingly working with art therapists

16
Introduction 17

to re-address the function, scope and meaning of their collections

and the opportunities they can offer to the public, in novel and
creative ways. At the same time, art therapists are recognising the
huge potential of museum and gallery collections and environments
for therapeutic work, enabling self-exploration, empowerment and
social inclusion. Art Therapy in Museums and Galleries is the first
book to explore this exciting and resourceful practice which makes
an important contribution to the ever-evolving field of art therapy,
and we are very grateful to the chapter authors for sharing their
knowledge, expertise and insight.
The first part of the book deals with the context for art therapy
work in museums and galleries. In Chapter 1, Sue Holttum, applied
psychologist and part-time research officer for the British Associa­
tion of Art Therapists, sets the scene by reviewing some of the key
published literature relating to art therapy work in museums and
galleries from the past 20 years, including placing this within the
wider arts and health arena. The projects she describes span a wide
range of client groups and geographical areas, and Holttum uses
hypotheses about the health benefits of arts activities in cultural
settings and therapeutic factors in art therapy as a basis for exploring
how museum and gallery settings have contributed to therapeutic
efficacy in the art therapy projects she considers. Finally, Holttum
identifies the need for more evidence in this area of work, and
suggests how art therapists can evaluate and research their practice
in order to advance this work.
Chapter 2 considers how commonly held perceptions about
museums (including galleries with collections) might affect engage­
ment in, and experiences of, museum-based art therapy. Ali Coles
draws on research undertaken in the UK with the general public
about the roles and purposes of museums (including galleries with
collections) and considers how the key findings relate to art therapy
in these settings. She concludes that many of these public perceptions
resonate with key therapeutic principles within art therapy, such as
those of holding and containing, trust, exploration and learning,
play and acceptance, which suggests that museums have great
potential as partners for art therapy practice. Coles also explores
how museums might be conducive to addressing issues related to
18 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

knowing and not knowing, care and neglect, fear, abuse of power,
and difference and  diversity, relating this to current debates in the
museum world, and anticipating a time when the therapeutic value
of museums is commonly recognised.
In Chapter 3, Mary Chamberlain explores the concept of ‘safe
spaces’ in the context of a gallery setting, through the lens of an
art group for refugees and asylum seekers at a museum in Oxford,
England. Discussing the influence of the creative and cultural nature
of the setting for the group as well as the impact of the particular cha­
racteristics of the spaces that are used, Chamberlain focuses on the
structures, both internal and external, psychological and physical,
which help to make a space feel safe, drawing on therapeutic prin­
ciples from art therapy. In the gallery setting, she has created a safe
space that provides participants with a sense of being seen and cared
for, and which encourages agency and control, in distinct contrast to
what they may have experienced in the outside world. 
Part 2 contains descriptions of, and reflections on, art therapy
work with museums and galleries from around the world, in a variety
of institutional frameworks and with a range of client groups. Nana
Zhvitiashvili reflects on her work as a museum curator in Russia in
the 1990s in Chapter 4. Motivated by a desire for integration, equality
and respect, she collaborated with a psychologist to bring together
museums and art therapy approaches in projects for marginalised
people, a process that was influenced by the post-communist political,
cultural and social transformations at that time. The chapter focuses
particularly on a project for young people with learning difficulties,
and Zhvitiashvili, now a qualified art psychotherapist, identifies
the key factors for the efficacy of museum-based art therapy based
on her experiences. She makes general recommendations that will
be of use to others when developing work of this kind and which
she has applied in her current museum-based art therapy work
with oncology patients (children and adults) at a private hospital
in London. Zhvitiashvili also explores the resonances between cura­
torial and art therapy practice from her dual perspective as curator
and art psychotherapist, discussing key ideas which inform both
areas of work.
Introduction 19

Chapter 5 takes us to recent work in the UK, where a small

London art gallery established a partnership with an art therapy
training institution and an experienced art therapy supervisor
to deliver a project for older adults living with dementia.  Emma
Hollamby, Elaine Homer and Jane Landes describe how the project
was established, and reflect on how the gallery collections were used
as the focus for weekly art therapy groups in a National Health
Service day centre, as well as how visits to temporary exhibitions and
curatorial talks contributed to therapeutic outcomes. In particular,
they discuss the influence of the collections’ themes of migration
and identity on the therapeutic work with this client group, showing
how the gallery’s collection helped group members to tell their own
stories, create artwork, and connect to each other, to the gallery and
to wider cultural life.
In Chapter 6, Simon Hackett, Ruth McGovern and Fiona
Fitzpatrick present a case study of an arts and museums project
in northern England for people using drug and alcohol services,
which included visits to museums and galleries and an exhibition
of the participants’ work. Drawing on theory associated with the
concept of recovery capital, the project was devised to span the three
overlapping areas of art therapy, visual and fine arts practice, and
museums/galleries and health and wellbeing, and was co-led by an
art therapist, artists, museum staff and drug and alcohol recovery
centre staff. It aimed to stimulate creative dialogues in order to help
participants to develop their confidence, social networks and com­mu­
nity engagement, and participants had the opportunity to be creators,
art critics, curators and exhibitors. The authors conclude that crea­
tive engagement with museums and galleries can support people
who are in recovery from substance misuse, noting the importance
of the role of the art therapist in providing a safe framework for the
therapeutic work. 
Chapter 7, by Stephen Legari, Marilyn Lajeunesse and Louise
Giroux, describes pioneering work in Montreal in a fine arts museum
where the first full-time art therapy post in the world in a museum
context has been established, and where art therapy is now fully
integrated. The post has a mandate to facilitate work with a variety
20 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

of client groups, to collaborate in research, supervise, and manage a

community studio to implement projects for wellbeing. Humanistic
principles and art therapy practice guide the foundation of projects,
with integration of art therapy trainings that benefit from engaging
in clinical opportunities and research in the context of the museum
setting. Projects are co-created with organisations and agencies,
thereby benefiting from close collaboration with other experts in
their field and allowing the authors to conclude that here, art therapy
in the museum is thriving.
Similarly, Sheila Grandison’s work in Chapter 8 highlights the
advantages that can be gained by long-term, phased projects in
partnership with museum and NHS (UK National Health Service)
professionals, and how each profession’s skills set can benefit both
the client group and those working with them. Drawing on the
varying levels of cultural access available to mental health service
users in a deprived part of London, Grandison calls our attention to
promoting cultural understanding and working with the community.
Over three phases of a project that is ongoing, she and her colleagues
have developed a flexible working model to provide gallery-based
training with both the client group and staff working with them for
reflecting on compassionate care creatively. Their ideas and practice
have bridged in-patient and cultural sites, building greater links
between an NHS Trust and a major gallery eight miles away.
Chapter 9, by Karen Lund, explores art therapy and social
projects with a fine arts museum in northern Spain, outlining the
benefits of a participatory meeting space for people at risk of social
exclusion. She emphasises the institution’s community role and refers
to the range of client groups involved, from offenders to unprotected
minors in foster homes. The important role of the art therapist
to safeguard the emotional frame for participants is outlined. She
describes working closely with the museum, which employed her
as a member of staff to facilitate the groups. Using artwork in the
museum, Lund explores cultural heritage, enabling and empowering
group members to express artistic responses and safely communicate
feelings and thoughts. Group members are integrated into public life
and enjoy improved participation in their community environment,
negating a tendency towards isolation. The gallery as a sensory space
Introduction 21

acts as an instigator for group members’ personal responses, and

Lund emphasises the positive responses from collaborating staff who
view museum users from a new perspective.
Michael Fischer and Whittaker Scott, in Chapter 10, describe
ano­ ther model of collaborative working in a contemporary art
gallery in Gateshead, England. They developed a project with the
NHS for children and young people, questioning what it was about
the gallery encounter that could add to art therapy group experience.
They provide evidence of the feasibility of their project and results,
so others can use this experience to establish similar  projects.
A central tenet of the work is the belief that for art therapists
and artists, art galleries add something to the therapeutic process
through the environment, which is inspirational to young people.
The aim of the project was accessing hard-to-reach adolescents to
address issues around confidence-building, self-esteem and rela­tion­
ships. Young people had the opportunity to learn new skills from
the freelance artist and exhibit their own artwork in response to an
exhibition, aiding promotion of positive mental health awareness in
the community. This chapter demonstrates intricacies, benefits and
challenges in developing a flexible balance between reflective and
edu­cational elements, and in overseeing working relationships with
gallery staff, resident artists and NHS management.
Part 3 considers wider perspectives on the interaction between art
therapy and museums and galleries and here, in Chapter 11, Helen
Jury considers how galleries and art collections extend our thinking
around the scope of art therapy not only theoretically, but also as
practising artists. She details how responses to the two Rembrandt
self-portraits in the National Gallery in London, and development of
ideas concerning keeping them in mind, informed concepts around
time, place, space and the roles of the review and supervision in art
therapy. Jury draws on parallels between absence and presence of
the image in the therapy space; how we hold in mind individual and
collective artworks of the client is considered, along with thoughts
and feelings about artwork that are evoked in the review. She refers
to the collapse of sense of time and its impact on clients when their
artwork is set out collectively, side by side as in a gallery setting,
and how the psychological effect of different temporal structures
22 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

can be considered theoretically, through drawing on our experience

of gallery viewing. Supervision is considered in relation to clients’
artwork in the absence of the client, with the opportunity to develop
explorative approaches.
In Chapter 12, Miriam Usiskin, Bobby Lloyd and Naomi Press
discuss a radical approach to working with psychosocial groups,
through crisis support for refugees living in transit on the France–UK
border at Calais. They refer to the setting becoming multipurpose
and multifunctional, interpersonal and improvisational, responding
to the necessary humanitarian needs of the population group that is
both homeless and highly vulnerable. They describe how, at times,
the potential spaces occupied by the art therapists and participants
become temporary, virtual and portable galleries, thereby recognising
the importance and significance of the art object as a constant in
otherwise impermanent and insecure surroundings. They describe
the work that has been carried out in this context with partner
organisations responding to the needs of the refugees, and how their
methods and planning as a team are an essential element of their
successful interventions. Mapping, representation of the experience
of the refugees, context-specific materials and exploration of refugee
experience are all recounted, as well as theoretical underpinnings as
rationale for this provision of psychological, virtual – and at times
physical – gallery space.
Chapter 13 explores how art therapists can unlock the therapeutic
potential of museum exhibitions. In the particular context of the
political situation in Colombia and the way in which arts in health
and art therapy work has developed in that country, Andrée Salom
focuses on four particular exhibitions. She frames them in therapeutic
terms and describes art therapy directives which could be used to
enhance their therapeutic efficacy for informal museum visitors as
well as scheduled groups, considering the possibility of delivering art
therapy to large numbers of people or to individual visitors wishing
to engage on a personal level with exhibits. She argues that a union
between art therapy and museums results in the transformation of
both fields, and that it can also be transformational for the individual
in terms of how they view and experience the world, thus facilitating
reparation and social justice. 
Introduction 23

These chapters form an exciting and impressive collection of

projects and theoretical viewpoints from which to consider an
expansion of the already growing work in this field, and the fore­
word from Jordan Potash in the USA reiterates how, as both artists
and art therapists, we bring exceptional and innovative skills to
work in conjunction with museum and gallery settings. The chapters
demonstrate versatile and original thinking in developing new pro­
jects and responding to gallery and museum resources, confirming the
huge potential for collaborations between art therapy and museums
and galleries. We believe that this book represents only a fraction of
the work that is taking place in this area internationally and we hope
that it will inspire others to develop, expand and share this area of
practice in the future.

Please note: Chapter authors have obtained the necessary consents to

include information about clients and service users, and pseudonyms
have been used to ensure anonymity.
 PART I

The Context
 CHAPTER 1 

Art Therapy in Museums

and Galleries
Evidence and Research

Sue Holttum 

Introduction 
In this chapter, I describe work by art therapists in museums and
galleries, draw out the contribution of the settings, and suggest
ways forward for research. I am engaged in art therapy research
as an applied psychologist at England’s Canterbury Christ Church
University, and as part-time research officer for the British Association
of Art Therapists. It would be difficult to do justice here to the full
range of innovative work by art therapists in museums and galleries,
so I focus on just a few projects from the past 20 years. My aim is to
discuss work that art therapists are doing in museums and galleries
with a range of participant groups and in different countries.
Art therapy in museums and galleries has been seen as one of a
number of kinds of arts and health approaches, and was included
in the UK’s All-Party Parliamentary Group on Arts, Health and
Well­being (APPGAHW) report (2017). This report suggested two
main ways in which arts and health projects may produce benefits
for their participants. First, the report suggested that the enriched
environment of arts engagement may reverse harmful effects of
deprivation and stress. The report drew on a biopsychosocial model
and understandings of animal and human biology (e.g. Bygren 2013;

26
Art Therapy in Museums and Galleries 27

Rasmuson et al. 1998). Environmental stresses can affect our genes,

determining whether certain genes are switched on or off (Borghol
et al. 2012). New knowledge has also indicated that the human
brain continues to adapt and grow new brain cells throughout life
(see Cozolino 2018 for an overview), and one study has reported
beneficial brain changes in response to art classes for older people
in a museum (Bolwerk et al. 2014). If we draw on Bygren (2013),
enrichment may be provided not only through cultural venues and
their exhibits, but also through the opportunities afforded for social
connection, interaction, creativity and play during participation.
The second proposed therapeutic mechanism in the APPGAHW
(2017) report was the way that absorption in arts activities may
reduce stress hormones through calming, and there is some evidence
to support this in relation to drumming (Fancourt et al. 2016) and
art therapy (Visnola et al. 2010). Considered alongside evidence that
simply visiting museums and galleries and viewing artworks can be
calming (Clow and Fredhoi 2006; Roberts, Camic and Springham
2011), it seems possible that a museum and gallery setting can add to
any calming effect of arts activities themselves. 
A variety of hypotheses have been put forward regarding the way
in which art therapy in its own right may yield therapeutic benefits.
The review by Gabel and Robb (2017) is particularly relevant in that
it examined group art therapy, the form most often used in museums
and galleries. Gabel and Robb (2017) reviewed 119 sources across
art therapy teaching material, practice reports and empirical studies,
and suggested five main mechanisms of action for group art therapy.
Their reviewed literature incorporated clients across the lifespan
and in different contexts (medical, psychiatric, wellbeing and re­
habilitation). Their five suggested mechanisms were: symbolic
expression (the use and sharing of symbols), relational aesthetics
(communication and attachment through artworks), embodiment
(expressing mental contents through art-related actions), pleasure
and play (relaxation and mastery through interacting with and
manipulating art materials), and ritual (special places such as the
art studio and consistent boundaries and practice). The following
section explores how a museum or gallery setting might contribute to
these, and other, therapeutic aspects of art therapy practice. 
28 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Evidence on art therapy involving

museums and galleries 
People diagnosed with cancers
Deane, Fitch and Carman (2000) evaluated 16 sessions of art therapy
for 21 people with cancer diagnoses in Canada. Participants received
a tour of the McMichael Canadian Art Collection, and then made
art in a studio with the art therapist. Deane et al. (2000) evaluated
the programme using a questionnaire and audio-recorded telephone
interviews. They reported that both the gallery tour and hearing
stories about artworks and artists inspired participants to create their
own expressive artwork. Deane et al. (2000) also reported that some
participants found new ability to discuss their condition with friends
and family, thus increasing their ongoing support, which became
possible once participants had depicted unspoken emotional material
and verbalised it with support from the art therapist.
While this may have been possible without inspiration from the
gallery tour, some participants appeared to find learning about the
artists and gallery artworks helpful in enabling them to be creative
in their own use of art for expression and self-exploration. Many
enjoyed learning about art and artists, and some continued to visit
art galleries or engaged further in other arts such as theatre. 

Young people
Some art therapy projects in museums and galleries have involved
young people. Linesch (2004) piloted art therapy in the USA’s Museum
of Tolerance, which houses exhibits concerning the Holocaust. In a
young people’s five-day summer camp, where the focus was learning
about tolerance, participants toured the museum with a guide and
made art in a group with an art therapist in response to the exhibits.
At the end of the week they exhibited their artwork. Although
Linesch (2004) did not conduct a formal evaluation, she suggested
that art therapy facilitated an ‘experience of museum viewing that
transitions the participant from passive viewer to self-expressive
artist and potential exhibitor’ (p.57). This suggests that basing
art therapy in a museum or gallery might bolster the potential for
Art Therapy in Museums and Galleries 29

identity transformation of art therapy participants through an artist

status (Thompson 2009; Wood 1997). 
Also in the USA, Treadon, Rosal and Thompson Wylder (2006)
piloted group art therapy for seven secondary school children with
behavioural and emotional problems. Numerous studies have
implicated environmental stress in the development of such problems
(e.g. McLaughlin 2016; Sandler et al. 2015). The children worked
partly at school and partly in an art museum. Treadon et al. (2006)
did not report outcomes formally, but suggested that participants
developed new interests in art and gained confidence in school art
classes. The children were absorbed in the activities and surprised
their teachers by their ‘lack of resistance or negative behaviours’
(Treadon et al. 2006, p.299). They were able to connect with the
artworks and produce their own expressive art with technical support
from the art therapists.

Family carers of people with severe

mental health diagnoses 
In the UK, Shaer et al. (2008) aimed to enable mental health service
users and carers (in separate groups) to create podcasts about their
experiences, using artworks in London’s Tate Britain gallery to
stimulate discussion followed by the opportunity to make art. Shaer
et al. (2008, p.31) stated, ‘Participants greatly increased their under­
standing and engagement of both gallery paintings and their own
images through a relationship negotiated via shared viewing.’ As
with Linesch (2004) and Deane et al. (2000), the art therapist here
contained the participants’ emotional reactions to difficult themes
when viewing exhibits and making art.
Building on Shaer et al. (2008), Roberts et al. (2011) evaluated a
two-session group art-viewing and art-making programme for eight
family carers of people with severe mental health problems, again in
Tate Britain. Participants appreciated the venue as providing a sense
of privilege and as a safe space. In one participant’s words, it was
‘like being somewhere very grand or something…and just for you’
(Roberts et al. 2011, p.154). Interest in art increased, and viewing
30 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

a tranquil seascape reminded some participants of their capacity for

coping by being outdoors or by the sea, for relaxation.

Mental health staff 

Huet (2011) also built on Shaer et al. (2008), again employing art-
viewing and art-making in Tate Britain. Huet (2011, p.3) referred
to her one-off session as piloting ‘art therapy-based organisational
consultancy’ for staff who cared for residents of a forensic learning
disabilities unit. The curator told the artist’s story, inviting a human
connection to art and artist, and Huet (2011) suggested that this
facilitated participants’ subsequent artworks that depicted powerful
work-stress themes. Two of the viewed artworks portrayed people
without homes, and among the themes Huet (2011) identified
through using thematic analysis (Braun and Clarke 2006), the pic­
tures prompted staff to voice their feelings about their clients being
seen as outsiders and about themselves being marginalised due to
their work.

Older people 
Salom (2011) piloted museum-based art therapy in Colombia for
ten older people resident in a care home, which involved a visit to
the Archaeological Museum in Bogotá. The aim was to allow them
to connect to their past through the Archaeological Museum and its
exhibits, and to open up to new experiences. Salom (2011) proposed
therapeutic roles for museums, for example ‘museum as group’ (p.83)
due to containing objects that signify a range of human experience.
Thus, participants can have their own experiences validated by mu­
seum objects as they can do by other therapy group members, a thera­
peutic factor that Yalom (1995) termed universality (Salom 2011). 
Many publications have reported evaluations of arts and health
projects in different countries with older people in museums and art
galleries, and I mention these in passing because they tend to involve
artists, but not art therapists (e.g. Age and Opportunity 2012; Flatt
et al. 2015; Harper and Hamblin 2010; McGuigan, Leggett and
Horsburgh 2015). The aim of many of these projects is to improve
the social inclusion and general wellbeing of older people, often in
Art Therapy in Museums and Galleries 31

the context of dementia and with an emphasis on stimulation and

enjoyment rather than processing difficult feelings or psychological
issues. They use the museum or art gallery to assist in this aim,
and benefits may accrue partly through the enriched environment
discussed in the APPGAHW (2017) report. As the study by Bolwerk
et al. (2014) suggested, art-based activities in a museum or gallery
may lead to positive brain changes for older people. However, as has
been illustrated already, art therapists often work with the expression
of difficult feelings and thoughts. 

Adults with severe mental health difficulties 

In a UK study, Colbert et al. (2013) interviewed seven participants
with psychosis-related diagnoses after a four-session programme
of art-viewing and art-making, at the Dulwich Picture Gallery in
London. Consistent with Linesch (2004), Colbert et al. (2013, p.255)
suggested that there was ‘the emergence of a sense of personhood
over patienthood or professionalism’ in that both mental health
professionals and service users began to see themselves and each other
as part of the ‘socially valued community of gallery-goers and art-
makers’. For one mental health service user, seeing strong emotion in
a painting (‘Samson and Delilah’ by Anthony Van Dyck) contributed
to his sense of strong emotion becoming seen as normal rather than
being a sign of illness. This seems to echo Salom’s (2011) description
of museum objects as representing human life and providing a
sense of universality (Yalom 1995).
Coles and Harrison (2018) describe an 18-session art therapy
programme in two museums in Gloucester, England. Seven of their
ten participants with severe mental health difficulties completed the
programme. Their mixed-methods systematic case study included
three short validated measures: the University College London
(UCL) Museum Wellbeing Measure for young adults (Thomson and
Chatterjee 2013), the Psychological Outcome Profiles (PSYCHLOPS,
Ashworth et al. 2005), which allows service users to set their own
therapy goals and rate their progress on these, and the Rosenberg Self-
Esteem Scale (Rosenberg 1989). Five of the seven participants self-
reported as improved on PSYCHLOPS. Two who rated themselves
32 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

as slightly worse had experienced difficult life circumstances during

the programme, and this finding highlights the value of gathering
additional contextual data. The mean change was positive, with a
large effect size, indicating clinically as well as statistically significant
change. Self-rated changes on the self-esteem scale were smaller but
consistent with PSYCHLOPS. Scores on the UCL Museum Wellbeing
Measure after each session suggested positive feelings.
Coles and Harrison (2018) outline the possible contribution of the
museum settings and exhibits, which their qualitative data seemed to
support. First, participants could make emotional connections with
exhibits and express these emotions in their own artworks, which in
turn seemed to assist self-understanding. Second, exploring boxes of
museum objects or viewing exhibits together fostered playfulness,
communication and mutual understanding, as when several people
chose the same object and it elicited similar feelings. Some participants
began to meet for coffee before sessions and formed friendships,
which suggests the enhancement of social connection as in Deane
et al. (2000) and Delucia (2016). Third, attending the activities in
museums helped participants to feel like ‘a person not a patient’
(Coles and Harrison 2018, p.122). This is reminiscent of Linesch
(2004) and Colbert et al. (2013). Fourth, the museum settings and
exhibits appeared to inspire participants’ imagination and creativity.
Some participants became motivated to set themselves artistic and
other goals, such as getting to the museum on public transport. 
It appears that the participants’ gains were facilitated by the thera­
peutic context and approach, beginning with boxes of museum objects
within a confidential space for early sessions, and then moving out
into the museum and to another museum later on. One could suggest
that the therapists gradually increased the terrain for exploration in
line with the progress of attachment via the triangular relationship.
Gabel and Robb (2017) located the triangular relationship within
what they saw as the larger concept of relational aesthetics operating
in group art therapy. They defined relational aesthetics as ‘the over­
lapping triangular relationships between group members, artworks
and leaders’ (Gabel and Robb 2017, p.129), and reported this
concept to be present in 64 per cent of the 119 sources reviewed. In
museums and galleries, the artworks and surroundings may extend
Art Therapy in Museums and Galleries 33

what is possible in clinical settings by significantly expanding the

available space for the operation of relational aesthetics (see also
Coles, Harrison and Todd 2019).

Military veterans 
Delucia (2016) in the USA has described group art therapy with the
opportunity to exhibit artwork in a community-based art therapy
studio and gallery dedicated to veterans. Delucia (2016) suggested
that when participants exhibited their artwork they experienced
empathy from viewers, stating that when friends and family visited
the gallery and saw veterans’ artwork, some veterans were able to
discuss distressing experiences with them for the first time.
Experiential avoidance (a feature of persistent post-traumatic
stress) was the focus in Lobban and Murphy’s (2018) two-week
residential programme of art therapy for four veterans with a diag­
nosis of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) at UK charity Combat
Stress. The programme included two art therapy sessions (viewing
and making) in galleries as well as group and individual art therapy
at the residential facility. Although Lobban and Murphy (2018)
reported a mean reduction in self-rated experiential avoidance, there
was no statistical test. During the first gallery visit, participants were
drawn to an etching (‘Map of Nowhere’, 2008) by the British artist
Grayson Perry (who is well known in the UK) and, the following
day, made art in response to it. Participants drew on their knowledge
of the artist and his ‘alter ego, and reputation for cross-dressing’
(Lobban and Murphy 2018, p.104) to discuss the issue of how one is
perceived by others, but the authors did not provide further detail of
this particular resonance. 

Adults with eating disorders

Thaler et al. (2017) added a one-day, museum-based, group art
therapy session to an existing clinical programme for adults with
severe eating disorders, in a rolling programme of art therapy at the
Montreal Museum of Fine Arts in Canada for groups of up to 12
participants. Baddeley et al. (2017) have described this programme,
which included lunch and an art educator-led tour, followed by
34 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

art‑making in an on-site studio. There were 78 participants in total,

and, in addition to carrying out thematic analysis on their written
answers to a short questionnaire, Thaler et al. (2017) used quan­
titative measures of mood, preoccupation with eating, and body
satisfaction. There were no significant therapeutic changes in body
satisfaction or preoccupation with eating, but anxiety decreased
(Thaler et al. 2017). The qualitative data suggested that visiting the
museum and learning about artworks served as distractions from
hospital routines, stimulated creativity and enabled seeing different
perspectives. Thaler et al. (2017) suggested that the creative, playful
aspect of the art therapy component in this setting challenged
rigid thinking. 

Adults without identified health difficulties 

In Greece, where art therapy is not yet well established, Pantagoutsou,
Ioannides and Vaslamatzis (2017) worked with ten members of
the public in a 12-session pilot art therapy group in the National
Museum of Contemporary Arts, Athens, with the aim of enabling
them to explore emotional issues in the context of Greece’s economic
struggles. No formal evaluation was reported, but the authors
suggested that viewing selected artworks and hearing about the
artists who had made them helped participants to make connections
to their own lives and, similar to Deane et al. (2000), inspired them
to create their own expressive artworks. The art therapists created an
atmosphere of acceptance, assisted by the museum staff welcoming
participants and encouraging ‘a critical stance towards contemporary
art’ (Pantagoutsou et al. 2017, p.70).
Two studies drawing on art therapy, in the USA and Hong Kong
respectively, have used the concept of relational aesthetics to increase
citizens’ political awareness (Betts et al. 2015; Ho et al. 2017). Betts
et al. (2015) reported that self-rated empathy increased more in
participants who made response art after viewing exhibits in the
USA’s Holocaust Memorial Museum, compared with those who only
viewed the exhibits without the art-making process. Ho et al. (2017)
reported a reduction in desire for social distance from people with
mental health difficulties after selecting, reflecting on, and making art
in response to artworks by mental health service users. 
Art Therapy in Museums and Galleries 35

Therapeutic factors in art therapy

based in museums and galleries
Almost all the projects discussed here describe how participants
made personal and often emotional connections with exhibits in the
setting. These personal connections with exhibits could be viewed as
either an aspect of relational aesthetics (Gabel and Robb 2017), or
Yalom’s (1995) universality (Salom 2011). However, the important
thing about these connections seems to be that in many reports,
they inspired participants’ own art-making and self-expression. In
some cases (e.g. Huet 2011; Pantagoutsou et al. 2017), there was
a suggestion that the art curator or museum guide encouraged the
forming of personal connections with artworks, prior to therapeutic
art-making, rather than positioning the artworks as above such
ordinary responses. 
Having made a personal connection with an exhibit, participants
of most projects were described as expressing their thoughts and
feelings in the subsequent art-making sessions, which may be viewed
as either embodiment and/or symbolic expression (Gabel and Robb
2017). Although these are concepts applied to group art therapy
outside art galleries and museums and mostly in clinical settings,
the exhibits in museums and galleries could be said to assist the art
therapist in encouraging art-based expression, invoking Salom’s
(2011) idea of the museum as therapist.
Several authors mentioned an enjoyable or playful aspect of their
projects, which is consistent with Gabel and Robb’s (2017) idea
that pleasure and play lead to relaxation and mastery, and with the
APPGAHW (2017) report, which suggests calming as a therapeutic
mechanism in arts and health projects. In museums and galleries, this
may be enhanced because the cultural setting celebrates creativity
and human expression or experience. McNiff (2004) has described
the art therapy space within a clinical setting as an asylum (refuge)
within an asylum (medically dominated mental health system). By
contrast, museums and galleries and their exhibits can be seen as
enhancing the already containing space: Jury and Landes (2015,
p.27) have suggested that museums and art galleries can be a ‘non-
clinical, safe and containing setting’ for art therapy, and Ioannides
(2017, p.104) referred to ‘valuable and priceless items that are very
36 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

well protected’, which she suggested may in turn help some people
to feel secure.
Coles and Harrison (2018) referred to participants setting
them­­selves new challenges, and although this could have been due
to their active involvement in setting and rating their own therapy
goals, another possible aspect was the stimulation and enrichment
(APPGAHW 2017) provided by museum objects in the early stages,
alongside the museum and gallery exhibitions and the buildings
themselves. The ‘specialness’ of a museum or gallery may add a sense
of ritual, possibly also enhancing security (Gabel and Robb 2017).
Specialness and value conferred by a cultural setting was mentioned
in Roberts et al. (2011), and also featured in Stevens et al. (2018) in
their study of arts-based recovery college courses held in cultural
venues. This might be an insufficiently acknowledged component of
art therapy in museums and galleries.
The long-standing view within art therapy of considering clients
as artists (Thompson 2009; Wood 1997) is potentially supported
by museums and galleries as cultural venues (Colbert et al. 2013;
Coles and Harrison 2018; Linesch 2004). Making, and particularly
exhibiting, artwork might serve not only to validate participants as
artists (Linesch 2004; Thompson 2009) but also to enable friends
and family to empathise with their feelings, perhaps for the first time
(Delucia 2016). This may arise without exhibiting, as a result of
an enhanced ability to communicate personal experiences through
viewing and making art (Deane et al. 2000), but exhibiting in a
culturally valued space may enhance this therapeutic outcome.

Where next for research?

Few of the reports on art therapy in museums and galleries used
formal evaluations, and this means that many of the findings and
therapeutic processes described here have to remain tentatively
stated. The APPGAHW report (2017) recommends the use of rigo­
rous mixed-methods designs for evaluating arts and health pro­
jects. One such example is Coles and Harrison’s (2018) systematic
case study. This approach enables researchers to gauge the degree
to which different sources of data converge on the same findings
Art Therapy in Museums and Galleries 37

and to understand unexpected outcomes. Systematic case studies

involve careful pre-planning of what data to collect, based on
hypotheses about processes and outcomes. This data is then
collected systematically and represented transparently (see Yin 2018
for an overview of this approach). If art therapists wish to pursue
a purely qualitative approach to evaluation, there are some helpful
texts for guidance on how to make this rigorous and less open to a
common criticism of descriptive case studies: that reported findings
are influenced by researcher bias. Willig’s (2013) text represents a
useful introduction to a range of qualitative methods in that it covers
many commonly used approaches, and discusses their comparative
strengths and weaknesses.
As a basic start, art therapists could routinely use short ques­
tionnaires to audit their work. For example, behaviour problems in
young people might be rated by teachers using the Strengths and
Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) (Goodman and Goodman 2011).
Social participation (new friendships or greater arts participation)
could be examined in a range of client groups, but may require
careful devising and validation of a new questionnaire to incorporate
arts participation. The role of the museum or gallery and its exhibits
could feature more in qualitative evaluations to test the suggestions
of Salom (2011) about their possible inherent therapeutic functions
for different participants, and to investigate the prevalence of the
idea of ‘specialness’ and what this might mean. The self-esteem
component of a sense of enhanced social identity might be captured
in participants who experience societal stigma using the Rosenberg
Self-Esteem Scale (Rosenberg 1989), which is a freely available and
widely used short questionnaire. 
For examining changes in wellbeing, the APPGAHW report
(2017) points out that the Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing
Scale (Stewart-Brown et al. 2009) has been used extensively in arts
and health studies in different countries. It utilises a seven-item short
form, making it especially useful for participants who find long
questionnaires daunting. PSYCHLOPS (Ashworth et al. 2005) is also
short and enables service users in collaboration with their therapist
to create their own goals for therapy and rate them pre, post, and
in-between. The UCL Museum Wellbeing Measure (Thomson and
38 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Chatterjee 2013) is intended for regularly gauging immediate positive

and negative emotions during arts and health projects and could
be useful for evaluating art therapy interventions when the data
is considered in the light of an understanding of clients’ particular
difficulties.
Thematic analysis (Braun and Clarke 2006; Clarke and Braun
2018) allows for data from interviews and focus groups to be grouped
into researcher-determined themes to illuminate participants’ ex­
periences and is widely used in psychotherapy and counselling
research studies. It can be a valuable component of mixed-methods
evaluations (e.g. Huet and Holttum 2017; Stevens et al. 2018; Thaler
et al. 2017).
Research itself (in addition to art therapy) might contribute
to enhancing participants’ social positioning if it is conducted in a
participatory way, for example by utilising an overall framework
of participatory action research (Leavy 2017), or experience-based
co‑design (Point of Care Foundation n.d.). These approaches view
service users as active stakeholders in the research, in an equal
partnership with professionals, and able to influence the design and
execution of the research. UK research funding bodies generally
require some level of consultation or active partnership working
with service users and members of the public (INVOLVE 2018),
and participatory research or co-design can maximise involvement
and influence.
None of these rigorous methods rules out the use of artworks
themselves to help convey findings. Reproductions of artworks
gained with clients’ fully informed consent can convey directly some­
thing of participants’ engagement with the intervention, and of their
communication through the use of art materials (Gabel and Robb
2017). However, images by themselves are open to multiple inter­
pretations and the final interpretation of any artwork created in art
therapy sessions always remains with the client. For a more detailed,
general discussion of collecting and representing visual material see
Pink (2013). 
The APPGAHW report (2017) recommends assessing the cost
effectiveness of arts-based interventions, for example by recording
use of health and social care services before, during and after an
Art Therapy in Museums and Galleries 39

intervention, and then ascertaining costs on the basis of actual service

costs. The report also highlights a way of establishing the social
return on investment (SROI), which ‘allows for the measurement
and capture of outcomes that can be intangible and hard to measure’
(Whelan, Holden and Bockler 2016, p.18). The return on investment
is expressed in monetary terms, which makes it easier to compare
and contrast findings from different studies, and arguably appeals to
stakeholders in constrained economic climates. However, estimating
these quantities can be problematic and contested, not least because
a social return is, in many people’s eyes, not reducible to money. 

Conclusion 
Research evidence on art therapy in museums and galleries suggests
that it is an approach that might enable participants to experience
increased understanding of personal identity, to make personalised
connections to exhibits and at times be inspired to share their ex­
periences through both art-making and words. In turn, this might
enable the processing of personal difficulties. The opportunity of
exhibiting one’s own work might enhance participants’ ability to com­
municate feelings to others, including family and friends, enhancing
their social support, as well as amplifying participants’ identity from
service user to being considered an artist. There are some commonly
used validated measures that have been explored here and that art
therapists might make more use of in their work in museums and
galleries. It is also likely that thematic analysis as part of a mixed-
methods evaluation can illustrate experienced benefits that are hard
to capture with standardised scales or are not yet articulated, being
qualitative and personal. Following up participants for a time after
the intervention is to be recommended, and in order to argue for
state funding in current climates, some form of economic analysis is
desirable, such as that based on use of other services before and after
the art therapy. Through research and evaluation that builds our
understanding of the contribution that museums and galleries can
make to art therapy practice, and the way in which this happens, the
art therapy profession can enhance its offer, and further demonstrate
its efficacy to service providers. 
40 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

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 CHAPTER 2

What Do Museums Mean?

Public Perceptions of the Purposes
of Museums and Implications
for their Use in Art Therapy

Ali Coles

Introduction
In this chapter, I explore how commonly held perceptions of
museums might affect clients’ experiences of art therapy in those
settings. These perceptions might impact on someone’s decision
about  whether to engage in museum-based art therapy in the first
place. In addition, a client’s attitudes towards the setting will be one
element in the complex interplay of factors affecting the therapeutic
process, particularly if the art therapy includes interaction with
museum objects and exhibitions, rather than simply the use of a
space within the museum.
A person’s attitude to a particular museum is likely to be affected
by any direct experience of that institution in the past, or of other
museums. However, it will also be influenced by consciously and
unconsciously held ideas about the nature and purpose of museums
in general. As Bollas (1992) points out, ‘If I visit the National Portrait
Gallery, this involves me with…a set of notions, feelings, internal
relations, and use-potentials evoked by the concept “museum”’
(p.34). Trustram (2014) uses the term ‘museum in the mind’ to refer

44
What Do Museums Mean? 45

to the ‘conscious and unconscious mental construct that a person

holds about a museum’ (p.69).
Museums carry different resonances from more traditional set­
tings for art therapy, such as clinical treatment centres. As will
be discussed in this chapter, ‘museum’ can be a highly evocative
concept, laden with historical, cultural and personal meaning, and
bound up with issues of power, inclusion/exclusion, trust and safety.
All these issues are, I suggest, relevant to therapeutic considerations.
It is important to remember that clients’ ideas about museums may
differ from the way art therapists think about museums, particularly
art therapists who work with museums, and from the way museum
professionals think about their institutions. In addition, clients might
find it hard to articulate their responses to the idea of engaging in
therapy in a museum environment; indeed, some responses may not
be in conscious awareness. Therefore, it could be very helpful for art
therapists to reflect on commonly held ideas about museums in order
to understand how clients’ attitudes towards museums might affect
their engagement in museum-based art therapy, and to facilitate
positive therapeutic outcomes. A clearer picture of how clients
might relate to museums will also further develop art therapists’
understanding of why, and how, museums can be valuable partners
in therapeutic work.
This chapter draws on the research by BritainThinks (2013),
entitled Public Perceptions of – and Attitudes to – the Purposes of
Museums in Society and carried out with adults in England, Scotland
and Wales. It had been recognised that ‘little is known about what
people think about museums in general and even less about their
perceptions of the role of museums and their impacts’ (ibid., p.7) and
this research sought to explore ideas about the roles and purposes of
museums in general, rather than personal experiences of, or attitudes
towards, particular museums. It is therefore very valuable for
identifying issues which can inform art therapy work in any museum,
and the findings have been used as the underpinning structure for the
discussion in this chapter.
The research was commissioned by the UK Museums Association,
which describes museums as ‘institutions that collect, safeguard
and make accessible artefacts and specimens, which they hold in
46 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

trust for society’ (Museums Association 2018a), encompassing art

galleries with collections of works of art, and this is the definition
I use in this chapter. The research involved six day-long workshops
with a total of 90 adult participants, carried out in rural and urban
areas. The participants were recruited to reflect the overall gender,
age, educational profile, occupational grouping and ethnicity of the
UK as a whole, and half of them had visited a museum in the last
year. The research process included activities designed to encourage
participants to adopt a ‘citizen perspective’ (BritainThinks 2013,
p.8), which meant eliciting views about the place of museums within
society and what the purpose of museums should be, rather than
more personal perspectives. The researchers used a combination
of open discussions and hands-on exercises, first facilitating the
spontaneous expression of perceptions, and then introducing other
potential roles and purposes for consideration. The researchers
did not seek to include a representative proportion of participants
with mental health or other difficulties which might lead them to
receiving psychological therapy; however, this may not have had a
significant influence on the findings, particularly given the focus on
general perceptions of museums rather than specific experiences.
This research was carried out in the UK, and perceptions of museums
will differ in other parts of the world due to cultural and historical
differences. Additionally, children’s perceptions may differ from
those of adults. However, I believe that the discussion in this chapter
will be useful for art therapists working in other parts of the world,
and/or with other client groups, when thinking about the interplay
between views about museums and experiences of museum-based art
therapy in their particular situations.

Positivity towards museums

The BritainThinks (2013) research found that, overall, there was
‘strong, positive emotional attachment to museums’ which did not
seem to be related to whether, or how often, people visited museums
(p.3). Any negativity towards the idea of a museum usually came
from people who had not visited a museum for decades, perhaps
What Do Museums Mean? 47

since  being at school, and this view was expressed in terms of

museums being ‘stuffy, aloof and boring’ (ibid., p.11). Most were
aware that museums have changed over the years and almost all
participants’ views became more positive when researchers provided
examples of modern museums.
If clients have a generally positive attitude towards museums, this
suggests that they might be receptive to the idea of a museum setting
for art therapy and to engaging with what they find there. This
should be an encouragement to art therapists who are considering
using museums in their work. Furthermore, a ‘strong, positive
emotional attachment’ to the idea of a museum (ibid., p.3) has echoes
of the concept of secure attachment (Bowlby 1982, first published
1969), the ideal relationship for exploration and growth. It may
not be too far-fetched to suggest that positivity towards museums in
general might be a helpful emotional framework for museum-based
art therapy, facilitating the development of a positive therapeutic
relationship between therapist and client, and between clients in a
group therapy situation.
At the very least, as Camic and Chatterjee (2013) point out
in their discussion of museum-based arts and health activities,
museums are ‘nearly always non-stigmatising settings in that they
are not institutions where diagnosis and treatment of medical and
mental problems occur, nor are they settings where one experiences
embarrassment, shame or criticism for attending’ (pp.66–67). Thus,
even if someone did not feel particularly positive towards museums,
he or she might be more inclined to feel enthusiastic about a museum
setting rather than a clinical setting for therapy, particularly in
communities where therapy is ‘associated with shame around illness’
(Salom 2011, p.81). Coles and Harrison (2018) cite evidence that cli­
ents of museum-based art therapy have valued being in a non-clinical
environment and, in their own findings, young adults in a museum-
based art psychotherapy group appreciated feeling like ‘a person
not a patient’ (p.123). Reflecting on their experiences of delivering
museum-based art psychotherapy, Coles, Harrison and Todd (2019)
consider that a museum’s status as a publicly accessible venue sends
a message to people who might have ‘withdrawn from society’ due
48 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

to their mental health difficulties that ‘you don’t have to be excluded

because of who you are or what’s happened to you’ (p.63).
However, some participants in the BritainThinks (2013) research
viewed museums as boring or aloof. This could be a result of
experiences from many years ago, as the research notes, or could be
thought about as an indirect expression of feelings of exclusion. For
example, Ander et al. (2013) found that some people who took part
in museum object handling sessions in hospital and inpatient mental
health settings ‘regarded museums as “not for the likes of me”’
(p.214) as they felt that they did not have the required intellectual
ability to interact with museum objects. This potential barrier to
engagement in museum-based art therapy could be explored with
clients in initial meetings, through describing the setting and how the
museum objects and environments will be used within the therapy.
For example, it might be important to reassure clients that they are
not expected to know anything about the museum’s collections, and
that the focus is on therapeutic rather than educational outcomes.
A client’s feeling of the museum being somehow ‘above’ them in
terms of intellectual status might also resonate with any feelings
that healthcare professionals are ‘superior’, perhaps due to having
specialist qualifications, and could exacerbate a sense of power
inequality between therapists and clients. While there may be value
in bringing in museum experts at times during the therapy, it seems
important for the therapists not to be seen as museum experts as
well as therapy experts. Coles et al. (2019) reflected on the value of
therapists exploring the collections alongside participants in museum-
based group art psychotherapy, with both therapists and clients ‘not
knowing’, rather than the therapists ‘having all the answers’ (p.64).
The idea of a museum being ‘aloof’ also has connotations of a lack
of care and concern, and it is conceivable that this might negatively
impact on the development of a positive therapeutic relationship
within that setting.
In addition, it is important to recognise that there is likely to
be a variation in attitudes towards museums between different sec­
tions of the population, at least in part due to the relative relevance
of museum collections and how they are presented. For example,
a street survey in London in 2004, in which 594 ‘visible minority
What Do Museums Mean? 49

ethnic people’ were interviewed (Tissier and Nathoo 2004, p.1),

found that 63 per cent of participants were either negative or
indifferent about museums. Subsequent focus groups of black and
minority ethnic (BME) museum non-users identified perceptions
that museums are for the ‘white middle classes’ and that they fail to
reflect, acknowledge or engage with BME groups (ibid., p.3). Despite
efforts by the museum sector to engage with specific communities,
including black, Asian and ethnic minority communities (Museums
Association 2018c), 14 years later UK Government figures showed
that white people were more likely to visit a museum or gallery than
people from other ethnic groups (Department for Digital, Culture,
Media and Sport 2018). The issue of relevance is explored later in
this chapter.

Museums as custodians of heritage

The BritainThinks (2013) research participants identified three es­
sential roles for museums. The most important role was considered
to be ‘safeguarding heritage’ and preventing museum objects from
‘being lost’ (ibid., p.12). This was deemed to be important even if
museum objects were never seen by the public. It is surely significant
for museum-based art therapy that the most important function of
museums to emerge from the BritainThinks (2013) research is the
care of objects, regardless of whether they are available for public use.
As Trustram (2014) notes, it seems that the construct of a museum
as a place of ‘preservation and permanence’ (p.69) has not been
significantly affected by the development of new museum functions
such as education and economic regeneration. Museums seem to hold
a ‘consistent meaning for our inner lives’ (ibid., p.69) despite the
growth of ‘blockbuster’ crowd-pulling exhibitions, museum shops
and cafes, and education and outreach programmes.
This idea of museums as places which take care of objects and
prevent them from being ‘lost’ (BritainThinks 2013, p.12) has power­
ful resonances with the role of the therapist within art the­rapy. At
one level, the art therapist provides ‘consistency of care’ for the client
(British Association of Art Therapists 2014, p.4) and ensures that the
client’s artwork is ‘safely stored’ (ibid., p.7). At a deeper level, there
50 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

are suggestions of ‘holding’ (Winnicott 1990, first published 1965)

and ‘containment’ (Bion 1994, first published 1962), which are key
to art therapy practice. Just as a museum ‘both holds (looks after)
objects and contains them (provides a structure that prevents their
loss or decay)’ (Froggett and Trustram 2014, p.490), the art therapist
creates a boundaried arena for the safe expression and exploration
of feelings and experiences. Ioannides (2017) talks of the ‘museum’s
ambience of safety and security’ and suggests that this allows visitors
‘to feel secure such that they can free their minds as they explore’
(p.104). Similarly, Silverman (2010) talks about museums providing
a sense of ‘ontological security’ because of the orderliness of exhi­
bitions (p.59) and Carr (2001) considers that ‘the museum holds
things in place for us, so our minds might move toward, surround,
look back at, consider and reconsider them’ (p.173); this ‘holding
in place’ has both temporal and spatial aspects when the museum
remains relatively unchanged between sessions. There are parallels
here with the therapist seeking to provide a consistent, reliable
physical environment for therapy and keeping client artworks safe,
perhaps for future re-viewing (Case and Dalley 2014, p.90), as well
as with the idea of holding a client in mind between sessions. Also,
in museum-based art therapy which involves moving between the
encounter with objects in the public exhibition spaces and reflective
art-making in private spaces, the endurance of the object between
sessions is mirrored in the way in which a client holds a chosen object
in mind so that it can act as a ‘psychological container’ even when
not physically present (Coles et al. 2019, p.60).
Schaverien (1999) discusses how the frames around artworks
in a gallery create a boundaried space which ‘permits potentially
unmanageable images to be contained’ (p.71), providing a rigid
structure that complements the freedom of the art expression con­
tained within. The display cases and other structural aspects of
non-art museum exhibitions could be seen as playing the same role,
creating a safe boundary around objects which might evoke powerful
feelings. These museum ‘frames’ echo the ‘therapeutic frame’, which
provides a safe, boundaried physical and mental space for clients
to share shameful or distressing thoughts, feelings and experiences
(Edwards 2014, p.51). The idea of containment and safety is also
What Do Museums Mean? 51

echoed in the larger ‘frame’ of the traditional museum with its grand
architecture, managed entrances and exits, security procedures and
watchful staff. A further layer of safety is provided by a museum’s
documentation, which maintains information about the museum
objects in accordance with defined procedures and standards, and
so helps to facilitate their care (International Council of Museums
Documentation Committee 2012). This has similarities with clinical
records, which hold data such as personal history and current symp­
toms in a clear and organised way so that each person can receive
safe and appropriate treatment.
However, a museum’s physical and procedural strategies for
keeping collections safe will not necessarily encourage feelings of
safety in clients of museum-based art therapy. For example, exhibition
elements such as glass cases and boundary lines on the floor which
demarcate zones of exclusion, preventing viewers from getting too
close to objects, may resonate with feelings of unworthiness or with
internal psychological processes of disconnection from feelings and
experiences. They might also evoke memories of locked wards and
restricted visiting hours in inpatient settings. The gaze of museum
staff may feel intimidating and lead to increased anxiety about being
‘under scrutiny’ by the therapist, and a museum’s grand architecture
could feel imposing or overpowering, and even suggestive of ‘old style’
psychiatric hospitals. In addition, the actual therapeutic frame can be
seen as more fluid in museum-based art therapy that involves moving
in and out of public exhibition spaces, and this might lead to clients
feeling less safe. Coles et al. (2019) state that in their experience of
using exhibitions within art psychotherapy groups ‘it felt as if there
was more emphasis on the psychological boundaries of the therapist
in holding the therapeutic frame’ and note ‘the practical steps we
put in place to make the work boundaried for the therapist as well as
for the participants, for example running the first few weeks of the
group solely in the private room using handling objects rather than in
the public exhibitions’ (p.61). They conclude that the ‘fluid museum
environment places demands on a therapist’s logistical organisation
skills as well as their psychological capacity to contain, hold and
integrate difficult feelings’ (ibid., p.64).
52 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Another aspect of safety in relation to museum purposes is ex­

plored by Pearce (1999), who considers that the documenting,
organising and storing of objects by museums is in tune with our
basic human need to make order out of chaos. This orderliness is in
stark contrast to chaotic lives which clients might be experiencing.
Pearce (1999) also notes that museum displays are often underpinned
by a linear sense of time, while traumatic memories can be ‘without
temporal narrative organization’ (Gantt and Tinnin 2009, p.150);
as Van der Kolk (2014) puts it, ‘the different sensations that entered
the brain at the time of the trauma are not properly assembled into
a story’ (p.194). Perhaps the way in which a curator works with
museum objects, organising, displaying and explaining them, can
be linked to the way in which a therapist might help someone give
expression to, make sense of and organise traumatic experiences.
It is particularly interesting that the BritainThinks (2013) re­
search suggests that people want museums to look after all the objects
within collections, even ones which will never be displayed. This
evokes the idea of an acceptance of the hidden, forgotten, unpalatable
or dismissed aspects of oneself by the therapist; maybe museums can
reassure us that our lives matter and that what has happened has
significance and will not be forgotten. The way in which museums
notice and value broken or incomplete objects could also resonate
with clients. Coles and Harrison (2018) explain that one museum-
based art psychotherapy client was encouraged in her attempts to
piece her life back together again by encountering a repaired pot on
display which had parts missing and visible joins. The broken pot
had been considered by the museum as worthy of painstaking care
and attention and ‘good enough’ for display, even with its scars and
imperfections. There are clear links here with the therapeutic process,
with its emphasis on respect, positive regard, self-acceptance and
recovery. Furthermore, Coles et al. (2019) consider that in museum-
based art psychotherapy the ‘ebb and flow between the private and
public spaces, and between the intimate and the more social relating,
could perhaps help someone to connect vulnerable and more robust
parts of themselves and encourage a more embodied, continuous
sense of self’ (p.64).
What Do Museums Mean? 53

Within the BritainThinks (2013) research, participants supported

the idea that museums can act as ‘society’s attic’ (p.15). Froggett
and Trustram (2014) consider that museums ‘enable communities to
hold certain objects collectively in mind’ (p.490), and this may also
apply to cultural concepts and understandings. The idea of a shared
heritage has possible implications for museum-based art therapy.
Salom (2011) suggests that relating to ‘collective imagery that offers
information about the human experience’ (p.83) might make someone
feel less isolated through drawing attention to ‘the commonalities
among human situations, emotions, difficulties, and achievements’
(p.84), linking this to Yalom’s (1995) group therapy principle of
universality. Thus, within museum-based group art therapy, a sense
of collective heritage might encourage interpersonal relating within
the group. Coles et al. (2019) talk about the museum as ‘a repository
of marks and traces of people over the centuries’ and suggest that
through interacting with an object one ‘becomes part of its story as
well…part of the community of that object’, and that this ‘might
help someone to see that their own narrative is connected to others’
narratives’ (p.61). However, a particular museum’s collection may
be more reflective of dominant cultures, with obvious implications
for clients who do not identify with those cultures, as noted above
in relation to different ethnic groups. It seems important to reflect on
this openly, while ensuring that this is done in a way which does not
increase any client’s feelings of marginalisation.

Museums as places for learning

Another essential role identified in the BritainThinks (2013) research
was that of providing information and learning for adults. If we
consider that psychological therapies involve learning about the self,
then the perception of a museum as a place for learning might make
it an appropriate and conducive setting for therapy. The participants
in the BritainThinks (2013) research spoke in terms of discovery and
exploration rather than education, which has even more resonance
with the process of learning about self within psychological therapy;
the idea that a visitor to a museum can ‘feel she is not being told
things so much as discovering them for herself’ in a ‘non-intrusive’
54 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

environment (Froggett and Trustram 2014, p.493) has strong echoes

of psychotherapeutic approaches. As Carr (2001) puts it, ‘The
museum offers its users an invitation to guide, connect, and construct
their own cognitive or emotional developments’ (p.179). In contrast
to this idea of a museum as a place for self-directed exploration and
learning, a clinical mental health setting might tend to encourage a
sense of ‘treatment’ given by an expert. Indeed, one museum-based art
psychotherapy client reflected that the museum setting made her feel
that she had been working on her ‘own personal goals’ rather than
just ‘going through treatment’ (Coles and Harrison 2018, p.123).
The BritainThinks (2013) research also identified a general
belief that museums can be highly trusted as ‘authoritative, reliable
and accurate’ repositories of information (p.13), linking with ‘the
Enlightenment ideal of the museum as a source of rationality’
(Trustram 2014, p.69). This perception of museums as reliable and
trustworthy may support museum-based art therapy, evoking aspects
of the therapeutic alliance which is associated with positive therapy
outcomes (Heynen et al. 2017). Furthermore, museums were seen as
unbiased and as ‘presenting all sides of the story’ (BritainThinks 2013,
p.3), suggesting that they are suitable places for issues to be looked
at, thought about and considered. Edson (2015) notes that museums
‘represent one of a diminishing number of institutions in which it
is acceptable to think, debate, and to disagree’ (p.9) and considers
that the fundamental attributes of museums include honesty, the
promotion of critical thinking and enhancement of open mindedness.
According to the Director of the UK Museums Association, reflecting
on symbols of discrimination, racism and oppression, ‘Museums are
exactly the safe and trusted places where difficult histories can be
discussed’ (Heal 2017), and there is a hint here of the psychological
‘environment’ which an art therapist seeks to encourage. Bedford
(2004) notes that museums offer ‘new perspectives and the chance
to see the world through others’ eyes’ (p.5), echoing processes that
are at play in art therapy groups. This is encapsulated in Salom’s
(2011) idea of the ‘museum as group’, in that museum collections
can demonstrate both diversity and commonality, and Ioannides
(2017) considers that museums are ‘symbols of uniqueness and
What Do Museums Mean? 55

tolerance towards differences’ due to the diversity of their collections

(pp.104–105).
However, a view of museums as rational and factual might
conflict with an art therapist’s attempt to encourage tolerance of ‘not
knowing’, uncertainty, ambiguity and paradox. In fact, as Fleming
(2016) points out:

All museum messages are the creation of the people who work at
the museum…every comment they make is an opinion that could
be opposed; every object they choose to display is loaded with
meaning; every decision to omit something from display could be
disputed. (p.74)

The choice of objects and how they are presented and interpreted
is a subjective decision, so that ‘curatorship is a relational activity’
(Froggett and Trustram 2014, p.494). At one extreme, museums
have sometimes been deliberately used by those in power as vehicles
for strongly partisan views and attitudes. More subtly, museums
may have misrepresented or omitted aspects of heritage, such as
that relating to black and minority ethic communities. Some are
now reinterpreting their collections so that the contribution that
marginalised people have made to society is acknowledged; for
example, the Victoria and Albert Museum in London has an LGBTQ
(lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer) Working Group which
aims to ‘unearth previously hidden or unknown LGBTQ histories
in the collections’ (Victoria and Albert Museum n.d.). It is also true
that museums have, historically, appropriated cultural property in
exploitative ways. Clients may feel strongly about these aspects of
museums, and this will impact on their sense of museums as places
that can be trusted or not. Art therapists working in museum settings
might choose to actively challenge the ‘myth of neutrality’ (Janes
and Sandell 2019, p.8), using this as a way in to exploring feelings
around knowledge, certainty, trust, power (and abuse of power) and
difference. For example, the realisation that a museum that presents
itself as an objective authority is, in fact, a vehicle for opinion might
resonate strongly with people who have experienced certain types
of emotional abuse. In this context, therapists’ transparency about
56 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

the subjectivity of their reflections in relation to clients would seem

particularly crucial.

Museums as places for play

The third essential role identified by the research participants was
providing entertaining education for children as part of a school or
family group. The perception of museums as places for children to
be entertained is likely to include the notion of play. How might this
perception affect adult users’ potential for play in the museum setting,
and what are the implications for museum-based art therapy with
this client group? Coles and Harrison (2018) found that a museum
setting which included hands-on exhibits enabled playfulness among
young adults in a museum-based art psychotherapy group, and
that this aided the formation of relationships within the group. In
Winnicott’s view, playing facilitates ‘growth and therefore health’
(2010, first published 1971, p.56). At a more fundamental level, art
therapy has drawn heavily on the idea that psychotherapy itself ‘has
to do with two people playing together’ (ibid., p.51, original italics),
and that play can be a form of communication in this context. Coles
et al. (2019) felt that a museum setting might make it easier for
therapists to be playful alongside clients, ‘all experiencing something
for the first time together’ (p.63). Perhaps, therefore, the idea of a
museum as a playful place can help the therapist in the essential
work of ‘bringing the patient from a state of not being able to play
into a state of being able to play’ (Winnicott 2010, first published
1971, p.51, original italics) and to play together with clients, in a
psychotherapeutic sense. This is in line with the Winnicottian idea of
cultural experience as an extension of ‘creative living first manifested
in play’ (ibid., p.135). However, in the context of museums, it is
recognised that people ‘come with their own values and ideas about
how they should behave in public space’ and that they ‘sometimes
need encouragement that “it’s ok to play”’ (Derry n.d., p.12).
A client might feel that it is not acceptable for adults to play in a
museum, or that only children benefit from playing, and might need
support from the therapist to develop their motivation and ability to
be playful in this setting.
What Do Museums Mean? 57

Museums as accessible and inclusive

Underpinning the research participants’ views about the key role
of museums was strong support for accessibility and inclusivity,
including towards people seen as vulnerable. Within art therapy,
the concepts of accessibility and inclusivity are key. Art therapists
seek to ensure that every client has maximum physical, sensory and
cognitive access to the therapy, and to adhere to principles of dignity,
equality and non-discrimination (Health and Care Professions
Council 2013). It is therefore encouraging that the public applies
these ideals to museums. Within museums, however, these qualities
take on a different aspect as they can contribute to addressing social
exclusion (Sandell 2003); as ‘places that embrace social inclusion’,
perhaps museums can offer ‘a supporting structure’ for challenging
discrimination (Ioannides 2017, p.108). By working towards in­
clusive participation and representation in culture, museums can
play a part in helping marginalised people to participate in society
more generally. At the same time, integrating social action with art
therapy practice (Kaplan 2006) perhaps calls for new types of setting
for art therapy. Perhaps, however accessible or inclusive a clinical
therapy setting might be, it is intrinsically a place for people set apart
by ill-health.
It is interesting to consider the public’s view that museums
should be accessible and inclusive in the light of Doering’s (1999)
idea of museum visitors as strangers, guests or clients. Doering
(1999) considers that visitors can be conceptualised as strangers (or
even intruders) when the museum sees its main responsibility as the
collection rather than the public, as guests when a museum wants
to ‘do good’ to visitors from a sense of mission, and as clients when
the museum’s main focus is on serving the public. The stranger will
feel unwelcome, unlike the guest or client. Guests and clients will
be welcomed into the museum, but guests might feel that this is a
privilege granted by the museum, while the client might see this as
an entitlement. Doering (1999) notes that museums were, at that
time, moving towards a position of being accountable to the public,
in line with the concept of visitors as clients, and this expectation of
accountability is now enshrined in the UK Museums Association’s
ethical guidelines (2018b). In relation to museum-based art therapy,
58 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

it is likely that a sense of being a client of the museum, with the

right to be there, will be most conducive to engagement. There are,
of course, clear parallels with the use of the term ‘client’ within art
therapy, referring to someone choosing to make use of services which
are available to them. Alternatively, someone might feel like a guest
if the therapy involves free admission, visits out of normal opening
hours, special access to museums staff or collections, or a designated
room which is not normally used by the public, and this could help
them to feel valued (Shaer et al. 2008; Ander et al. 2013; Coles and
Harrison 2018).
Although the BritainThinks (2013) research found a public per­
ception that museums should be accessible and inclusive, in practice
some museum-based art therapy clients might feel that they do not
belong within the museum setting. This could be a result of feeling
unwelcome or unworthy when visiting museums in the past, or of
a more generalised sense of rejection and low self-worth. Exploring
how clients see their relationship to the museum would be helpful
in ensuring that they gain maximum therapeutic benefit from the
therapy and could also inspire more general reflections on how
they see themselves in relation to others and the world at large. This
could be done at an initial meeting phase, encouraging the client to
reflect on how it might feel to be attending the first museum-based
art therapy session, and perhaps explored further during the therapy.

Museums as under threat

Finally, the research found that there was a ‘widespread perception
that the future of museums is threatened’ by decreasing visitor num­
bers, budget cuts or new technologies (BritainThinks 2013, p.26).
Many museums in the UK are under great financial pressure; the
Museums Association (2017) reported that ‘at least 64 museums in
the UK have closed since 2010 – the vast majority due to public
funding cuts’ (p.4). Clients of museum-based art therapy might be less
likely to experience the setting as a place of safe, continuous ‘holding’
if they know, or believe, that the museum is struggling to make
ends meet. Alongside this, a feeling that museums are undervalued,
disregarded and vulnerable might resonate with a client’s internal
What Do Museums Mean? 59

world, exacerbating feelings of neglect and potentially feeding into a

sense of not getting ‘good enough’ care from the therapist.
A sense of a museum being ‘under threat’ could also connect
with someone’s deep-seated feelings of fear. Clients might, of course,
have the same concerns about funding of health services, with similar
implications. However, museum closures have the additional factor
of the ‘loss’ of collections (at least in terms of public access to those
collections in that particular museum) and if we think about museums
as places that contain our collective memory, at a societal level, then
fear of collections being ‘lost’ could be associated with a fear of
losing part of our collective sense of who we are. At an even more
fundamental level, Trustram (2014) considers that the permanency of
museums serves as a ‘defense against our anxieties about mortality’,
assuring us that ‘despite death, life will continue’ (p.69), so that an
anticipated or actual museum closure could resonate with a client’s
fears around death. Exploring any anxieties around the survival of
the museum in which an art therapy intervention is based would seem
to be essential in order to maximise the possibility of therapeutic
work based on feelings of security and trust.

Conclusion
In this chapter, I have considered the possible implications for museum-
based art therapy of various perceptions about museums held by adults
in the UK. Many of these perceptions resonate with key therapeutic
principles of holding and containing, trust, exploration and learning,
play and acceptance, and I feel that this is an encouragement to art
therapists who are seeking to utilise museums within their practice.
Perhaps a museum is well suited to contributing towards the ‘creative
and containing environment’ which art therapists need to provide
for effective therapeutic work (Health and Care Professions Council
2013), and reflecting on these perceptions of museums with clients
might help to activate these therapeutic principles within the therapy.
I have also identified how views about museums could be harnessed
within museum-based art therapy for the exploration of issues such
as knowing and not knowing, care and neglect, fear, abuse of power,
and difference and diversity.
60 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

These resonances between the UK public’s ‘museum in the mind’

(Trustram 2014, p.69) and important aspects of art therapy practice
mean that partnerships between museums and art therapy can be
‘particularly fruitful’ (Silverman 2010, p.45). However, to return to
the idea that the concept of a museum evokes a set of ‘use-potentials’
(Bollas 1992, p.34), the general notion of a museum held by adults
in the UK, as explored in the BritainThinks (2013) research, does
not yet include a psychological therapy role. For this to become a
commonly perceived ‘use-potential’, there will need to be an increase
in museum-based art therapy practice, along with a sharing of
information about this work with the wider public. A greater recog­
nition of the therapeutic value of museums would, in turn, further
enable engagement by clients and ensure that the partnership of
museums and art therapy continues to bear fruit.

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 CHAPTER 3

Making Space Safe at

Modern Art Oxford 
Mary Chamberlain 

Introduction 
I am a qualified art therapist and have worked for many years as a
creative art practitioner (rather than an art therapist), using some
of the therapeutic principles gained during my training. My creative
practice involves working with vulnerable people and teaching art in
environments that feel relaxing and trustworthy. A huge focus of my
work is creating safe spaces (internal and external) for group work.
During this chapter, I examine concepts of ‘safe spaces’ in my work
as a creative art practitioner with Modern Art Oxford, a 50-year-old
public institution for contemporary art. The name of the group at
Modern Art Oxford is Making Space Safe and the work is a pilot
venture of Modern Art Oxford Associate Artists, set up in response
to a perceived need for therapeutic art practice in a public gallery. As
well as offering my own perspective, I draw on an evaluation of the
project (Radermacher 2019) which explored whether the project had
achieved its objectives; how a safe space was created and experienced;
and how the project could be improved. 
I am interested in exploring themes inherent in the title of the
group itself – Making Space Safe. I have thought about the name of
the group – about each word separately and then joined. Making.
Space. Safe. Making Space. Space Safe. Making Safe. These three

63
64 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

words and their interactions hold within them the vision and goals of
this art group for refugees and asylum seekers. In this chapter, I focus
on the physical space that the group meets in. As Papadopoulos
(2002) states, ‘The most basic form of therapy for individuals who
are functioning at a very basic level (at a given period in their life)
is the provision of a safe and reliable environment’ (p.23). It is this
that intrigues me – how to set up and establish a provision with
an overt focus on creating a sense of safety within a creative and
cultural organisation, and what, if any, difference the setting makes
to attendees. 

Background to the group 

The group was set up in October 2016 and members are referred by
external partners: Asylum Welcome, Refugee Resource and Sanctuary
Hosting. I am supervised by Dr Michael Korzinski, previously
co-founder and clinical director of the Helen Bamber Foundation
(HBF), and currently working as an independent psychologist and
psychosocial expert. He specialises in work with the victims of com­
plex trauma, including victims of torture and gender-based violence
(especially in conflict-affected areas), trafficking and slavery.
Arriving in Oxford in 2014, having previously run a successful
weekly art group at HBF in London for six years, I was keen to
see if a similar creative art group existed there. My former group
at HBF met in the premises of this therapeutic organisation and
referrals to the art group were made by HBF clinicians. Occasional
creative partnerships and trips to cultural institutions such as the
British Museum, Tate Modern and Kew Gardens complemented our
programme of work.
I found there was no group of this kind for refugees and asylum
seekers in Oxford so decided to establish one. The challenge of
setting up a group in a new city almost from scratch seemed to me
like having blank canvas, with opportunities of choice about the
physical, psychological and theoretical space in which we might
meet. Having previously run a group for many years at HBF, I had
a successful template in mind that I was keen to draw on and adapt,
where needed.
MAKING SPACE SAFE AT MODERN ART OXFORD 65

Choice of physical setting for

Making Space Safe 
Options for a physical space where the group could meet included
an open space in the foyer of a well-known refugee agency and a
private room in another refugee agency. Initial clients were already
very familiar with both these spaces and felt in some way ‘known’
in these settings where clinical, legal and practical work took place.
The alternative was to base the group in a cultural and creative venue
where the group setting would encourage dialogues around art and
the making of artwork and what it is to be an artist, rather than an
individual’s legal or psychological status as a refugee or asylum seeker.
It was this that strongly appealed to me, to work under the aegis of
a cultural and creative venue and team, and house the work there,
offering clients the experience of belonging to a group in another
type of space. Modern Art Oxford, with its strong reputation for
engagement and learning activities and location in the city centre,
was my home of choice for this group.
As can sometimes be the way, my enquiries to Modern Art Oxford
coincided with the gallery wishing to look strategically at how it might
become more engaged with different groups and communities within
Oxford and the surrounding areas. Work using art with vulnerable
people such as refugees and asylum seekers is specialised, requiring
the practitioner to have a high degree of sensitivity, understanding
and experience of working with therapeutic boundaries. The gallery
created a new scheme entitled ‘Associate Artists’ for this strand of
engagement work. My group became the first pilot group to be run
under this strand and I became the inaugural Associate Artist at
Modern Art Oxford. I stress this, as it highlights two aspects of my
involvement with running the group at Modern Art Oxford. First,
as a creative art practitioner, having the bespoke role and title of
Associate Artist endowed me with a personal sense of safety and
being valued, which in turn enabled me to work towards creating a
safe space for the group. Second, the kudos of working under such
a title helped to enact some of the process I wished my group to
experience: the sense that they were being valued and given space at
a leading creative cultural organisation in the city centre. There was
also a sense of excitement and timeliness about the dialogue for
66 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Modern Art Oxford as this was the first time it had worked with
refugees and asylum seekers in this way, offering a regular and fixed
place in which to make art within a project that had longevity, and
where the group was a closed one with participants referred by
external referring agencies.  

Associate Artists scheme at Modern Art Oxford 

From the gallery’s point of view, the project represented a vital and
specialised way to engage with a vulnerable population within the
city and surrounding countryside, who might not otherwise think
to access its building. Modern Art Oxford is renowned for being
experimental and bold in its curatorial programming. Its Associate
Artists scheme was similarly devised to be bold, working with
invited artists who specialise in the development of creative skills
for specific groups of vulnerable people and/or with protected
characteristics. This strand of work has developed and grown since
my initial engagement with Modern Art Oxford. There are currently
three Associate Artists working with a range of groups, including
vulnerable young people and prisoners and their children, and the
groups enable people who may be isolated and vulnerable to engage
with art-making and the city’s cultural offering. Associate Artists
fundraise for their own projects initially and then, ideally, the project
becomes embedded into the gallery’s core funding streams. Funding
for Making Space Safe came from private donors, Oxford City
Council and the Network for Social Change and the gallery provided
the room for free. As well as providing support in kind, the gallery
also provided financial support during intermittent periods in the
pilot phase when the project was lacking in external funding. 
Another vital aspect of Making Space Safe that came through
strongly in the evaluation is my attitude and manner as Associate
Artist, leading the sessions and creating a safe space. Although I am
not practising as an art therapist, my training in art therapy under­
pins my practice as a creative art practitioner and enables me to
create a sense of trust that has little to do with the physical space.
In my work, I have the opportunity to combine my skills as an
artist with my therapeutic training and ‘hold’ a group of people,
some of whom have experienced extreme trauma, enabling them to
MAKING SPACE SAFE AT MODERN ART OXFORD 67

create artwork of which they are proud. My role involves creating a

physical and psychological space where group members can explore
and discover their creative voice as well as exercise autonomy over
which art materials they will use, or which subjects they will depict.
The interplay in my role between creative art practitioner and artist
with a training in art therapy is echoed by the external collaboration
between a contemporary art gallery and the various therapeutic
refugee agencies who refer participants to the project. 

Description of the group 

About 20 people have participated in the Making Space Safe group
since it started. Participants are men and women from a range of
different countries including Kurdistan, Afghanistan, Syria, Kosovo,
Malaysia, China and several African countries, and are mostly aged
between 20 and 45 years. Prior to their arrival in the UK, they may
have witnessed or experienced displacement, torture, genocide, rape
and other human rights abuses. People are referred to the group for
many reasons – as a stepping stone to assist their integration into the
community, as a place of respite and relief from mental or emotional
pressure, to make friends and reduce isolation, or as an impetus to
learn new things and gain artistic skills. Among the participants there
is often a great range of familiarity with their own art-making process
and experiences of being part of a group. To date, an assistant has
been present for about half of the sessions. The Making Space Safe
assistant has a background and training in the visual arts and is
experienced in running art groups with refugees and asylum seekers.
Their role is to set up the space and ensure safe storage of artwork,
help with teas and coffees, support the creative activities, and assist
in facilitating a safe and secure environment.
Sessions run for 90 minutes and terms are structured very loosely
along the lines of school terms with an autumn, spring and summer
term and corresponding holidays and half-term breaks within these.
The group aims to be inclusive and welcoming, regardless of artistic
skill and experience. Some group members study art in their own time
outside the sessions and teach themselves further skills via YouTube,
while, for others, it is enough to make it along each week. I have
found that if participants return following an initial taster session,
68 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

they usually attend regularly each week for at least six months or so.
One of the group members has been attending for 18 months.
Participants can choose whether to attend each session and when
to arrive and leave. I like to think that there is a sense of freedom
and care within the whole process. Group members have a sense of
being able to come and go as they please, and that is important, but
if they choose not to attend, their absence is acknowledged without
judgement to ensure they know they are missed when not there. This
element of choice and agency of participants was highlighted during
an evaluation interview with one of the referring agencies:

The fact that participants are made aware that they’re free to

come when they can and feel comfortable doing so and there are
no repercussions to missing a class is helpful. As when a partici­
pant is unable to come to a session they feel confident that they
can come the following week without there being any problems
and they will be welcomed and supported. (Radermacher 2019)  

Giving traumatised and displaced individuals the opportunity to

take part in an art group in a contemporary art gallery, based on
principles of a safe space, brings with it possibilities for recovery.
While traumatic experiences can lead to a sense of frozenness, I
believe that art has a quality of movement inherent within it. Van
der Kolk (2014) says that ‘trauma robs you of the feeling you are in
charge of yourself’ (p.203) and ‘recovery from trauma involves the
restoration of executive functioning and, with it, self-confidence and
the capacity for playfulness and creativity’ (p.205). The making and
exhibiting of art bring variation and choices to participants whose
lives might be on hold while in this country, while they may be
unable to work and are waiting for resolution of their status. I liken
my approach to teaching a language: first the vocabulary of different
materials, then devising sentences and paragraphs, before going on
to enable group members to discover their own creative process and
artistic voice. My work has the sense of the ‘present continuous’
about it, involving exploring, developing, learning, creating, erasing,
undoing, recreating; the process is an ongoing and unfolding one,
held within a geographical and psychological safe space. One of the
referring agencies touched on this in the evaluation interview:
MAKING SPACE SAFE AT MODERN ART OXFORD 69

It’s developing something else, it’s being creative, isn’t it? It’s sort
of enabling people to wake up something inside because you
know a lot of our clients spend a lot of time trotting in between
the different crisis agencies and this is a safe space between all of
those. (Radermacher 2019)

Herman (1992) speaks of how ‘the first principle of recovery is the

empowerment of the survivor. She must be the author and arbiter of
her own recovery’ (p.133). Within the art group, each participant
must make artwork for themselves. No one else will intervene to
draw a line for the participant – indeed, it is one of the group rules
not to draw or paint on each other’s work and to use another piece of
paper if you want to demonstrate something. The whole principle
of the art group is based on the empowerment of the individual and
enabling them to create artwork, and discover and enjoy a quality of
agency and control in their lives. As Wertheim-Cahen puts it:

The activity of the art process itself, involving doing something

with your hands and body, offers at least moments in which
the asylum seeker regains power over his own life however
momentarily, and enables some to have an aesthetic and therefore
a positive experience. (Wertheim-Cahen 1998, p.52) 

We have ‘group rules’ or codes of behaviour, from the logistical such

as, ‘Please clean up your own brushes’, to the emotional such as,
‘Please treat others with respect even if you don’t agree’. In this way,
the rules aim to create an internal locus of safety both individually
and collectively for the group. The group is reminded of these rules
at the start of each term and every time a new member joins. These
boundaries operate to keep people safely in, and also to keep people
safely out; over time, staff at Modern Art Oxford have learned to
understand and respect the work and be sure not to enter the space
when a session is running.

The referral process 

Much of the focus of setting up the group was on developing and
liaising with our partners over the referral form for Making Space
Safe. Conversations mainly revolved around whether there was a need
70 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

for a form, strengths and weaknesses of running an open or closed

group, and organisational logistics of who would fill in the form.
In an initial session with my supervisor, looking at creating
the group and getting it off the ground, he used the analogy of
building a house. We thought about the vital importance of a robust
referral mechanism, operating similarly to the walls of a house and
protecting the inhabitants. The referral form is completed by referring
organisations, who appreciate its simplicity. It was devised to focus
on the individual’s relationship with art-making and the best way
to contact them. Questions include: whether the participant attends
other classes or has attended any classes previously; the participant’s
familiarity with art materials; what their expectations are for the
group and whether they have any goals they would like to achieve;
whether they have an interest in art galleries and museums; and the
referee’s reason for making the referral.
Having referral forms which are filled in by partner organisations
helps to ensure that the referral has been thought through by the
referee and endows the process with a sense of care. The referral
is almost always accompanied by a phone call with the referee in
which we briefly discuss the reason for the referral. The process is a
relational one, and there is trust and mutual appreciation of skills that
have been built up over time. The referral process is not necessarily
a mechanism to screen out potential participants, but rather one by
which I can find out more information about participants so that I
am better able to respond to their needs, as well as a way of building
relationships with the referring agencies. I have yet to turn down a
referral and would, at the very least, speak with my contact who
made the referral to understand their rationale if it seemed unclear.
Some referring agencies have taken to this referral process well,
whereas others would prefer a more fluid approach where clients
can drop in as and when they wish. This is not appropriate with
Making Space Safe because of the need to create a stable and secure
environment for all members of the group. 

The setting of Modern Art Oxford 

In the evaluation, referring agencies described the gallery as being
‘quite a calm and quiet place’ in which to run the sessions. This is in
MAKING SPACE SAFE AT MODERN ART OXFORD 71

contrast to refugee agencies’ premises, which can be more chaotic due

to the urgent nature of some of the work they undertake. The cen­
trality of the location was also mentioned by all the external referring
partners, as the gallery is easy for participants to find and travel to. I
feel that having such a prime central Oxford location in which to meet
sends out a powerful message to attendees of being valued. This is
echoed in the internal space; physical storage space is in great demand
within the gallery, but we have been given use of a shelf within a
secure cupboard for storing our materials and artworks (Figure 3.1).
I point this out not only to demonstrate how the creation of a
safe space operates on many diverse levels, from the micro to the
macro, but also for the political nuances that being given dedicated
space might carry. There is a political aspect to dialogues of space
when working with people who have been dispossessed. A South
African artist is quoted as saying, ‘It’s all about space… Claiming
art is reclaiming space’ (David Koloane quoted in Deliss 1996,
p.265). Although my group is named Making Space Safe, it could
equally be named ‘Reclaiming Space, Safe’. When people have been
dispossessed and the land they consider to be their home has been
removed from them, the physical backdrop to a therapeutic group
becomes of interest and forms part of the landscape of the group.

Figure 3.1 Making Space Safe shelf within the storage cupboard
72 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

The art gallery environment 

The art gallery environment points to qualities of beauty and wellbe­
ing. De Botton (2007) writes of how ‘we depend on our surroundings
obliquely to embody the moods and ideas we respect and then to
remind us of them. We look to our buildings to hold us, like a kind
of psychological mould, to a helpful vision of ourselves’ (p.107).
There can be a duality of aesthetics in a modern-day gallery; walls
are normally white, artificial lighting bright and natural light often
muted or dimmed in order to display artwork to best advantage. A
creative, professional and corporate ambience is prioritised in some
public spaces in order to appeal to potential funders or for venue hire.
On the one hand, from the point of view of a creative art practitioner,
credence and authority are given to the work by having a ‘cool’ space
to meet in – a space that conforms to the current received wisdom of
a modern art gallery aesthetic with white walls, vinyl black lettering
on signage and minimal visual clutter. On the other hand, this
aesthetic can have negative associations for the specific client group
of refugees and asylum seekers; the bare starkness of the white,
the brightness of the artificial light and a lack of ‘comfort’ might,
at worst, be reminiscent of detention centres or suggest a distinctly
foreign environment.
Feedback from the group, however, indicates that members like
the space where the group is held – they think of it as a studio, and
as a place to exhibit work. One member has spoken of how it made
her feel important to walk through the gallery doors to attend the
group. So, it seems that even if the typical aesthetics of a modern art
gallery may verge on the clinical, there is potential for creativity and
encouraging the mindset of an artist. In fact, Modern Art Oxford
was formerly a brewery and has, to my mind, a sense of external and
internal warmth resulting from its original purpose as an industrial
space for ‘making’. 

The Project Space at Modern Art Oxford 

Since Making Space Safe began in October 2016, we have mostly met
in a room called the Project Space (Figure 3.2). This can function as
a public space but can also become a private area. It is on the ground
MAKING SPACE SAFE AT MODERN ART OXFORD 73

floor near to a main entrance, the shop and cafe. Overhead strip
lights cast a warm light and create a well-lit space. The art supply
cupboard is located in one corner, and the door to the workshop
where brushes and art materials can be cleaned at the end of class is
situated in the other corner. Although not an ideal art-making space
as it is windowless, the space has provided, to my eyes, a warm and
secure environment to make work in. The secure nature of the space
was picked up on by gallery staff in the evaluation; ‘The physical
space itself provides a safe space of quiet’ and ‘The actual physical
space, the room, is quiet and removed from other activities, making
it a safe space where participants know they won’t have to interact
with unknown people on the periphery’ (Radermacher 2019). Given
the aims and objectives of the project – to make space safe – the
physical characteristics of the room were significant. 

Figure 3.2 The Project Space (photo credit: Stu Allsop)

The room is a good size, with the option of placing the two trestle
tables in different positions. Both tables are set up and art materials
laid out in advance to create a sense of welcome and an invitation to
create within the room. By setting up the room in advance, we make
sure that the space is in a state of readiness for the participants’ arrival.
74 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

However, there is a flexibility on offer with the set-up, and I am keen

to understand where group members feel most comfortable in the
room to make their artwork. To help encourage familiarity with, and
ownership of, the space, I have asked group members where in the
space they would like to make their work, encouraging them to walk
around the room and examine what it feels like to inhabit different
parts of it. So far, the choice has been to place the tables in the far
corner, giving the members a little privacy as well as physical space
in the room, a space within a space (Figure 3.3). When asked why, a
group member said that he liked it because of ‘how it feels’.

Figure 3.3 ‘Our’ corner in the Project Space

The space is sometimes empty, other than our trestle tables, chairs
and art materials, and at other times we have shared the space with
a current exhibition. On the occasions we have shared our space
with an exhibition, I have yet to see any member of the group go
towards, pick up a related item, or engage with the show. We may
have conversations about the current exhibitions, all of which are
free to enter and easily accessible from the Project Space, but most
participants do not choose to visit them. I am unclear about why
there is little engagement with the exhibitions during the sessions,
and there may be many factors at play. One possible reason is that
MAKING SPACE SAFE AT MODERN ART OXFORD 75

the focus of the group is very much on participants making their own
artwork and being in the present – the ‘here and now’. 

The basement at Modern Art Oxford 

Modern Art Oxford has prioritised the use of the Project Space by
the group. However, at times, logistics have demanded we meet in
the basement area, a space on the ground floor accessed via steps
from the cafe (Figure 3.4). A sign is placed at the head of the stairs
when we meet there stating that a session is in progress and that the
stairs should only be used for getting to the accessible toilets and
baby-changing facilities.

Figure 3.4 The basement space

This space is dimly lit and is an area used for live music and ex­
perimental artwork. Bachelard (1964) writes of the cellar as being
‘first and foremost the dark entity of the house, the one that partakes
of subterranean forces’ (p.39). This basement area is a public space
at a gallery (rather than a house) and thankfully does not quite have
that quality, yet I am mindful of the connotations that a basement
may have for a group as a place where objects are stored and can
become discarded, and even as a place of incarceration.
76 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Since the start of 2018, due to changes to the museum building,

we have temporarily moved to this basement space. The table,
chairs, art materials and group leader are the same but the spaces are
palpably different. The lighting, the placement in the building, the
privacy and the size of the two spaces differ enormously. As in the
Project Space, I have placed the table and chairs in a corner to make
a space within a space and to give some separation from the members
of the public who need to come through to access the toilet and baby-
changing facilities. To my surprise, the feedback from the group has
been entirely positive regarding the move to this space; they told me
that this space is ‘okay’ and ‘the same’ as or ‘similar’ to the Project
Space upstairs.
The natural and built environments have a profound impact
on our health and wellbeing. Within healthcare, access to daylight,
fresh air and natural materials aids healing, restoring the integrity
between mind, body and soul. Patients and staff alike appreciate
health and social care environments that are well designed and
animated by the arts (All-Party Parliamentary Group on Arts, Health
and Wellbeing 2017, p.11). Perhaps due to past experiences of not
getting the help they need, participants may be so grateful for what
is provided to them that it is hard to express a negative opinion of a
space, facilities or group. It may be that they are seeking to reassure
themselves, or me, that the work can continue as before in this new
space, or that they might be fearful of losing what they have if they
voice objections. Another possible explanation is that the fabric of
the group is made up of more than the four surrounding walls, and
that the group’s perception of itself is based more on relationships
and trust and the artwork which is made than the physical setting.
Perhaps there is a perception of the venue for the group being the
whole space of Modern Art Oxford, the larger building; whether
accessing a private room by a main entrance, like the Project Space,
or a darker, downstairs space like the basement, the group is still at
Modern Art Oxford. 
It will be interesting if this basement space becomes the preferred
one at the gallery. To my mind, it has fewer associations with the
more traditional ‘white cube’ gallery-type space. According to Brian
O’Doherty (1986), ‘A gallery is constructed along laws as rigorous
MAKING SPACE SAFE AT MODERN ART OXFORD 77

as those for building a medieval church. The outside world must not
come in, so windows are usually sealed off. Walls are painted white.
The ceiling becomes the source of light’ (p.15). Continuing with the
ecclesiastical theme, Thomas McEvilley (in O’Doherty 1986), speaks
of how ‘In classical modernist galleries, as in churches, one does not
speak in a normal voice’ (p.10). Perhaps this spacious basement area,
often used for gigs, lends itself to a more relaxed environment that is
a little freer. Although access is given to the public for baby-changing
and toilet facilities, in a sense this space is more private, tucked away
as it is. 
There is a need for caution and an awareness of cultural specificity
when looking at different areas and rooms. Whereas I perceive the
dimness of lighting in the basement as being a negative factor in a space
required for making artwork, I must be wary of assuming that group
members feel the same. Tanizaki (2001) writes about the value of a
certain level of dimmed lighting for accentuating beauty, illustrating
the need for the creative art practitioner to try to understand how
groups relate to spaces rather than make assumptions: 

And so it has come to be that the beauty of a Japanese room

depends on a variation of shadows, heavy shadows against light
shadows – it has nothing else. Westerners are amazed at the
simplicity of Japanese rooms, perceiving in them no more than
ashen walls bereft of ornament. Their reaction is understandable,
but it betrays a failure to comprehend the mystery of shadows.
(p.29)

The importance of a safe and

therapeutic creative space 
Van der Kolk (2014) speaks of how ‘being able to feel safe with
other people is probably the single most important aspect of mental
health… For our physiology to calm down, heal, and grow we need
a visceral sense of safety’ (p.79). Creating that visceral sense of safety
for the art group requires a variety of external elements to be put
in place. Feedback given in the evaluation by one of the referring
agencies highlighted the importance to clients whose lives can be ‘so
chaotic and unboundaried’ of ‘having that regular rhythm of being
78 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

able to go to that place, as part of the structure of their week, and

somewhere where they can sort of get lost in their work and get away
from their troubles’ (Radermacher 2019). 
Part of the safety created for the group is a sense of my reliability.
Part of this is my weekly contact with group members outside the
class, sending reminder texts or emails the day before each session.
My intention is also to try to give them a feeling that someone is
being mindful of both them and the group between sessions.
As I am the lead artist running the workshops and the key liaison
link with our various partners, my own sense of safety and support
is fundamental. To this end, I have a variety of important support
structures in place. I have regular contact with the Curator of Creative
Learning and Creative Learning Assistant at Modern Art Oxford and
am assisted each week by an art group assistant who was interviewed
and selected for the role. As an external Associate Artist, I value that
my work has a psychological home within the organisation, as well
as a physical space. I also receive regular supervision from a psycho-
social practitioner, which is vital in order to address my own needs
and concerns as they arise.

Conclusion 
Callaghan (1998) provides a précis of the accumulative effects on
body and mind of the experiences of many asylum seekers and
refugees, including the sense of exile; the loss of ‘home’; the un­
certainty and anxiety brought about by the (prolonged) wait to
discover the outcome of their asylum process and whether they
will be allowed to remain in the UK; separation from families; and
financial, physical and emotional stress. Making Space Safe provides
a regular space within the city centre that is held and supported
by a carefully thought-out structure and team of skilled and caring
professionals – a space which can provide a sense of attention, of
being seen and cared for, and within which the participant can have
agency and a sense of control over artistic choices and decisions. This
is a group which has been built up over time with mechanisms and
procedures in place to allow clients to create, heal and flourish. The
project brings together a variety of organisations to create a vital,
creative and ultimately safe environment for attendees.
MAKING SPACE SAFE AT MODERN ART OXFORD 79

Making. Space. Safe. I conclude by returning to where this chapter

started, with a focus on these three words. Within this chapter, I
have attempted to look at some of the elements involved in basing
the group in a ‘making’, creative organisation such as Modern Art
Oxford, giving a background to the relationship and looking at some
of the nuances of holding the group in an art gallery. I have focused
on ideas surrounding ‘space’, concentrating on the physical spaces
we have used and how these might affect the group. Finally, I have
detailed some of the internal and external structures that make up
this work, looking at how they might create a sense of safety for
attendees of the group.
In Making Space Safe I have the privilege of witnessing people
joining the group and experiencing the space, often for the first time.
I also witness group members using their autonomy and experiencing
a variety of art materials, trying out new things, learning what they
like and do not like, and ultimately exploring and seeing if this space
might be one in which they want to stay for a while – a safe space. 

References 
All-Party Parliamentary Group on Arts, Health and Wellbeing (2017) Creative
Health: The Arts for Health and Wellbeing (second edition). Accessed on
15/7/19 at https://www.culturehealthandwellbeing.org.uk/appg-inquiry/.
Bachelard, G. (1964) The Poetics of Space. London: Penguin.
Callaghan, K. (1998) ‘In Limbo: Movement Psychotherapy with Refugees and
Asylum Seekers.’ In D. Dokter (ed.) Arts Therapists, Refugees and Migrants:
Reaching Across Borders. London and Philadelphia, PA: Jessica Kingsley
Publishers. 
De Botton, A. (2007) The Architecture of Happiness. London: Penguin. 
Deliss, C. (1996) Seven Stories about Modern Art in South Africa. Paris and
New York, NY: Whitechapel/Flammarion. 
Herman, J.L. (1992) Trauma and Recovery. New York, NY: Basic Books. 
O’Doherty, B. (1986) Inside the White Cube: The Ideology of the Gallery Space.
San Francisco: The Lapis Press. 
Papadopoulos, R.K. (2002) ‘Refugees, Home and Trauma.’ In R.K. Papadopoulos
(ed.), Therapeutic Care for Refugees: No Place Like Home. The Tavistock
Clinic Series. London: Routledge. 
Radermacher, H. (2019) Making Space Safe: An Evaluation. Melbourne:
Radermacher and Associates (unpublished). 
Tanizaki, J. (2001) In Praise of Shadows. London: Vintage Books. 
Van der Kolk, B. (2014) The Body Keeps the Score: Mind, Brain and Body in the
Transformation of Trauma. London: Penguin
Wertheim-Cahen, T. (1998) ‘Art Therapy with Asylum Seekers: Humanitarian
Relief.’ In D. Dokter (ed.) Arts Therapists, Refugees and Migrants: Reaching
Across Borders. London and Philadelphia, PA: Jessica Kingsley Publishers. 
 PART 2

Art Therapists
Working with
Museums and
Galleries
 CHAPTER 4 

From Isolation to Relation

Reflections on the Development of
Museum-Based Art Therapy in Russia

Nana Zhvitiashvili

Introduction 
In recent years, the role of museums in wellbeing and healthcare has
been redefined. Paradigms have shifted in the last two decades as
museums have moved away from a position of ‘authority’ and adopted
more open and integrated approaches to working in dialogue with
their audiences (Barrett and Tapia 2003). I have previously worked as
a museum curator developing therapeutically minded programmes,
and I now work as an art therapist integrating the cultural resources
of museums into my clinical practice. What follows is a reflection
on my use of museums as therapeutic environments in Russia, an
early example of the bringing together of museums and art therapy
approaches, and key factors for effective work. I will also review the
similarities between my roles as an art therapist and museum curator.

Developing ‘museum therapy’ in Russia after

the collapse of the communist regime
Due to the political and economic turmoil after the collapse of the
communist regime in Russia in the early 1990s, The State Russian
Museum in St Petersburg, the largest national art museum in the

82
From Isolation to Relation 83

country, significantly reconsidered its mission and began experi­

menting with new forms of educational work. The museum had to
address fast-changing cultural, political and social landscapes in a
newly reformed society of freedom of speech. Functioning under the
ideological pressure of the government of the Soviet Union for more
than 70 years, museums had limited freedom to curate collections and
engage the public; as state-funded institutions, they were guided by
rigid regulations imposed by the regime. Throughout Soviet museum
history, there were attempts to address the relationship between
museums and their audiences. For instance, museum experiments
from 1932 to 1935, initiated at The State Historical Museum in
Moscow, focused on the apperception (the mental process by which a
person makes sense of an idea by assimilating it into past knowledge
and experience) of diverse young audiences. These experiments were
stopped abruptly by the 1936 Decree issued by the Central Committee
of the Communist Party, which accused museum curators of ‘quasi-
scientific and harmful perversions of museum pedagogy’ (Yukhnevich
2001, p.23). Almost all innovative programmes were banned for a
few decades under Stalin’s repressive regime. From the 1950s to the
1960s, the Khrushchev era during which repression and censorship
in the Soviet Union were relaxed (the so-called ‘Thaw’ period),
museums remained a conduit of political education. Within this
politicised model, the content of educational work was reductionist
– museums served as illustrations of political doctrines. The collapse
of ideological rule and emergence of new liberties in the early 1990s
led cultural institutions to redefine their relationship with the public.
One of the key questions posed was: how can museums operate
more as people-focused institutions? Simpson (1996) summarised
the position in the 1990s:

It is time that museums undertook a re-appraisal of the funda­

mental philosophies upon which they currently operate, to re-
evaluate and re-focus their roles in the light of contemporary
social thinking, so reflecting in their policies and practices the
recognition of other peoples’ world views and rights with regard
to the ownership, representation and interpretation of material
culture. (p.266) 
84 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Museum education was the first domain of museum work to res­

pond to societal transformations by offering new opportunities to
interpret art in a wider context and connect it to the life experiences
of the museum audience. In the light of the political changes in
Russia, museum educational and curatorial practice began to deal
with new concepts such as representation, power, cooperation and
interpretation. Intense distrust of mega-narratives of the Soviet era
with its standardisation of knowledge led to a problematisation of
the museum as a central tool in regulating cultural politics. Russia’s
difficult transition from totalitarianism to democracy (the Perestroika
phase, 1985–1991) manifested in reforms declaring freedom of
speech, political pluralism, modernisation of economics and new
relations with the West. However, by 1991 the loss of centralised
control and the government’s inability to facilitate these changes led
to the collapse of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). The
consequences of this political event were devastating for the majority
of Russian citizens: accelerated impoverishment of the population,
high level of unemployment and extreme nationalist conflicts.
In the early 1990s, I belonged to the generation of young
professionals who felt empowered by the changes happening in post-
Soviet Russia. In 1990, as a curator at The State Russian Museum, I
led the team that organised the first exhibition in Russia featuring art
by people with disabilities, including those with learning disabilities,
visual impairments and cerebral palsy, and people with autism and
mental health problems. In the process of collecting artworks for
the exhibition, we encountered a hidden reality: most people with
‘special needs’ (the term we used at the time), young and old, had
been living in special care homes away from the public, isolated and
forgotten. The exhibition, Through Different Eyes, opened in 1991
and provoked heated debates about such ‘hidden histories’ and the
potential for museums to be places where the unrepresented and the
misrepresented can have a voice.
Foucault (2009, first published 1961) describes how the creation
of disciplinary institutions (such as psychiatric hospitals) was a me­
thod of exercising control over ‘madness’ by power systems. Care
homes and psychiatric hospitals in the Soviet Union were used
by the regime to restrict and sometimes persecute the ‘unwanted’
From Isolation to Relation 85

in society. For me as a curator, it was essential to discuss the place

of disabled and mentally ill people in Russian society, giving them
a chance to demonstrate their creativity, reflect on their experiences
and reveal the truth about their marginalisation. Rather than
thinking that museums should be neutral and non-biased spaces, we
felt strongly that it was our responsibility to initiate a radical shift
in the understanding of the need for wider integration of people on
the margins of society, and also to encourage museums to address
their role in the process. In 1913, Fedorov, one of the key figures of
Russian pre-revolutionary philosophy, defined museums as ‘supreme
institutions of unity’, preserving social memory and responding
to changes in the world (1995, first published 1913, p.21). This
statement is still relevant now, more than one hundred years later;
museums as public arenas can articulate the most difficult societal
dilemmas and invite the public to discuss them. As Dodd and Jones
wrote in 2014: ‘Health is increasingly recognised as a societal issue,
linked to multiple and complex factors, persistent inequalities such
as social and economic deprivation, and lifestyle’ (p.3). One of the
key questions that emerged from the exhibition was: ‘How can we
give marginalised people the means to share their experiences in a
way which supports their creative development and enhances their
social integration?’
Later, having established contact with our museum colleagues (for
example, at The Royal Castle in Warsaw and The Slovak National
Museum in Bratislava as well as American museums), we realised
that our initiatives were part of transformations happening across
the museum sector in Eastern Europe, with a particular focus on
widening access and dismantling barriers for previously marginalised
audiences. Due to all the changes that have happened since the 1990s,
we can now see a very different cultural landscape. Treadon, Rosal
and Thompson Wylder (2006) refer to two important elements of
current museum education discourse: first, ‘the power of art objects
to elicit feeling and meaning in addition to stimulating appreciation’
and second, that ‘the profile of a museum attendee must be expanded
to include those from various socioeconomic classes, cultures, and
ability levels’ (p.290). 
86 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

The experience of the exhibition Through Different Eyes led us

to create a year-long trial project for people with disabilities, which
then developed into a long-term programme. The format of the work
was interactive discussions in the museum exhibitions followed by
art-making in the studio. Partnerships were formed with two sectors,
education for people with special needs and the social care sector; we
initially worked with young people with learning disabilities (aged
16–18). The programme started within a framework of educational
activities; however, due to the combination of the professional skills
of a psychologist who used art as an integral part of her practice and
an artist/art historian (curator), it incorporated strong therapeutic
elements from the beginning. Art therapy as a profession did not
exist in Russia in the early 1990s but during the time of Perestroika,
American and European art therapists introduced clinical art therapy
practices to Russia and ran various training programmes, enabling
us to think about the use of art therapy in the museum framework.
We began questioning the outcomes of our practice – growing self-
esteem, positive social experience and acquisition of new skills by
the participants – and realised that they could be attributed to the
therapeutic nature of our sessions.
The numerous challenges we experienced in our work from
1990 until 2000 helped us to formulate some of the fundamental
principles which would inform our practice for the next ten years. It
became essential to examine the barriers that prevented progression
of the programme on a regular basis, both within the museum
(understanding the needs of each audience group, establishing reflec­
tive practice procedures, articulating outcomes, educating museum
staff), as well as outside (funding, forming partnerships, defining and
disseminating good practice). The barriers that we were trying to
overcome were of a physical, intellectual, cultural, attitudinal and
financial nature. From a conceptual point of view, it was important
for us to establish a clear distinction between museum education and
museum-based therapy. It was equally important to advocate new
ideas of museum art therapy as an evidence-based practice within the
museum community. 
From Isolation to Relation 87

Museum-based art therapy work

with young people with learning
difficulties – a brief case study
I will focus on a case study of work with a group of young people with
learning disabilities, undertaken in the 1990s. Despite a convincing
body of publications on art therapy with children and adults with
learning difficulties (Rees 1998; Bull and O’Farrell 2012; Critchley
2016), there remains a lack of rigorous research on museum art
therapy with this client group. I (as a museum curator) ran the
groups with the psychologist Olga Platonova, who was employed
by the museum specifically for this project.  We had received brief
art therapy training provided in Russia by American and British art
therapists. Due to the emergence of a new museum paradigm with
no precedents of therapeutically minded work to rely on, our ethos
and theoretical understanding were based on an eclectic model which
incorporated ideas from museum education, psychology of art, art
therapy and the concept of disability adopted in Russia at the time.
In 1991, we formed a partnership with one of the orphanages for
children and young people with learning difficulties in St Petersburg.
We worked with a group of 12 young people, boys and girls aged
17 and 18. In the process of collaborative work with the staff we
established that our group of young people experienced difficulties
with social interactions and emotional regulation and had high levels
of anxiety due to insecure attachments and deprivation in early
childhood, and that their use of language was limited. We created
a year-long programme in partnership with their carers and other
specialists, within which young people contributed their own ideas to
planning and delivering the activities. The project aimed to encourage
social adaptation and creative rehabilitation: due to changing socio-
economic conditions, young people with learning difficulties were
able to interact more actively with the wider social context. The
young people were preparing to move into an adult care home, a
significant forthcoming change in their lives, and we focused on the
idea of transition and how we could cope with that individually and
as a group.
88 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

After a series of preliminary discussions with the carers, we

concluded that the museum environment could help the young
people to adapt to a wider social context and break the cycle of social
isolation. Special attention was given to the process of preparing
young  people for their museum visits: meeting with them at the
orphanage, discussing their expectations, giving them a detailed
step‑by-step plan of their museum journey in a visual format. They
visited the museum fortnightly with their two carers and engaged
in group discussions in the museum exhibitions followed by studio-
based art-making. Due to their previous isolation in the orphanage,
the group found the introduction to the new environment both over­
whelming and exciting. At different stages of our work we addressed
the concept of ‘transition’, drawing on the young people’s ability to
gradually adapt to the museum and studio space and to internalise
this experience.
We tried to involve carers as much as possible in order to model
interactions with the group for them. As the level of control and
restrictions from carers created inhibitions for young people in their
verbal and emotional expression, it was important for us to shift
negative anticipation to constructive, positive expectations, which
supported young people’s ideas and made them feel valued. This
‘triangular’ relationship between young people, their carers and the
museum team triggered essential discussions about autonomy and
dependence, fears and risks, and continuity and disruptions. It also
provoked useful debates with the orphanage staff about conven­
tional models of teaching for young people with learning difficulties,
which were often directed towards cognition, thinking function
and practical skills, overlooking the role of emotional literacy,
creativity and imagination. The relations between museum and care
system played an instrumental role in reaffirming for the carers the
importance of creative elements in education, and to a certain degree
challenged the established hierarchical structures of power between
young people and their carers.
We drew on a model of engaging with art collections that reflects
the progression from ‘associations to appropriations’ (Rasanen 2003,
p.184). Rasanen’s model is based on a triangle:
From Isolation to Relation 89

1. Expression and skills – bridging personal and social knowledge

of the viewer with the cultural knowledge mediated by the
artwork (reflections).
2. Facts and ideas – a stage of enquiry when an artefact is
approached using art historical and critical methods, under­
standing the meaning of the work in its historical context
(conceptualisation).
3. Perceptions and emotions – a stage when the viewer is moving
into making his or her own artistic response to museum work
(production) (Rasanen 2003, p.184).

This incorporated a diversity of forms of activity, from a multisensory

approach (touching, smelling, looking, listening) which would assist
with associations, to role play, movement and storytelling. This
combination of different approaches helped us to work with young
people with varying linguistic skills and to develop the relational
aspect of the group. Looking together at museum artworks and
sharing feelings was an important part of the entire process; this
joint attention can be characterised by a set of behaviours, including
sharing of attentional focus and affect around a common object
(Isserow 2008). Isserow (2008) refers to early proto-communication
between a mother and a child, stating that ‘the external behaviour of
joint attention can be seen to be determined by the infant’s internal
capacity to see himself as separate from a whole object as well as
able to think triadically about the inter-relationship between objects’
(p.37). From our observations, it seemed that for young people who
had been deprived of maternal care from birth, joint looking was a
phase of re-creating some of the essential processes which they had
never experienced in their infancy.
In our sessions, we also utilised a narrative approach, which
assisted the young people in keeping the focus on the artefacts and
maintaining a sense of personal continuity. As their personal history
was fragmentary – they rarely had their life story in photos, or
memories of their family members – we used gradual exposure to
artefacts which revealed stories and preserved memories to enable
them to talk about themselves and validate their experiences. Our
sessions were accurately documented (photo and video documentation
90 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

with consent) and young people were able to create visual diaries of
their museum journey. Narrative work can contribute to continuous
development for children and help to ‘mend the things that are broken’
(Bausch cited in Gunaratnam and Olivier 2009). Thus, the use of
museum spaces with rich cultural content that lends itself to different
types of storytelling and interpretation can have a restorative power.
Initially, the young people did not listen to one another, were
inhibited in their choices of art materials and lacked confidence to
find their voice in the discussions. When we talked about feelings,
most members of the group found it extremely difficult and descended
into a ‘freeze’ mode. This resembled a human response to a stimulus
perceived as an imminent threat, and made us aware of the survival-
oriented reactions of these young people in the new environment.
Their level of concentration did not allow them to stay focused on
the artwork for more than five to ten minutes.
After a few months of working with the group, we held a
museum session which seemed to be pivotal for the dynamics of our
interactions. The group focused on a well-known painting by Russian
marine artist Ivan Aivazovsky called ‘The Ninth Wave’ (1850) (Figure
4.1), which depicts a sea after a night storm and a small group of
people attempting to save themselves by clinging to the debris of a
wrecked ship. The colour palette and the composition do not give
the viewer a definitive answer about the outcome of this drama; the
painting is open to interpretations, and the viewer may use the visual
and verbal, analytical and intuitive modes (Barrett 1994). In Russian
art history, this is an iconic image and it encapsulates the dramatic
tensions of human struggle against the enormity of nature’s force. The
title refers to an old sailing expression meaning a single and decisive
wave, larger than the others, which threatens to engulf people.
The ambivalence of this painting inspired the group to speculate
about possible scenarios of either death or survival, and to use their
imagination to identify with the characters on their journey. We
incorporated sensory, drama and artistic forms of expression within
the boundaries of the therapeutic process, and the use of different
modalities channelled communication in the group and enabled
members to talk about their strong feelings. The fear, anger, hope and
sadness that emerged in the group resonated with the overwhelming
From Isolation to Relation 91

life changes the young people were facing at the time, in moving
into adult care. This intense experience of engaging with the museum
artwork played a transformative role in the dynamics of the therapy
and served as a catalyst for establishing a more cohesive group. 

Figure 4.1 Ivan Aivazovsky, ‘The Ninth Wave’ (1850), oil on canvas,

© State Russian Museum, St Petersburg 

Gradually, the young people felt safe enough to experiment with

new types of behaviour, balancing between being autonomous of and
dependent on the group, articulating their thoughts and feelings and
experimenting with art-making. Their concentration and attention
spans increased and their communication skills improved. The social
aspect of the group, which occurred outside their usual environment,
proved to be beneficial for the teenagers, increasing their adaptability
to new situations. The group format allowed young people to be
seen and heard by their peers. The role of peers becomes important
for adolescents and often replaces the family as the primary support
group, especially in the context of an orphanage. For young people
with learning difficulties, the question of negotiating their autonomy
and finding their voice in light of moving on to the new adult care
home became of existential importance.
92 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

In the course of our work with this group, and subsequent

engagement with other client groups over the next ten years (1991–
2001), we established some of the key factors which determined, in
our opinion, the efficacy of museum-based art therapy (Zhvitiashvili
and Platonova 2000). These are outlined below.

1. Establishing partnerships 
We now perceive museums as places that contribute to social co­
hesion and that can act as catalysts for cultural and social change.
However, working in partnerships with other sectors requires the
constant negotiations of shared goals and expectations. It was vital
to acknowledge the role of partners as it is unrealistic to think that
the museum can have any significant impact on social inclusion on
its own. The nature of our collaboration with a number of non-
governmental organisations as well as hospitals, orphanages and
educational institutions was consultative, focusing on specific aspects
of each project. We realised the benefits of employing the skills,
experiences and contributions of people from different professional
backgrounds. Prolonged marginalisation and institutionalisation of
the target groups created a degree of resistance among professionals
towards engaging with museums, and so establishing trusting, long-
term relationships and continuity of work were the key factors in the
formation of working partnerships.

2. Interpreting museum collections

from multiple perspectives 
Using museum resources in a more integrated way and creating new
ways of establishing the dialogue between people and art collec­
tions was central to our work. When working with an artefact, one
cannot reduce it to a simple summary of its technical or historical
elements – it triggers a complex process of projections and responses
(Osorina and Nekrasova-Karateeva 1998). Collaborative ‘curator-
psychologist’ work facilitated the process of experimentation, which
led us to the use of a museum art therapy model: it unified physical,
emotive and cognitive elements. This model can be described as
gradually moving through different stages of visual thinking: the
From Isolation to Relation 93

‘contact’ stage – the first encounter with an artefact, collecting

and processing observations, which may include kinaesthetic and
multisensory aspects (for instance, people can use their body to express
responses to the artwork); the ‘orientation’ stage, which entails in-
depth examination of different aspects of the artefacts (colour,
forms, composition, themes), viewers testing ideas contextualised by
art historical knowledge and articulating emotional responses with
reference to their life experiences; and finally the ‘meaning-making’
stage, when the therapeutic format encourages participants to trust
their own process in formulating thoughts, insights and ideas. At
this final stage, the process may culminate in art-making, through
which people can internalise their experience and achieve a degree of
symbolisation. The enhanced capacity to think symbolically suggests
a gradual transformation from experiencing the world as concrete
and two-dimensional to seeing it as a psychologically animated and
extended space (Isserow 2013).

3. Introducing reflective practice 

Our museum team devised two modes of reflective practice: a small
working group that met on a fortnightly basis (including our colleagues
from the education department), serving an almost supervisory
function; and termly seminars with larger groups, involving museum
educators, artists, psychologists, and representatives from hospitals,
social care, education and parents’ associations. The latter groups
debated a wider range of issues related to the social integration of
disabled people, which resulted in a series of publications. These
ongoing discussions were instrumental in reshaping the established
approach of the museum towards people with disabilities, such as the
museum imposing its values and knowledge on the audiences rather
than giving them a chance to select suitable modes of interaction.
We learned the importance of moving from a ‘museum-centric’ to
an ‘audience-centric’ model, integrating the voices of the people we
worked with right from the planning phase of each project. Collab­
orating with different disciplines was not always easy, but by taking
this opportunity for reflection, definition and growth, we broadened
our perspectives and kept our new audiences’ needs in focus. 
94 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

4. Identifying evaluation tools

Finding meaningful evaluation tools was a challenging task. There
was pressure from the museum to find qualitative and quantitative
evidence to demonstrate that museum-based art therapy programmes
were effective. One of the methods, alongside more traditional ones
(such as observations, questionnaires and facilitated discussions) was
video and audio recording of our interactions during the sessions.
We developed a list of seven behaviours by participants (including
us) that we thought would indicate active engagement, interaction
and a level of change (some of them are: making comments about
art, creating connections with prior experiences, engaging in group
interactions, demonstrating new levels of understanding and engage­
ment, exercising creativity). It could be a time-consuming exercise;
however, this type of evaluation was beneficial in assessing the
quality of changes for the groups we worked with as well as for the
museum staff. The carers were also involved in observing changes in
the young people at their orphanages or care homes, which helped us
to understand what was going on outside the museum. 

5. Fostering integration
At one point in our programme development we focused our efforts
on integration, aiming to bring young people with disabilities and
young people from mainstream education together. We started or­
ganising week-long workshops twice a year, ‘From monologue to
dialogue’, where young people (with and without disabilities) were
able to meet and engage in a creative process. For five days, a multi­
disciplinary team of professionals (museum educators, artists, art
and music therapists, musicians and actors) worked with young
people, using different art forms (movement, drama, art, music)
and taking inspiration from the museum’s collection (Figure 4.2).
The end product was an exhibition or a performance. With consent
from all the participants, these events were presented to the local
community and contributed to establishing a wider acceptance of
integrative practices, confronting the segregation of certain groups.
It was important to address issues related to group dynamics, such
From Isolation to Relation 95

as setting boundaries, conflict resolution, and accepting differences.

The psychodynamic framework of these groups served as a holding
environment and provided safety and support as well as enhanced
social contact, which members could take at their own pace.

Figure 4.2 Painted sculptures. ‘From monologue to dialogue’ workshop (1997)

96 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

6. Focusing on the visual in the art

museum and linking it to art therapy
In the art museum, we encounter a pictorial, rather than textual,
model of the world. The visual format of representation played a
significant role in assisting the young people in ‘activating and re-
experiencing emotions through the act of seeing’ (Chaney 2001). The
way we consume and process information is increasingly based on
a visual format, and visual representation of ideas, especially in art
museums, is now gaining more importance as a tool for building
group cohesion, enhancing engagement and triggering creativity
(Housen 2007; Yenawine 1999; Zinchenko 2006). This museum-
based art therapy programme provided a platform for creative inter­
ventions, which led to better integration of the skills and resources
of both cultural and social sectors. For instance, carers started to use
drawings with young people with learning difficulties as a way of
reflecting emotional states.

7. Educating museum staff and sharing skills 

Initially, we encountered resistance and criticism from our museum
colleagues in the professional community. This response could have
been attributed to a number of factors, including anxiety related to
their lack of understanding of this audience group, negative attitudes
towards people with disabilities and disbelief that there could be
effective outcomes. These tensions prompted us to think about
education for museum professionals and we introduced experiential
training programmes for those who intended to start museum-based
art therapy programmes. Some of the museum initiatives ended up
being ‘inclusion and access’ programmes, which led to debates on
how to distinguish between museum-based art therapy programmes
and those which provide wider access to marginalised audiences. One
might ask: ‘What is the difference/similarity between educational
and therapeutic practice?’ Waller (1993) has debated the similarities
and differences between art teaching and art therapy, referring to
the historical links of the two disciplines. She points to the fact that
they overlap when teachers use therapeutic insights to teach children,
and art therapists facilitate artistic experimentation. Our museum
From Isolation to Relation 97

team strongly believed that through both processes we participate

in creating spaces (both physical and intellectual) that support
dialogue and integration. In the next section, I will draw on my own
dual experience as a curator and as an art therapist to discuss the
similarities and differences between the two professional positions.

Dual perspective – as an art therapist

and as a museum curator 
Since the 18th century, the definition of a curator, who assembled,
maintained and interpreted museum objects, has been transformed.
Now the role of the curator is to revitalise the dialogical potential of
the museum and to comment critically on the relationship between
reality and representation (Schubert 2000). As a museum curator
in the 1990s, I collaborated with a psychologist who practised art
therapy as a primary mode of work but did not have any museum
work experience. By bringing our diverse skills together we were
trying to establish common ground and negotiate the differences in
our approaches. Hawley Reagan (2017) points out that there is a
lack of research which considers the different attempts ‘to translate
principles from the field of art curating into art therapy practice’
(p.1). A number of art therapists have written about the subject:
Gilroy (2008), for example, suggests a view that art therapists can
enrich their practice by incorporating their implicit knowledge of art
history and art-making in their work. She reflects on the role of the
curator as an ‘interpretative bridge’ (Gilroy 2008, p.260) between
an artist and their audience, and focuses on the importance of the
social context of production for art and art therapy. Marxen (2009)
parallels concepts from contemporary art with art therapy practice,
referring to relational aesthetics, the concept formulated by cultural
theorist Bourriaud (1998) when artistic forms are given to social
intervention and relation.
Hawley Reagan (2017) made a systematic attempt to address the
connectivity between the two disciplines, using grounded theory to
establish the link between art therapy and art curating. As an art
therapist, she analysed the changes in the museum field which led to
the emergence of participatory, process-based and audience-focused
98 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

approaches in the last 20 years. She outlined principles which would

be equally applicable to art therapy practice and a curator’s practice,
including creation of multiple points of access, an emphasis on
experiences of the objects in the museum context, and a focus on
trust in the non-linear process of art. She wrote:

Similar to curating art exhibitions by beginning with a familiar

piece, art therapists have also used familiar images as a starting
point. Art therapists often employ images from art history or
techniques inspired by famous artists as a point of access to
engage clients and enrich their experience with art therapy.
(Hawley Reagan 2017, p.44)

Some of her findings resonate with my experience and I will briefly

discuss the ideas which, in my opinion, would equally inform both
an art therapist’s and a curator’s practice. 

1. Engaging people
Current curatorial practice dismantles the ‘authoritative’ model
of museum communication with the audience and replaces it with
another model, which can be characterised as ‘process-oriented’,
that is, based on collaboration of all the participants of museum
interactions. A growing body of research supports the link between
cultural attendance and public mental health. Bygren et al. (2009)
conducted a large-scale study to ‘ascertain the possible influence
of attending various kinds of cultural events or visiting cultural
institutions as a determinant of survival’ (p.65). They established
that cultural attendance contributes to a higher quality of life and
recommended that it should be an integral part of any public health
policy. For instance, they found ‘a higher mortality risk for those
people who rarely visited the cinema, concerts, museums, or art
exhibitions compared with those visiting them most often’, leading
to the conclusion that attendance of cultural events ‘may have a
beneficial effect on longevity’ (Bygren et al. 2009, p.70).
O’Neill (2010) comments on the outcomes of this study in the
UK context: ‘Social prescribing, art therapy and community art
projects should have providing inductions to mainstream cultural
From Isolation to Relation 99

services as a core aim, so that people’s capacity to use these on their

own is enhanced’ (p.26). He gives all-encompassing practical re­
commendations, including ‘an efficient and easily accessible method
by which public health and voluntary organisations could refer
people to cultural institutions’ (O’Neill 2010, p.27). Empirical and
evidence-based examples in literature (Huet 2011; Peacock 2012;
Ioannides 2014; Coles and Harrison 2018) suggest that museum-
based art therapy projects can frame the entry experience in a way
that enables participants to feel valued and connected and gives
people confidence to encounter unfamiliar opportunities, as well as
deepen their pre-existing interests and experiences.

2. Creating narratives and communicating

ideas through objects
There are similarities between the symbolic, historical and cultural
value of museum objects and the use of objects in a psychothera­
peutic context. Greenblatt (1991) describes a museum as a ‘memorial
complex’ (p.46), a cultural machine ‘that generates an uncontrollable
oscillation between homage and desecration, longing and hope­
lessness, the voices of the dead and silence’ (p.48). This relates to
Freud’s idea of suppressed memory (1958, first published 1914). The
museum presents not only objects, but also ideas, emotions, stories
and interpretations related to the objects. Uncovering and presenting
the hidden meanings of an artefact through curatorial practice
resembles the therapeutic process of bringing unconscious material
into consciousness and familiarity. The evolution of the perception of
an object from the phase of the ‘transitional object’ (Winnicott 1971)
to complex symbolic interpretations not only signifies the formation
of personal cultural experience, but serves as a prerequisite to the
development of the self. Froggett and Trustram (2014) apply object
relations theory to museum practice and illustrate how the capacity
for reflection and symbolisation can be enhanced by engaging with
artefacts: ‘Museum objects have been described as functioning as
symbols of identity, relationships and social group… By internalising
a relation to objects we become subjects with distinctive capacities
for relatedness in which we can accept a world of other people’ (p.5).
100 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

In a systematic review of material objects in the context of

psychological theory, Solway et al. (2015) refer to the use of transi­
tional objects ‘in the service of projects originating in the inner
world’ (p.5), dwelling on Winnicott’s work Playing and Reality.
Winnicott (1971) describes the location of cultural experience in the
‘potential space between the individual and environment’ (p.100).
In the context of museum practice, Jordanova (1989) concludes that
‘The “knowledge” that museums facilitate has the quality of fantasy
because it is only possible via the imaginative process…objects are
the stepping-stones towards fantasies, which can have aesthetic,
historical, macabre or a thousand other attributes’ (p.23).

3. Belief that generating meaning

is a collaborative effort 
In recent museum developments, the experience of the viewer/visitor
has been placed at the centre: the viewer who is making their own
meanings, controlling the extent of their engagement and creating
connections with their own life experiences. Contemporary museums
invite the public to speak for themselves in order to ‘maintain their
legitimacy as public institutions’ (Thumim 2010, p.293), and curators
and educators facilitate this process through various means. Thumim
(2010) talks about the ‘valorisation of emotional experience’ in the
museum context, concluding on the basis of case studies that the
discourse of self-representation invokes a therapeutic discourse as
much as a democratic one (p.302). Message and Healy (cited in
Thumim 2010) advocate for the centrality of emotion in the museum
experience, explaining that visitors’ experiential accounts are offered
as trustworthy because they do not claim to be objective. Shaer et al.
(2008), writing about an art therapy-based intervention at the Tate
Britain gallery for people with long-term mental health conditions,
reflect that the project promoted the gallery ‘as a place that welcomes
the individual’s personal thoughts on any of the works’ and signalled
that insight that ‘does not only come from experts and personal
experience can be as illuminating as historical knowledge when it
comes to interpreting art’ (p.26).
From Isolation to Relation 101

In art therapy, meaning emerges through the therapeutic rela­

tionship, enhancing the client’s sense of agency. The provocative
question posed by art critic and writer John Berger (1972, p.32),
‘To whom does the meaning of art of the past properly belong? To
those who can apply it to their own lives, or to a cultural hierarchy of
relic specialists?’ is now being answered by the museum community
through inviting visitors to make sense of their museum experiences,
and offering visitors physical and digital platforms to share their
views, to complement art historical knowledge.

4. Containing: a multiplicity of
different levels of interactions 
If we consider the cultural space as a ‘container’ of material and
non-material values, we can see how within its framework the per­
ception of such fundamental values as tolerance, personal dignity,
self-actualisation and the development of creative activities are
taking shape. It seems that there are certain similarities between
the containing function of the museum and the therapy space. The
containing function of the museum is not only of a physical nature
(preserving objects and presenting them to the public), but also of a
symbolic nature, enabling viewers to share culture in a safe environ­
ment and hold it in their minds. ‘Holding’ (Winnicott 1971)  or
‘containing’ (Bion 1984, first published 1962) is central to the process
of therapeutic work as it resembles the early pre-verbal relationship
between mother and infant, which later forms a child’s ability to
symbolise psychic events. Froggett and Trustram (2014) talk about a
containing museum as a place where cultural experience is located,
enabling visitors ‘to discover for themselves objects that symbolise
personal experience’ (p.12).
Both museum and art therapy spaces can facilitate visualising,
processing and even reconciling conflicting thoughts and narratives.
However, it is debatable whether museum curators can hold
emotional responses from the most vulnerable clients as effectively
as art therapists, who are professionally equipped to accommodate
different levels of interactions with a client. Killick (2000) considers
102 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

that ‘the core anxieties evoked in this journey towards relatedness

require experiences of containment before change is possible’ (p.113).
I want to emphasise the importance of the containing function at the
institutional level as well as in the wider community; structure and
support become essential factors for the work to be effective. In the
current political and economic climate, changes in healthcare seem to
have partially eroded the containing ability of the wider community
and systems in which we work, therefore museums emerge as in­
valuable resources for therapeutic work in the community.

5. Making links which lead to

meaningful interpretations 
In therapy, making links between external and internal, between
what is known and unknown, is important. A similar process happens
when curators ‘contribute to cross-referential understandings of art
between different artistic, ethnic, cultural, sexual, gender and  class
locations and works’ (Hawley Reagan 2017, p.23). There are almost
unlimited ways of seeing the image, and some of them involve our
own projections and depend on our ability to symbolise. This trans­
formative experience may eventually lead to the increased capacity
to integrate insights:

Personal vital value of perception and interpretation of a work

of art may be determined by a limitless number of factors, but is
fixed (and therefore checked) by one integral sign: whether the
interpretation became, in the end, an event of the inner personal
life of the interpreter. (Boyko 2006, p.200)

Conclusion
In this chapter, I have attempted to review my experience of developing
museum-based art therapy programmes in Russia, a process that was
influenced by political, cultural and social transformations in post-
communist Russia. The model we used might not be fully transferable,
but essential elements will be applicable to different cultural contexts.
I have presented a set of recommendations that can potentially be
utilised in various institutional scenarios; my work at The State
From Isolation to Relation 103

Russian Museum has informed a museum-based art therapy project

with oncology patients (children and adults) which started in 2014
at the private hospital in London where I currently work, and which
appears to be effective in addressing the needs of people with long-
term life-threatening conditions (Figure 4.3). As museums bridge
conceptual and practical aspects of work, I conclude that they offer
therapeutic resources which can be employed to benefit vulnerable
client groups, although this new field of art therapy practice requires
more rigorous research in terms of understanding the specificity of
conditions, processes and outcomes.

Figure 4.3 ‘The Shadow’ by patient A (2017)

104 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

The similarities of the two positions of art therapist and museum

curator suggest that the art therapy–museum alliance can be
productive, but this entails the constant revision of roles and
professional boundaries. It might be useful to explore further how
these professional stances can complement each other in therapeutic
situations. In the light of changes happening in the museum curatorial
field, Schaverien’s (1989) statement becomes debatable:

the agreed task of looking deeply into and behind the apparent
in the images distinguishes the role of the art therapist from that
of the art critic. The therapist, unlike the art critic, sees the visual
relationships in the context of the personal relationship. (p.154)

On a personal note, I want to stress that by engaging with an artwork in

the museum, we engage with the elements of our own experience. In an
attempt to connect with and understand artworks, we become aware
of our changing self and the need for continuous reinterpretation of
our experience. As art therapists, we need to advocate for the efficacy
of this approach and instigate further research and discussions about
the ever-changing state of our professional practice.

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 CHAPTER 5 

Starting with Art

Ben Uri Artworks as a Stimulus for Art
Psychotherapy in Dementia Care

Emma Hollamby, Elaine Homer and Jane Landes

Introduction 
Starting with Art began as a small-scale, qualitative art therapy
pilot project exploring the potential for a gallery and museum to
promote wellbeing for a group of older people living with dementia
(PLWD). It sits within the context of wellbeing work delivered by
the Ben Uri Gallery and Museum, as well as a broader trend for art
therapy/museum collaborations. Ben Uri is based in North London
and centres its work around a strong collection of émigré art from the
20th century to today, exploring themes of identity and migration. 
The gallery collection provided the focus for weekly art therapy
groups in a UK National Health Service day centre. A trainee art
therapist facilitated the groups over two academic years while on
clinical placement with the gallery. The project involved establishing
a role for art therapy in the gallery setting and a strong gallery
presence in the day centre. As well as the core collection from which
replica artworks were produced and used in therapeutic sessions, the
broader experience of the gallery, including temporary exhibitions
and curatorial talks, was integral to the project. In this chapter, we
reflect on our collaboration over the first two years of Starting with
Art, focusing on one of the groups. 

108
STARTING WITH ART 109

Dementia and the arts

Dementia is an umbrella term which describes a wide set of symptoms
(Alzheimer’s Society 2017) and includes a range of incurable pro­
gressive brain diseases. These can lead to a severe decline in mental
abilities – most markedly in language, judgement, reasoning and
memory (Waller 2002, p.122). Each person’s experience of dementia
is different and can be made harder to deal with by concurrent
depression, anxiety and personality changes. Difficulty in finding the
right words can decrease social confidence and increase feelings of
isolation. Consequences for family members are also far-reaching
as they adapt to change, and they may experience frustration and
despair alongside their loved ones (Waller 2002). 
It is predicted that by 2025 numbers of people living with
dementia will reach one million (Alzheimer’s Society 2014a). The
National Institute for Health and Care Excellence recommends that
‘People with dementia are enabled, with the involvement of their
carer, to maintain and develop their involvement in and contribution
to their community’ (National Institute for Health and Care Excel­
lence 2015). Consequently, there is a demand for appropriate services
for the two-thirds of people with dementia who live in the com­
munity (Alzheimer’s Society 2014b). The arts are increasingly being
employed to fill some of this need, reflecting growing awareness of
the positive impact of arts engagement on health and wellbeing.
The Taylor Review (Taylor et al. 2015) emphasises the social and
therapeutic benefits of such participation for PLWD and the potential
role for galleries and museums in offering accessible person-centred
arts initiatives (London Arts in Health Forum 2015). Personal growth
through art activity is possible at any stage of life (Ehresman 2014),
an ethos that fundamentally underpins this project.

Ben Uri Gallery and Museum 

Ben Uri Gallery and Museum is a public art gallery founded in 1915
by Russian-Jewish émigré artist Lazar Berson in Whitechapel in the
East End of London. Its name was taken from biblical craftsman
Bezalel Ben Uri, creator of the tabernacle in the Temple of Jerusalem.
110 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

It began as an art society providing support for Yiddish-speaking,

Jewish immigrant artists and craftsmen who were working outside
the cultural mainstream. By the 1920s, it had moved to London’s
Bloomsbury, then on to Soho and the West End, before settling in its
current North London home.
Today, Ben Uri has a core collection of more than 1300 works
with an ambitious temporary exhibitions programme addressing
the gallery’s core themes of identity and migration. The collection
comprises predominantly British and European art reflecting the
work, lives and contributions of émigré artists and their journeys
to London. It features major works by David Bomberg, Mark
Gertler, Frank Auerbach and Leon Kossoff, and regularly lends to
other institutions, reflecting its importance in the narrative of early
20th‑century British art. The collection holds work from some 380
artists from 35 countries and continues to grow. Ben Uri’s focus
today is to celebrate the impact of these émigré artists and their work
on British art and culture. 
Ben Uri receives no core government funding and operates as
a registered charity. Part of its charm lies in the sense of intimate
connection and ownership engendered in Jewish and other minority
community visitors (Glasser 2015). It runs an ambitious range of
projects with the aim of meaningfully and sustainably connecting to
new audiences; using art differently.

How the project began 

In 2000, David Glasser was elected as Ben Uri Executive Chair,
bringing a focus on ‘creating a new style of visitor-engaging museum
addressing contemporary issues and social integration through the
visual and creative arts’ (Ben Uri 2018a). In 2013, co-author and art
therapist Jane met David. This was a fortuitous meeting, at a time
when the gallery was considering how best to develop a wellbeing
strand alongside its education programme and Jane was interested in
creative innovation within art therapy, having recently left an NHS
art therapy post. In their meeting, they discussed the gallery space
and its suitability for on-site group visits, nascent ideas for taking
reproductions to outside partners as a way of reaching people who
STARTING WITH ART 111

would not otherwise be able to access the collection, how this might
differ from the main education programme and what working safely
and effectively with vulnerable client groups might entail. Working
with PLWD was first mooted. There was an air of excitement about
the possibilities and a loose collaboration was envisaged whereby the
gallery could use Jane’s expertise to help set up and advise on what
were ostensibly arts and health projects.
Shortly thereafter, Aimée Taylor joined the gallery as Learning
Manager. Aimée was interested in a growing consensus that museums
and galleries can have a therapeutic function for visitors (Ioannides
2016) and that the diversity of their contents (held safely within
their walls) can enable people to find commonalities with others
while affirming their own unique identity (Salom 2008). Aimée was
particularly interested in the potential of a gallery/art therapy collab­
oration and she, together with Jane, spearheaded the project. They
decided to offer a placement to an art therapy trainee who, under
supervision from Jane, would use the collection to work safely and
in some depth with clients. Jane’s role was Consultant to Ben Uri
and University Trainee Supervisor. Initially, her work was conducted
on a pro bono basis until project funding was secured by the gallery
to cover supervision and other meetings. Emma Hollamby was then
appointed as a learning intern, establishing the project partners and
acting as the main administrator of the project – responsibilities that
led to the establishment of the Learning and Wellbeing Officer role to
which Emma was appointed. 
At this stage, the aims of the project were to: 

• increase access to the gallery and art collection 

• stimulate participants’ meaningful engagement with art images 
• work therapeutically with people living with dementia using
the Ben Uri Collection and temporary exhibitions
• improve quality of life for participants 
• form partnerships with other agencies (for example, dementia
day centres) 
• find a suitable trainee to work clinically
• provide that trainee with a good training and learning ex­
perience 
112 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

• measure and record outcomes 

• consider the project’s potential as a template for working with
other groups 
• secure future funding. 

Why art therapy?

Within the art therapy/dementia literature, a crucial distinction is
made between whether project objectives focus on the process of art
as a wellbeing/enrichment activity or on treatment outcomes, such as
reduction of symptoms and/or behavioural improvements (Beard
2012). Ben Uri’s wellbeing programmes with older adults fall into
two distinct strands which illustrate this dichotomy. Emma brings
art to older audiences and those with dementia through practical art
workshops and discussion sessions. Starting with Art (as described
in this chapter) was facilitated by a trainee art therapist, Elaine, and
fits into the second category. Both aim to use the gallery collection
to improve the quality of life for participants. In art therapy, how­
ever, benefits primarily come from using the arts to communicate
inner experience (Ehresman 2014). Connection with others (and
concomitant benefits) are arrived at predominantly via this route.
Elaine was being trained to work with great sensitivity, paying close
attention to non-verbal communication that comes about through
image-making and what might be conveyed symbolically. Clients’
artwork could reveal painful subjects such as loss that art therapy is
able to contain safely (Jensen 1997). Elaine worked alongside other
healthcare professionals at the day centre, integrating art therapy
into participants’ care plan objectives and sharing her professional
knowledge where applicable, while being mindful of confidentiality.
She had access to personal biographies put together when service
users first joined the centre and was able to set therapeutic goals in
line with individual needs. 

Offering a clinical placement 

Art therapists practising in the UK must first complete a mandatory
training at postgraduate level, including clinical placements. Two
universities were approached for a suitable candidate and following
STARTING WITH ART 113

an informal interview, Elaine, from the University of Roehampton,

secured the placement. By offering a placement contract to a student,
Ben Uri agreed to provide the necessary opportunity for clinical
practice, enabling the student to fulfil their course requirements.
This included finding a suitable project partner within the local
community. The student, in turn, agreed to introduce gallery artworks
into their clinical work. A partnership agreement was signed by the
student, clinical supervisor, manager of the partner organisation and
a representative of the gallery. Once the partnership was established,
the gallery maintained an ongoing relationship with the university
and the community partner, ensuring that all parties were happy as
the project progressed. This clarified aspects of the collaboration,
such as provision of art materials and appropriate space to conduct
art therapy. Elaine completed an induction period at Ben Uri and
attended curatorial talks and regular project team meetings held at
the gallery. Similarly, Emma and Jane attended celebration events
at the day centre. 
Offering such a placement was treading new ground and to our
knowledge no other gallery or museum had done so before (British
Association of Art Therapists – Museums and Galleries Special
Interest Group 2018; Peacock 2012; Peacock, Hamil and Dumison
2014). Working with a trainee enabled the gallery to explore a wider
range of responses to the collection, while the student gained a training
experience at the cutting edge of art therapy practice (Jury, Landes
and MagSIG 2015). The placement ran from October 2014 until June
2015 and was subsequently extended for a second academic year.
Jane and Elaine met regularly throughout the placement for cli­
nical supervision. Elaine also attended a reflective practice group at
Roehampton. It is important to note that Elaine came to the placement
in her first year of training and stayed for two academic years. The
model of supervision therefore needed to be flexible in line with her
developing learning needs and skills (Ronnestad and Skovholt 1993).
Initially, supervision focused on practical issues such as how to set up
groups and how to measure outcomes in a meaningful way. As the
first year progressed, exploring visual material began to be crucial.
This included consideration of how the gallery images were used as
well as processing the content of artwork made by clients in response.
114 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

The day centre

From the beginning, developing a relationship with the right project
partner was essential. The gallery looked for an organisation that did
not have a steady stream of funding, did not offer many activities, was
overstretched, or would not otherwise have engaged an art therapist
or indeed organised visits to a gallery. For Ben Uri, this represented
an ethical obligation to support those services that would most
benefit from collaboration. Eight local day centres and residential
homes for PLWD were contacted. Three expressed interest and one
enthusiastic day centre manager took up the opportunity to work
with Ben Uri. Others felt they did not have the capacity to take on a
new initiative.
 At this time, the day centre offered specialist care for up to 25
people with moderate to severe dementia. The staff team brought
energy and verve to their daily programme of activities, which was
varied, stimulating and often fun, with good use made of the facilities
for group activities and the locality for external visits. Groups came
together for quizzes, physical exercise and cooking workshops
as well as weekly music and pet therapy. Nevertheless, the centre
could be a chaotic and emotionally volatile environment. For PLWD,
behaviours that challenge (James 2011) are often a response to an
unmet need, or unexpressed emotions such as boredom, frustration
and anxiety. Staff working in the centre often used humour as a
coping mechanism, and this can disguise a ‘hidden culture of despair’
(Waller 2002, p.123). Providing art therapy in the centre using the
gallery artworks was an attempt to meet some of those needs.
When Emma and Elaine first visited, they found rooms that were
comfortable and visually stimulating, with creative wall displays
celebrating people’s artwork and photographs of centre users in their
younger days. People approached Emma and Elaine to ask about
the gallery and discuss their own pictures on the walls, giving a feel
for the close engagement and vitality that was to come. This initial
visit generated excitement, curiosity, optimism and enthusiasm
from service users and staff about the project and partnership with
the gallery.
STARTING WITH ART 115

The art therapy group

Up to five people attended the art therapy group each session, which
was timetabled in six-week blocks over two academic years. Referrals
were made through the centre’s clinical team and participants were
aged between 76 and 97, with a diagnosis of subtypes of moderate
to severe dementia and other secondary illnesses. Most were female
and the group’s range of ethnicities reflected the demographic of
the locality. Group membership was stable, and attendance was
consistently high from a core group of regular attendees. When three
people eventually left to access different services, new members were
recruited. The others, Albert and Sheila (names have been changed
to ensure anonymity), attended almost all 40 group sessions over the
two years. 
The group quickly became a focal point of the centre’s activities
programme. It met each week at the same time in the training kit­chen.
This was a light and airy room with running water and a  view  of
the garden. The art therapy approach was shaped by the principles
of the NHS Trust responsible for governance of the centre and by
the gallery’s ethos, so as to utilise the unique characteristics of the
collection to support wellbeing. Self-directed therapy models can
be anxiety provoking and therefore problematic for people already
experiencing anxiety due to their condition. Introducing the gallery
artworks into the group aimed to reduce this and offer social benefits
to the group. The Trust’s expectations were for staff to be kind,
welcoming, respectful, professional and positive, to work as a team
and to make decisions collaboratively with service users. 
The group, facilitated by Elaine, offered a safe and confidential
space for members to explore reproductions of gallery artworks
and experiment with art materials. The same member of centre staff
was allocated to support the group each week. The choice of art­
works was influenced by the current exhibitions and sometimes by
limitations of copyright licensing. In addition, the Mental Capacity
Act (HMSO 2005) points to the importance of people being involved
in the decisions about them, and a sharing of power. This ethos, along
with British Association of Art Therapists best practice guidelines for
dementia care (British Association of Art Therapists 2015a, 2015b),
116 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

was drawn on when thinking about how the artworks were selected,
introduced into the sessions and discussed. Members were vocal
about what they wanted to see and clear about what they did not
like, and in this way helped to determine which paintings were
displayed. During sessions, Ben Uri catalogues were also on hand
for people to refer to, enabling group members to select and discuss
images they were interested in at their own pace. Reproductions and
art materials were high quality in order to convey dignity and respect
(British Association of Art Therapists 2015a, 2015b). After the group
sessions, selected artworks were left on display throughout the week,
providing an ongoing connection to the gallery for those who had
taken part. Other artworks were displayed in the dining hall for all
centre users to enjoy during lunch. Careful consideration was given
to how the images might be received and the themes they might bring
up for the group and other people in the centre.
Elaine became familiar with the gallery collection and exhibitions,
including the history of the artists and their artworks, by attending
curatorial talks. She used this information to enrich discussions.
Artworks were viewed together in a spirit of shared curiosity and
exploration, keeping interpretation open. In this way, the group be­
came as self-directed as possible, with members interacting with each
other by talking about the art.

Visiting the gallery

When they could, the group visited each new gallery exhibition, with
centre staff organising transport and additional staffing and making
changes to the daily schedule. Ben Uri provided a welcoming and
intimate space, with adequate time for participants to tour exhibitions
and view the artworks they were most interested in, in their own time.
Group members overcame physical challenges to get to the gallery,
so that they could engage up close with the original artworks. Over
time, the group developed a special relationship with the gallery built
from regular visits and familiarity with the gallery staff, including
the Director. People got to know the artworks intimately, identified
deeply with the characters and were delighted to recognise works in
STARTING WITH ART 117

the gallery that they had seen before in the catalogues. The importance
of this cannot be underestimated for people with dementia. The
artworks themselves seemed like familiar friends.
Visits were memorable occasions that generated excitement in
the gallery and lively discussion back at the centre as group members
shared their experiences on return. Sheila expressed admiration for
the works she enjoyed most and asked questions about the artists.
Albert recounted being warmly welcomed by the gallery Director,
who had given everyone exhibition catalogues.
The groups visited five exhibitions held at Ben Uri Gallery and
Museum, as well as an exhibition to celebrate the gallery’s centenary,
which was held at Somerset House in Central London. Each
exhibition had a different theme and a different subsequent influence
on art therapy practice within the group. Refiguring the 50s: Joan
Eardley, Sheila Fell, Eva Frankfurther, Josef Herman & L S Lowry
(2014) explored the work of five figurative artists and their strong
identification with a place and the people they lived and worked
with. This exhibition resonated with the members’ life experiences of
post-war Britain. By comparison, No Set Rules (2015), an exhibition
of works on paper from the Schlee collection in Southampton and
Ben Uri’s own collection, inspired experimentation with art materials
and led to an increase in art-making. The group was fascinated by
Ben Uri curator Sarah MacDougall’s account of Roger Hilton’s life
(1911–1975), an artist incapacitated yet still driven to paint from his
bed. Rothenstein’s Relevance – Sir William Rothenstein and his Circle
(2016) included Jewish subjects, portraiture and figure studies (in
Paris, London and Gloucestershire) and the First and Second World
Wars. The exhibition coincided with a deepening of the therapeutic
work, and group members depicted characters in their own artwork
based on the gallery originals. Out of Chaos; Ben Uri: 100 Years in
London (2015) was Ben Uri’s centenary exhibition held at Somerset
House and prompted a wider exploration of the history of the gallery.
Unexpected: Continuing Narratives of Identity and Migration had
explicit themes of journeys, displacement, loss, memory and identity
(MacDougall 2016b) and particularly resonated with the group’s
experiences of living with dementia.
118 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Using the gallery artworks

One of the strengths of group psychotherapy is that people often
identify their own difficulties through relating to another group
member (Yalom 1986). In the art therapy group, people articulated
their difficulties via the narratives they encountered in the gallery
reproductions. The images themselves were a conduit to communi­
cate feeling and explore this from a distance. For example, someone
might describe the emotional state of a character they viewed when
it was perhaps a projection of their own feelings. In this instance,
the artworks acted as a container for feelings (Schaverien 2009).
This sometimes carried on over several sessions. It was felt that
the artworks acted as a spur to art-making or, in some instances,
allowed  participants to be actively involved in the group without
making art. 
Having gallery replicas in the therapy room stimulated much
animated discussion and interest. Looking together (Isserow 2008)
at the artworks offered an opportunity for people to connect empa­
thically as well as to acknowledge their differences, as they expressed
varying perspectives and feelings in relation to the works. Pictures
affect viewers (Schaverien 2009, p.82) and Elaine noticed that the
artworks seemed to directly impact how people were feeling and
relating to each other in the sessions. In response, she started to bring
in paintings that might specifically evoke calm or reverie to counter
people’s agitation and anxiety. At one point, it seemed as if an image
from the gallery was illustrating for clients how to be in relation to
each other; the group, Elaine imagined, began to resemble the family
grouping depicted in ‘Sabbath Rest’ by Samuel Hirszenberg (1894,
Ben Uri Collection – Figure 5.1). Gallery artworks, such as Chana
Kowalska’s ‘Shtetl’ (1934, Ben Uri Collection – Figure 5.2), firmly
grounded the group in the present while also providing a bridge to
connect with memories. Group members shared their own happy
memories, feelings of excitement and, at times, elation evoked by
this painting.
STARTING WITH ART 119

Figure 5.1 Samuel Hirszenberg, ‘Sabbath Rest’

(1894), oil on canvas. Ben Uri Collection

Figure 5.2 Chana Kowalska, ‘Shtetl’ (1934), oil on canvas. Ben Uri Collection
120 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

There were debates around the relative merits of different artworks

and their styles, with some preferring the Old Masters and others
intrigued by more contemporary art. ‘In the Synagogue’ by Alfred
Wolmark (1906, Ben Uri Collection – Figure 5.3) was much admired
by the group, with members recognising the influence of Dutch
painter Rembrandt (Smith, Edlin and Goldschmidt 2018) in the tonal
values of the painting, the composition and indeed the subject matter.

 Figure 5.3 Alfred Wolmark, ‘In the Synagogue’

(1906), oil on canvas. Ben Uri Collection

The gallery artworks facilitated a ‘holding in mind’ of the clinical work

because they evoked, for Elaine, memories of the sessions and how the
group had responded. She thought of them as she would the client’s
STARTING WITH ART 121

own artworks in terms of carrying emotional content for the group

members. The gallery itself provided containment for Elaine who
referred to it as ‘a kind of mothership’ – a secure base to return to.
The Ben Uri Collection includes images exploring the lives of
Jewish artists and their experience of persecution. While these might
not be appropriate to have on general display in the session or at
the centre, the catalogues enabled people to choose such content
and share it more privately with Elaine if they wanted. One member
chose a George Grosz illustration titled ‘Interrogation’ (1938, Ben
Uri Collection) depicting the torture of a man by three Nazi soldiers.
Rather than relating to a personal narrative of the past this seemed
an expression of experience in ‘the here and now’ of living with
dementia. Although this harrowing image evoked uncomfortable
feelings in Elaine, she sat with what she understood to be her client’s
emotional discomfort, being ‘alongside’ them in their distress. For the
client, this was a way to have an unbearable feeling acknowledged
without expressing it in words or sharing it more widely in the group. 

Theme: migration 
Migration is a key theme in the Ben Uri Collection, which prompted
Jane and Elaine to explore within supervision the idea that dementia
may be considered as ‘a kind of migration of the self’. Certainly,
images such as Josef Herman’s ‘Refugees’ (c.1941, Ben Uri Collection)
with its expressionistic style and symbolic significance was of great
interest to the group, although sometimes difficult to look at; on
one occasion, a group member covered this up. In another session,
Albert drew attention to ‘The Edge’ by David Breuer-Weil (2007,
Ben Uri Collection – Figure 5.4), in a catalogue. The painting is a
direct response to the Holocaust and wider universal themes about
humanity, with the broom becoming a symbol of persecution (The
Times of Israel 2013). Elaine saw a metaphor here for how PLWD
are regarded in society, as having outlived their usefulness. ‘The Shoe
Shop III’ by Julie Held (2004, Ben Uri Collection) depicts a migrant
woman as an outsider looking in. This echoed experiences in the
group as they looked out into the garden at a different group from
the centre, as well as possibly linking to their experience of living
with dementia in general.
122 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Figure 5.4 David Breuer-Weil, ‘The Edge’ (2007),

oil on canvas. Ben Uri Collection

Exploring narratives of painful separation in the gallery artworks

appeared to help the group members accommodate their own feelings
about loss and the proximity of death. Intimate relationships forged
in the centre over the years end as people move on to residential care
or die. PLWD may not remember why their loved one is no longer
there but continue to carry the grief and sense of loss. ‘Brother and
Sister’ by Joan Eardley (1955, Aberdeen Art Gallery and Museums,
featured in the Ben Uri exhibition Refiguring the 50s) seemed per­
tinent to processing those feelings with the heartrending, tender
depiction of the separation of close siblings. When Emma shared the
story behind this work with the group during a gallery visit they
were captivated to hear that the brother and sister were reunited
27 years later. The gallery artworks often fostered hope, and stories
of migrant artists using art in the face of overwhelming adversity
uplifted the participants and all involved. 
Working with a gallery collection of migrant artwork was an
opportunity for Elaine to acknowledge and incorporate cultural
differences in visual symbols and imagery (British Association of Art
Therapists 2014) and respond to the cultural diversity of the clients in
the centre. Members of the group who were from the Caribbean and
South America picked out images such as ‘West Indian Waitress’ by
Eva Frankfurther (c.1955, Ben Uri Collection). These Lyons Corner­
house workers, known affectionately as ‘Nippies’ and observed with
STARTING WITH ART 123

empathy by the artist, not only represent an archetypal migrant but

also celebrate the stoicism and dignity of working people in post-war
Britain (MacDougall 2014). The painting opened up opportunities
for cultural differences in the group and personal stories of migration
to be explored and shared. 

Theme: identity 
The theme of identity, which underpins the gallery collection, rever­
berates throughout work with PLWD as they struggle with a shifting
sense of identity and self (Falk 2002) due to the progression of the
illness. Artworks became a trigger for remembering those who had
been important in their lives, such as family members and friends,
celebrating the good times and acknowledging losses.
Sometimes the focus was on art appreciation as members offered
personal opinions, shared their likes and dislikes, commented on
techniques and debated what makes good art. They recounted
experiences of visiting museums and galleries, and Albert remembered
missing lessons at school in order to visit Tate Britain. Sheila took on
an authoritative role reminiscent of her career as an English teacher.
She enlivened the group with her keen intellectual curiosity and by
reading biographical information about the artists aloud from the
gallery catalogues. She identified with them and this reconnected her
with her own background as an artist, an identity she expressed in
the group with her bohemian vivacity and style of dressing. During
gallery visits she often exclaimed, ‘I am an artist myself you know!’ 
The group expressed political views inspired by stories of migrant
artists overcoming adversity. When women’s rights were discussed in
response to Lily Delissa Joseph’s ‘Self Portrait with Candles’ (1906,
Ben Uri Collection), Sheila’s fist thumped the air, emphatically evoking
a sense of being on a ‘Votes for Women’ rally. Lily Delissa Joseph was
involved in the women’s suffrage movement, as Sheila’s grandmother
had been. The group was greatly affected by viewing John Allin’s
‘Protest at Whitechapel Road and Commercial Street’ (1975, Ben Uri
Collection), which represents the Battle of Cable Street, a 1936 anti-
fascist protest. Sheila expressed strong disapproval of fascism and
fondly remembered a Jewish school friend. Identification with the
124 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

artist’s experiences connected the group on an emotional level and

with ideals that they felt strongly.
Albert adapted portraits to represent himself at earlier life
stages as well as members of his family. He was fond of paintings
that depicted older people such as ‘The Professor’ by L.S. Lowry
(1960, private collection, displayed in Refiguring the 50s) and Alfred
Wolmark’s ‘Men of Old’ (1922, Ben Uri Collection) and which
conveyed an empathic understanding of what it is to be old. His com­
ments suggested he felt implicitly understood.

Art-making 
Alongside looking at gallery artworks, the group provided a con­
taining space to connect with feelings and other group members
through creating art. Art-making was prolific; members made work in
response to the gallery collection and often drew inspiration directly
from the images in terms of their themes and visual style. Sometimes,
Elaine modelled physical tasks and subtly intervened in processes to
maintain the flow, such as dribbling water on a watercolour palette
if the person had forgotten how to dip the brush. Sessions involved
using materials in a sensory way based on the gallery artist’s methods
(Byers 2011) or at other times emulating narrative and symbolic
elements. The members’ creative processes included direct copying,
drawing on aesthetics such as colour scheme or composition, or using
materials in a similar way to the gallery artist. Written accounts of
art therapy with PLWD describe incomplete works which are often
fragmented, partially completed or confused in composition, with
fused symbols and boundaries (Wald 1986). Elaine believed that the
artwork produced in the group seemed more coherent and complete
compared with Wald’s descriptions. Group participants’ difficulties
depended on the type of dementia and concurrent illness, but over­
all their creativity and technical competencies were remarkable given
their cognitive, motor and visual impairments. To ascertain the role
of the gallery artworks in facilitating image-making is an area for
further investigation. 
Albert was inspired by ‘The Old Gardener’ by William Rothenstein
(MacDougall 2016a) to produce an acrylic painting that he re-
STARTING WITH ART 125

worked over six sessions, adding and removing elements. Acrylic

paints gave him a sense of control over the image, allowing him to
overpaint layers and make significant changes or repairs. For him,
making art seemed to offer a sense of mastery, of being in charge of
something again. He regularly drew inspiration from a Lowry street
scene which featured in the exhibition Refiguring the 50s, creating a
series of drawings of people standing in a line or at a bus stop (Figure
5.5). These images are perhaps symbolic of the experience of being
in a day centre, following a daily schedule and waiting around. It is
possible that they also allude to the existential anxiety of living with
a terminal illness, waiting and wondering (Rayner 1986).

Figure 5.5 Albert, ‘Waiting in Line’, pencil and pastel drawing

Evaluation
The evaluation process had four main strands arising from the initial
project aims: 

1. Evaluating the quality of the clinical practice, placement and

learning experience for the trainee using the HCPC Standards
of Proficiency for Arts Therapists (2013) and the university
placement assessment process. 
126 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

2. Measuring and recording improvements in quality of life for

participants using criteria adapted from the UCL Museum
Wellbeing Measures Toolkit and direct feedback from
participants and carers.
3. Exploring the link between meaningful engagement with art
images and the outcomes for the group using the supervisory
dialogue. 
4. Considering the project’s potential as a template for future work
within the wellbeing team using: records of group attendance;
verbal feedback from participants and their carers to Elaine;
subjective accounts of what Elaine observed in sessions which
were recorded in weekly evaluations and reflections from
supervision with Jane. 

The four strands of the evaluation process were assessed as detailed

below. 

1. Quality of the training experience 

The placement met the requirements for years one and two of
Elaine’s art therapy training course at Roehampton University to a
high standard, because of the innovative and pioneering nature of
the work.

2. Improvements in quality of life for participants 

Beard (2012, p.644) states that there are important gaps in the evi­
dence base to support the use of art therapy for PLWD and, according
to Waller (2002, p.125), there are considerable problems in trying to
measure the effectiveness of such a group. The impact of this group
on participants’ psychological wellbeing was evaluated using criteria
from the University College London (UCL) Museum Wellbeing
Measures Toolkit for older adults (Thomson and Chatterjee 2013).
The measure was specifically designed for participants in museum
activities and piloted with older people with dementia. Its focus on
measuring changes in mood and emotion within sessions matched, to
some extent, the therapeutic aim of this project, which was to improve
quality of life for participants. A limitation was that social wellbeing
STARTING WITH ART 127

and communication and creative capacities are not included in the

measure. Using a colour-coded ‘umbrella’ on which to rate mood and
emotion, on a 1–5 scale, the measure distinguishes between feeling
states which are considered positive and negative. This did not
entirely resonate with the potentially cathartic experience of sitting
with difficult feelings in a therapy group; rather, it was important
to consider the expression of a range of feeling states as potentially
bene­ficial for the group (Coles and Harrison 2018). Additionally, the
scales were overly complex for the client group in vocabulary and
visual style. Therefore, Elaine evaluated changes in participants’ men­
tal state during the sessions based on her observations and verbal res­
ponses from group members using criteria mainly selected from the
UCL toolkit. These measures of wellbeing and key indicators were:

• Engagement – active/interested/alert/entertained/inspired/absor­
bed/creative
• Social interaction – friendly/talkative/interested/lively/listening/
observing
• Feeling safe and secure – comfortable/relaxed/confident/encour­
aged
• Mood – visible enjoyment/being able to express affect/reduction
in distress/feelings contained.

3. The link between meaningful engagement

with art images and group outcomes
The gallery artworks were used in tandem with the wellbeing criteria
to explore changes. For example, frequently Sheila’s mood would
improve significantly by the end of the session and this seemed to
correlate with changes in how she described the subjects of the
paintings. How group members used the gallery artworks was based
on qualitative observations of the sessions that were written up
and sent to the gallery. Client confidentiality was ensured (HCPC
2016, Guideline 5, p.7) by not identifying individuals by name when
sharing data for secondary purposes in line with NHS information
governance protocols. Session records were compliant with the legal
requirements for data protection, record keeping and information
sharing (National Health Service 2018). 
128 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

4. The project’s potential 

Group members had a choice whether to attend the group or not
and yet consistency of attendance was remarkable given the severity
of illness. Albert’s and Sheila’s carers gave helpful feedback on their
perception of the impact attending the group had made. Sheila’s
carer said that Sheila found attending exhibitions at other galleries
difficult because of the noise and crowds. Although Sheila no longer
painted, she was maintaining her identity as an artist through being
in the group and was able to enjoy exhibitions again; this was impor­
tant since the visual arts and music had been her main interests
all her life. Albert’s carer confided that she believed ‘he wouldn’t
be the same without his art’. His interest in making art gave him
relief from worry in the early evening and, in turn, respite for her.
He established his own art table at home which he used to contain
his anxiety; his drawings provided an interest and connection with
friends and relations.
Elaine received consistent positive verbal feedback from the
group about their experiences, observed their fondness and support
for each other and felt their sadness before breaks and the ending.
William Rothenstein’s ‘Blasted Trees’ (1917–1919, Cartwright Hall
Art Gallery) seemed to capture Albert and Sheila’s feelings preceding
a break. Albert drew L.S. Lowry’s ‘Man Lying on a Wall’ (1957, The
Lowry) in the final session and this seemed to symbolise the ending.

Conclusion
Recent research from Age UK affirms the importance of creative and
cultural participation for wellbeing (Age UK Policy and Research
Department 2018). This project enabled people to have access to
a gallery collection as well as therapeutic support. Being part of a
gallery project made participants feel as if they belonged and gave
them a personal sense of purpose and agency. In this context, true
to Ben Uri’s mission statement, they were able to explore their own
identity and creativity (Ben Uri 2018b). 
In the art therapy group, people responded sensitively to the
visual aesthetics and emotional feeling and tone of the gallery art­
works. When talking about the paintings, it seemed that members
STARTING WITH ART 129

were able to access and articulate their feelings more easily than at
other times and share their rich and interesting life histories with
one another within the group. The symbolic content of the Ben Uri
Collection with its themes of migration and identity was particularly
pertinent for this work. The impact of dementia on people’s lives is far
reaching. PLWD often lose their home as they progressively require
more care, family relationships are irreparably disrupted and with
cognitive decline come personality changes. All of these vicissitudes
contribute to a major shift in identity (Rusted, Sheppard and
Waller 2006, p.518). The gallery artists expressed their feelings and
experiences of persecution, displacement and loss of their home
and loved ones through their art. This undoubtedly resonated very
deeply with the group.
Developing the project in the gallery’s centenary year was an
exciting and auspicious time for Ben Uri to become involved with
art therapy. This celebration also fortuitously coincided with the
day centre’s 25th year. Some of the group’s artwork was exhibit­
ed to coincide with celebration events at the centre, enabling carers
to share in achievements and instilling a sense of pride, purpose
and accomplishment in participants. Visiting the gallery became
an important feature of the project, connecting the gallery to the
community partner and ensuring that the relationship to Ben Uri
would continue and be upheld on conclusion of the placement.
The considerable success of the initial two years of the project
can be attributed to the hard work and enthusiasm of the whole team
and went a long way to achieving aims to increase gallery access and
stimulate meaningful engagement with art. Cultural access must be
seen as a right for all and this project provided the opportunity for
participants to engage in a particularly intimate way with a gallery.
The Ben Uri Collection provided the impetus for the group to tell
their own stories and create their own artwork, and to feel connected
to each other, the gallery and wider cultural life. They embraced the
opportunity to engage, responding with boundless humanity and
creativity, and warmly appreciated being so intimately involved with
Ben Uri Gallery and Museum and its collection.
Starting with Art has since partnered with new organisations
working with a range of different client groups, including people living
130 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

with brain injury, refugees and asylum seekers and young people in
schools. This work has been facilitated by new art therapy trainees
and, as the project grows, new ways are found to use the universal
themes of this unique collection to connect meaningfully with people.   

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 CHAPTER 6 

Creative Dialogues
A Journey from Recovery to Discovery for
People Using Drug and Alcohol Services

Simon Hackett, Ruth McGovern

and Fiona Fitzpatrick

Background
I was invited to join the Creative Dialogues art group at a point
where my life was feeling particularly chaotic. I was therefore
anxious that I would be unable to engage fully, and that I might
feel even more stressed by going and putting myself in a setting
of social vulnerability. I am happy to say that my experience has
been the total opposite of my fear. I left my first art session feeling
so much more grounded than when I arrived and this has been
my experience each time since. (Creative Dialogues 2016) 

Creative Dialogues was an arts and museums project for people in

recovery from substance misuse, including drugs and alcohol. Some
people attending the project also had multiple social and health needs,
including mental ill-health, instability in their accommodation or
homelessness, and contact with the criminal justice system. The aim
of the project was to stimulate ‘creative dialogues’ that might lead
people to develop their confidence, social networks and engagement
in a wider community. Participants were offered the chance to expe­
rience being creators, art critics, curators and exhibitors through a

133
134 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

series of workshops, museum and gallery visits, and an exhibition.

The project was facilitated by an art therapist, artists from the
Newcastle Institute for Creative Arts Practice, staff of the Tyne and
Wear Archives and Museums (TWAM) outreach team, and drug and
alcohol recovery centre staff.
It all started from a conversation between two art therapists. A
newly qualified art therapist, Fiona Fitzpatrick, approached Simon
Hackett with the idea of running an ‘arts in health’ project in a
recovery centre where she had been working. Fiona had seen the
need for longer-term arts in health projects that could provide people
with a wider experience during their recovery. Fiona and Simon dis­
cussed partnering with local museums and galleries to develop a
project that would aim to build the participants’ confidence in the
arts to a point where they could exhibit their own work. It was
agreed that the project would have an art therapist involved from
inception to delivery to help support the participants’ recovery
journey within a therapeutic and person-centred framework. Simon
agreed to be Fiona’s supervisor and mentor throughout the project.
The recovery centre staff were keen to support the project as it fitted
with their aim of helping people to develop a healthy engagement in
the community during their recovery. The project proposal was sub­
mitted to Newcastle University’s ‘EngageFMS’ fund, which supports
collaborative projects between the Faculty of Medical Sciences (FMS)
and the Newcastle Institute for Creative Arts Practice (NICAP), and
the project received a grant of £5000 for a 12-month period to cover
staff fees and art materials, and to fund Ruth McGovern’s time as a
researcher.
We started with some questions:

• Does engaging in a ‘creative dialogue’ add something to

people’s recovery from drug and alcohol problems?
• How do we engage people meaningfully in arts and cultural
practice when they are in recovery, through using museum and
gallery spaces and artefacts?

The recovery centre staff referred potential participants to Fiona, the

art therapist who was leading the project. The art therapist facilitated
CREATIVE DIALOGUES 135

several introductory meetings for the potential participants alongside

artists in order to explain the project, establish relationships and
alleviate any anxieties before the project commenced. During the
project, a group of 16 people from the recovery centre took part in
20 visual art workshops and eight museum and gallery visits, with
time for reflection and art-making in-between visits. The museum
and gallery visits were as follows: 

1. Segedunum Roman Fort and Museum (guided tour of building) 

2. Segedunum Museum (found object activity outside museum,
drawing exercise inside) 
3. Holy Biscuit Gallery, Shieldfield, Newcastle upon Tyne (visit
to see an annual exhibition by Chilli Studio members, entitled
‘Curiosity and Grit’ – Chilli Studios is a charitable organisation
in Newcastle upon Tyne running a user-led creative studio
service)
4. Hatton Gallery, Newcastle University (walking outside
drawing activity) 
5. Hatton Gallery (visit to see Collections exhibition)
6. XL Gallery (site visit)
7. Laing Art Gallery (visit to see exhibition ‘The Arts and Crafts
House: Then and Now’) 
8. Segedunum Museum (final visit of exhibition ‘Roman Empire:
Power and People’). 

Finally, there was an exhibition of participants’ artworks in an art

gallery for a week, which then toured to the participants’ local mu­
seum, Segedunum, situated very close to the recovery centre.
The Creative Dialogues participants completed a blog during the
project, which is referred to in this chapter, and a focus group was
held following the exhibition as an opportunity for participants to
feed back about their experience of the project. The art therapist,
artists and museum staff planned the museum and gallery programme,
reflecting on exhibition content and therapeutic considerations, and
anticipating potential anxieties around visiting museums. All agreed
that it was important to give enough time within each museum and
gallery, take part in guided exhibition and venue tours led by artists
136 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

and museum staff, and plan visits on quieter days to enable reflection
on the content of exhibitions.
The recovery centre where the workshops were based was a few
hundred yards from Segedunum Roman Museum and both the centre
and the museum were local to most of the participants. The group
was given free access to this museum throughout the project and the
participants were encouraged to visit independently.

Creative Dialogues themes

The project used Creative Dialogues themes drawn from theory
associated with recovery capital (Hennessy 2017), including ‘choice’,
‘connecting’, ‘collective commitment’, ‘community’, and participants
becoming ‘champions’ as artists and exhibition curators of their own
work. Creative Dialogues drew from three distinct but overlapping
areas of practice that can be supportive and engaging for people who
are facing challenging circumstances: art therapy, visual and fine arts
practice, and museums/galleries and health and wellbeing.
Art therapy has long been used in clinical settings with a wide
range of people accessing social and healthcare services, including
those with substance dependency (Aletraris et al. 2014), people
with learning and communication difficulties (Hackett et al. 2017a;
Hackett et al. 2017b), and those within the criminal justice system
(Rothwell and Hackett 2018). Although art therapy can take a
number of forms, its aims are broadly to support personal wellbeing
and growth. An idea that ‘the art therapist is like the viewer who
visits the artist in her studio’ (Schaverien 1999, p.75) is a helpful
illustration of the overlapping areas of the art therapist’s place within
the Creative Dialogues team. The art therapist’s role was to weave
between the participant, the artwork, the artist/art students and the
museum and gallery. This role holds the theoretical and practical
frame established by art therapists Lloyd and Kalmanowitz (2005)
within their ‘portable studio’, the drawing shed, for working in non-
clinical settings: ‘central is a belief in people as possessing internal
resources rooted in experience, resilience and culture, with the
therapist actively holding the potentiality of multi-meanings, and the
CREATIVE DIALOGUES 137

possibility for sustained immersion in image-making even in the most

challenging of circumstances’ (paragraph 3).
The concept of recovery capital is the combined sum of internal
and external resources available to individuals in recovery from
substance misuse (White and Cloud 2008). It focuses on people’s
ability to access key social, physical, human and cultural resources.
Cloud and Granfield’s concept of ‘recovery capital’ (2008) has been
used as a theoretical framework to understand the range of benefits
that Creative Dialogues participants reported. Social capital is
perceived as the resources held by people through their membership
of a social group (Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992). Herein, reciprocity
and trustworthiness develop through the connection between group
members (also known as bonding capital) and with external networks
and the community (also known as bridging capital) (Putnam 2000).
Human capital includes a variety of individual attributes that
enable effective functioning within society such as knowledge, skills,
education, health and mental health (Cloud and Granfield 2008).
Cultural capital is linked to human capital and encompasses values,
beliefs, perceptions and appreciations that come from belonging to
a particular cultural group (Cloud and Granfield 2008). One of the
project’s aims was to encourage participants to engage with their
local museums and galleries in a confident and independent way. We
hoped that by connecting with their local community via museums
and galleries they would feel a sense of belonging in a new way that
could support their recovery journey after the project had finished.
We hoped that a legacy of the project would be for the participants
to be able to experience museums and galleries positively, as a safe
space, associated with a sense of personal growth and wellbeing. 

The museum next door!

At the start of the project, the art therapist guided the group and
helped people to think and speak about agreements that were
important for the workshops and their hopes and fears (Table 6.1).
Both artists were present for this exercise in a listening capacity. All
the workshops included space at the beginning and end to reflect
138 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

on learning and personal experiences, and time to do a relaxation

exercise. Schaverien (1999) discusses the ‘sacred space’ within art
therapy: ‘…the setting aside of space wherein the individual, as a
member of a community, can be silent, meditative and self-reflective.
Such a place needs to be separated from everyday life and needs of
material existence. It must be inviolable; a sacred space’ (p.63). A
fine arts student volunteer in the group described her own personal
experience of this ‘sacred space’ and how the art therapist facilitated
the sessions:

The art therapist always started and ended the workshops with
a meditation breathing exercise to put everyone in a much more
open and relaxed frame of mind. I valued the fact she asked what
the participants had thought about the previous session at the
beginning and how they thought it went at the end. This constant
yet non-invasive evaluation enabled Creative Dialogues to always
be adaptable to the needs of those involved. (London 2016) 

The project began with visits to Segedunum Museum, a ten-minute

walk down the road from the recovery centre and the site of the most
excavated fort along the Hadrian’s Wall, built by the Romans by order
of Emperor Hadrian in AD 122. Today the site has reconstructions
of a bath house and an interactive museum housing an exhibition of
Roman artefacts. Alongside this, TWAM staff brought in a collection
of artefacts to some of the workshop sessions. We felt that this
would encourage a more personal connection to the museums and
break down any potential barriers that participants may have about
interacting with the collections. Bringing objects out of the museum
gives direct access to cultural assets:

Object handling is the ultimate asset-based approach for museums

and helps to create thematic activities based on collections, so that
the museum becomes more than just a service providing a space
for an activity, rather it actively links audiences and activities
with the history of the museum. (Lackoi et al. 2016, p.28)
CREATIVE DIALOGUES 139

Table 6.1 Group agreement

Group agreement Hopes and fears

Everyone to arrive on time. Hopes
Call to give advance notice of Improve myself.
lateness or absence. Learn something new.
Use clear communication. Make new friendships.
Show mutual respect: towards Share ideas and experiences.
other people’s ideas and opinions Feel proud of own artwork.
and artwork. Open new doors and new
Use respectful language to self and opportunities.
others. Have involvement with project
Know that all contributions are in future.
welcome. Make a difference to other
Let everyone speak and listen to people’s lives across the globe.
the views of others. Have the arts more integrated
Create and maintain a supportive in people’s recovery.
environment. For the exhibition to be
Ensure a drink/drug free zone brilliant.
prior to and during the session. For project to grow, be
Keep mobile phones on silent sustainable.
during workshop (unless prior For project to have a legacy
arrangement made due to and impact on others.
emergency). (Mobile phones for
taking photos are fine.) Fears
Have an organised break. Not believing in personal
Keep food and drink in the abilities and achievements.
kitchen when artwork and People not engaging.
materials are out. Running out of time.
Treat everything disclosed within Not getting materials I want.
the session as confidential. Not being able to fulfil
Keep an open mind. ambitions.
HAVE FUN!!

At one session, the group explored a museum box which had been
created during a project for people with dementia, with objects from
the 1940s to stimulate memories. The objects elicited many personal
stories from participants and generated associations to the ‘everyday’
140 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Roman objects which were present in the Segedunum exhibition, such

as shoes, ornaments and clothes. It felt significant that the objects
were relatable to the participants and that they offered a sense of
connection. Through these museum artefacts, interest and curiosity
was sparked about the importance of their own lives, stories and
everyday objects. Following on from this, the art therapist observed
how the participants were interested in collecting and presenting
their own found objects during the workshop. They all gained more
confidence within discussions and spoke about their own interests
and stories, being able to share about their own ‘everyday’ objects
with each other. The objects were mainly small and held with
affection in the participants’ hands as they described the personal
importance and reason for sharing them. Objects included beer bottle
tops, a necklace, sculptures and photographs. Julie Brooker (2010)
has explored the benefits of using found objects in art therapy to
help improve emotional and mental wellbeing, suggesting that they
allow thoughts, feelings and memories to be connected to, recognised
and processed. 
The following week, the group was brought back to Segedunum
Museum and engaged in a workshop outside the museum which
was  described as an activity in ‘seeing deeply’ and an experience
of ‘being’ with an object. This creative exercise started outside the
museum. The group stood in the Roman fort ruins and were asked
to look on the ground and find an object of interest. Rocks, stones
and plants were brought back to the circle. The whole group had
a minute of silence looking at their objects and then each person
was able to share their feelings with the group as they stood in a
circle. The group  were encouraged to have a further few minutes
alone in silence with their chosen objects. The group then moved
inside the museum to the ‘Roman Empire: Power and People’
exhibition. This exhibition brought together over 160 pieces from
the British Museum to explore the story of one of the most powerful
empires in history. Exhibits included sculpture from the villas of the
Emperors  Tiberius and Hadrian, coins from the Hoxne treasure,
jewellery, and almost perfectly preserved children’s clothing from
Roman Egypt. 
CREATIVE DIALOGUES 141

Art materials were given out and shared among the Creative
Dialogues participants within the space, including watercolours,
pencils, pens, oil pastels, chalk pastels and charcoal. The participants
were asked to hold in mind how certain objects have ‘power’ over
others and how each person’s chosen object could be thought of as
sacred for the day. They were then invited to draw in the museum,
either drawing their own found object or another object within the
exhibition. 
One participant had engaged in the ‘seeing deeply’ and ‘being’
with an object by sharing with the group personal feelings, past
experiences and current family attachment issues that this exercise
brought up. This participant chose one of the messier materials,
charcoal, when creating her image and she later gave a first-hand
account of her museum visit:

The session today began with a grounding exercise, which

involved breathing exercises and feeling grounded within
yourself. We then walked down to Segedunum to do a looking
and drawing exercise/activity. We did this outside, with each of
us picking up an object that took our fancy, and seeing what
feelings and emotions it created. I picked a large slate rock. Other
members of the group picked flowers and pebbles. To me, my
piece evoked feelings of family with the rock being layered with
cracked and crumbling sections, much like my family! We next
went inside to the exhibition ‘Roman Empire: Power and People’.
Indoors we continued with the exercise, putting our emotions
and feelings onto paper. We had brought paper, pens, paints
and charcoals and the group got down to work. This was really
interesting for me as I chose to work with charcoal, which I’ve
never used before. After 40 minutes, we packed up and headed
back. We then spent 15 minutes eating and discussing the task
we had done. I learnt a lot today. I still can’t draw, charcoal is
really messy and art is very relaxing and therapeutic. Roll on next
week. (Creative Dialogues 2016) 

Frances O’Brien (2004) has reflected on the use of messy materials in

art therapy, stating that ‘the chaotic use of materials might express
142 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

the trauma caused by chaotic relationships of abuse, neglect and

fragile attachments’ (p.4). Much of the art-making in the workshops
was led by professional artists using structured activities to explore
techniques and ideas. The art therapist was consistent throughout
the project and was present every week. The artists and art therapist
jointly planned the project and the art therapist gave guidance to the
artists about the therapeutic element of art materials and advised
when messier materials such as clay or plaster of Paris could be
introduced.
Entering the workshop space the week after visiting the Segedunum
museum, the participants found that the tables surrounding the circle
of seats were covered in A3 photocopied images taken from the book
of the ‘Power and People’ exhibition. It was as if the museum space
had merged with the workshop space. Group participants were given
information about collage. The artist facilitators explained that many
artists have used collage as a way of making images and showed
work made by Gabriel Orozco. Orozco’s work fitted well with the
activity looking at the exhibit of Roman ‘everyday objects’ during the
museum visit, as ‘Playing with ideas of accessibility, Orozco’s work
revolves around various repeating themes, exploring materials in a
way allows the viewer’s imagination to discover creative associations
between aspects of everyday life that are often overlooked or ignored’
(Kurimanzutto 2018, paragraph 1).
The group were invited to choose, cut and merge images together,
creating something new. Everyone was encouraged to have a go at
‘doing an Orozco’ with images from the ‘Power and People’ exhibition
(Figure 6.1), and collective collages also featured as a group activity
in other workshops (Figure 6.2).
CREATIVE DIALOGUES 143

Figure 6.1 Doing an Orozco

144 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Figure 6.2 Collective collage workshop

The role of the art therapist

The art therapist involvement in the planning stage focused on
holding in mind the boundaries which would be necessary to create
a therapeutic experience within a project that was mobile and
had multiple venues. Safe boundaries are often considered to be
important in art therapy and the art therapist will seek to provide
a framework, or ‘therapeutic frame’, to help people differentiate
between the literal and the symbolic or between internal and external
reality (Edwards 2004); ‘The essence of the therapeutic frame is that
it provides a physical and mental space where feelings can be held in
order to facilitate creativity and emotional growth’ (Edwards 2004,
p.51). In this project, the art therapist attempted to create a safe
therapeutic frame throughout its conception, planning and delivery.
Consideration needed to be given to the group’s needs within the
frame of the workshop space, the museum space (internally and
externally) and the various other parts of the project. The art
therapist attempted to create a ‘safe space’, whether in the workshop
space or the museums and galleries, where participants could feel
CREATIVE DIALOGUES 145

free to explore the art media and their own abilities, something that
group members had felt apprehensive about prior to commencing
the group. Although it was not the primary focus or intention of
Creative Dialogues, some people in the group found that making art
did inevitably communicate something about themselves. In the end-
of-project focus group, people spoke about using their art to resolve
painful experiences.
Group members spoke about disabling anxieties in their daily
lives prior to attendance at the group. These anxieties were sometimes
mirrored when visiting museum and galleries, and their initial worries
about creating artwork within these spaces was alleviated with the
support and reassurance of the art therapist. By the end of the project,
the group accomplished a ‘walking and sketching’ activity outside
the Hatton Gallery, surrounded by the general public.
A frequent expression used within the focus group was the ‘shared
experience’ in the art group. It was acceptable to make mistakes, take
risks and ‘expose’ oneself through art because the individual group
members were all ‘in it together’. Engagement was promoted by a
social obligation, enhanced by the enjoyment members experienced
from attending the sessions. One group member reported, ‘It’s the
one group I really don’t want to miss.’
Reciprocal obligations within the group also encouraged members
to complete ‘homework’ tasks of sketching, drawing and painting at
home. In effect, the combined personal enjoyment and responsibility
to one another to complete such tasks extended the therapeutic ben­
efit of the art sessions beyond the parameters of the group and into
the group members’ individual, personal space. Moreover, group
members felt that this had also benefited social relationships with
others outside the group, through conversations about the project
with friends and family members. Two focus group members reported
that their families were happy when they painted due to the positive
emotional impact it had on them. One of the focus group members
also felt that her art had enabled her to communicate more effectively
with her husband, allowing her to share difficult things from the past
that she had not spoken about to him before. The art she created was
about past traumas and through her art she found the language to
talk about this with her husband. 
146 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

‘Wow! What a night’: the exhibition 

Wow! What a night. How proud I felt. Never before felt like
this. The Creative Dialogues Team have been wonderful. No
judgement, just encouragement to do what I never thought I
could do. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart. (Creative
Dialogues 2016) 

The exhibition was set up to demonstrate and communicate the

efforts and value of the group’s work (Figures 6.3, 6.4 and 6.5). The
museum and gallery visits, and reflecting and responding to them, gave
the participants the experience of being the viewer and the viewed,
the audience and the artist. The group had five museum and gallery
experiences before visiting the XL Gallery where they would showcase
their own work. The XL Gallery was situated inside the Fine Art
Department of Newcastle University, alongside the Hatton Gallery.
To introduce the participants to the exhibition space gradually,
the  visit started by the group exploring the outside of the Hatton
Gallery and XL Gallery at Newcastle University Fine Art Department,
before going inside. The artists distributed cameras to the participants
and the task was to observe the interior of the galleries and photo­
graph anything that captured their interest, whether it was the curve
of the stairwell, the tiled floor, or an object in their bag. To help
the participants to engage with the space, the gallery building was
explored like a museum artefact: ‘Like the temple and the theatre, the
art gallery is a place designed for a particular purpose. Set apart from
everyday life by its physical boundary, the building and the rooms
within are laid out according to accepted code for exhibiting of
pictures’ (McNiff 1998, p.69). The space surrounding the building,
as well as the building’s physical form and structure were studied
and explored via art-making. The group physically touched the
building and walked through the grounds. The participants were
able to look at the space and current exhibitions without feeling
too intimidated. A gallery staff member took a group photo within
XL Gallery exhibition space, instilling a sense that the participants
were valued as prospective exhibitors. Reflecting on the session,
each participant was asked to speak a word aloud to describe their
experience of being  a viewer in a gallery and artists preparing for
an exhibition. The words were spoken in a circle within the gallery
CREATIVE DIALOGUES 147

space and included ‘inspired’, ‘creative’, ‘jealous’ (that they were

not a student at the university studying fine art), ‘content’, ‘relaxed’,
‘curious’, ‘calm’, ‘excited’, ‘energetic’ and ‘influenced’. 
After visiting the XL Gallery the group had an idea of the number
of pieces each person was able to exhibit. During the following two
group sessions, each person was given one-to-one time with the art
therapist and artist to look through their work and decide which
pieces they would like to exhibit. This three-way view, from the
creator/participant, artist and therapist was important and helped
participants to feel confident about the choices they made about
showing their work. The art therapist also gave consideration to the
content of the work and asked about any vulnerable feelings group
members might have about their artwork and themselves. This was
also an important private opportunity for participants to identify any
work they did not want to display to the public or to talk about
anything about the exhibition that might be worrying them. 
In planning the exhibition, the group decided to aim to display
as many different art forms as possible to show the breadth of
work that had been completed during the group’s life. There were
several discussions within the group over the weeks leading up to
the exhibition, such as whether to display group members’ names
alongside their artwork. The group decided not to do this. There was
a collective view that they wanted to be represented as the Creative
Dialogues group as they felt that this was a group experience and not
just about individual artists. 
A planning document was created jointly by the art therapist,
artists, museum staff and students leading up to the exhibition, which
included the installation, marketing and invitation mail-out list that
was shared with the participants for their input. The team of staff also
created a timeline and distributed this to the participants and part­
ners so that everyone was aware of deadlines. The group discussed
the practical and physical elements involved in the installation of the
exhibition under the guidance of the artists, art therapist and fine
art students. 
The group explored different types of interpretation that can
accompany a museum or gallery exhibition to explain the work to
the audience. It was agreed that the voice of the participants had been
important throughout the project and that the information given
148 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

should reflect the value of the art-making within the museum and
galleries and workshop environment for the participants. Therefore,
the group agreed that having their own voices within the gallery space
as quotes would assist the audience to think about the therapeutic
value of the project experience for the participants. A set of quotes
from the participants was agreed and sent to a printer to enlarge and
laminate so they could be displayed alongside the artwork. 
Ideas about how the group could engage the public once inside
the exhibition were also discussed, such as a comments book, a
board with metallic alphabet letters to write comments on and
a pro­jector to display a slideshow of photographic work. The letter
board became a safe and playful place within the exhibition where
the participants could stand together and communicate through
posting up fun phrases. This corner of the exhibition space was filled
with laughter and brought its own value to people’s experience of
the gallery: ‘It is play that is universal, and that belongs to health:
playing facilitates growth and therefore health; playing leads into
group relationships; playing can be a form of communication in
psychotherapy’ (Winnicott 1971, p.41).
The group chose pages from sketchbooks to display in the glass
cabinets. This became a personal reflective experience for each
participant as they looked back on the life of the group via their own
sketches and record of thoughts and ideas. One participant asked if
he could display sculptures that he had created previously, before the
Creative Dialogues project, as he was keen to share his artistic skills
with the public again having not done so for several years due to
substance misuse. The group agreed that this was a great idea once
they had seen the work and heard the story behind its creation.
An invitation list was created and one of the students created
a flyer which was emailed out and printed. The image on the flyer
(Figure 6.3), a photograph from a charcoal workshop, was chosen
from a selection by the group as it was an example of a whole-
group element of the project and one of the most enjoyable art
materials that the group worked with. It was felt that the charcoal
workshop was an important bonding experience for the group.
This was the messiest workshop, and the group cleared up together
with enjoyment and laughter at the mess that they had created. The
importance of this workshop was perhaps connected to this messy
CREATIVE DIALOGUES 149

element, reflecting a shared experience of their inner worlds which

might include emotional trauma from the past (O’Brien 2004).

Figure 6.3 The flyer invitation

Figure 6.4 The exhibition

150 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Figure 6.5 The exhibition: detail

The participants distributed the flyers to friends, family, local lib­

raries and other recovery project participants. The group discussed
the preview opening of the exhibition and decided on having a
non-alcoholic drinks reception, a short welcome speech to describe
the project and a performance by the charity Streetwise Opera (an
award-winning national charity that uses music to help people who
are, or have been, homeless to make positive changes in their lives). 
Some of the opera performers knew some of the group, and they
had performed in many museums and galleries throughout the UK
so were in a good position to support the participants and help them
to feel more at ease. It was hoped they would be an inspiration by
showing how other vulnerable adults can enter the museum and
gallery environment and overcome their fears.
Quotes from participants included (Creative Dialogues 2016): 

I am feeling grateful for the experience I have had and all the
learnings I have taken from the Creative Dialogues art group. 

I can’t believe how many people came to the exhibition opening

and to see my work, I never thought that would happen.
CREATIVE DIALOGUES 151

I have found my time at Creative Dialogues both challenging and

engaging. It has pushed me creatively and personally. This has
been more than I initially expected. 

I felt so proud to show my friends and family my artwork on the

walls in the exhibition. Can’t believe how professional it looked. 

Thank you so much for putting up the exhibition, it looked

amazing, I was quite overwhelmed. 

I was so proud to see so much of my work on the walls and see

how great all our work looked together. I loved our quotes stuck
to the walls as well. 

It was lovely having Streetwise Opera there to sing, made it feel

special and was great as I knew some of them too.

‘It’s not about recovery, it’s about discovery’ 

Two female and one male participant attended the end-of-project
focus group after the exhibition. The focus group was scheduled to
happen the day after the exhibition so that they had an opportunity
to join together at a time when they might have felt low because
the project was coming to an end. The small number of attendees
for this focus group did bring into question whether the ending
felt too difficult for some participants. In hindsight, allowing more
time between the end of the exhibition and a project reunion for the
focus group might have produced a higher turnout. The aim of
the focus group was to explore the impact of the project and to share
our reflections with funders and partners of the project, Newcastle
University and Tyne and Wear Archive Museums.
We were surprised to discover in our focus group that there was
an absence of ‘recovery talk’ from group members and they did not
discuss their substance use or attempts to change. Rather, members
discussed their experience of art, both the doing and the viewing of
it, talking about the impact of this on their values and perceptions
and, importantly, what they learned about themselves along the
way. One group member summed this up by saying, ‘It’s not about
recovery, it’s about discovery.’ The people in the focus group told
152 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

us that Creative Dialogues was welcoming and encouraging, a safe

space for people with a shared experience of using drug and alcohol
recovery services.
In the Creative Dialogues project blog, group members said that
the project had also benefited their social relationships with others
outside the group. People spoke about being able to ‘disappear into
their art’, providing them with a welcome break from anxieties,
concerns and cravings to use substances. This ‘disappearing into
their art’ was an experience that happened within the museum and
gallery spaces as they entered and became immersed in the objects
and artwork on display and sat down to create art within these quiet
spaces. People spoke about immense pride in themselves and each
other during the exhibition. They appreciated the time and effort
that others had committed to preparing the exhibition, including the
professional presentation of their work in frames. The high-quality
environment provided by the gallery as well as the attendance of
Streetwise Opera on the opening night all contributed to a greater
sense of self-worth. While visiting the gallery space during the site
visit, one participant talked about her envy of students at Newcastle
University Fine Art Department. At the Creative Dialogues exhibition
opening night, she talked with pride at being able to show her own
artwork within this same space. The group as a whole spoke of the
positive impact on them of the exhibition being in such a ‘prestigious
building’ within Newcastle upon Tyne.
Health and wellbeing are increasingly understood as tied up
with, and not separate from, learning, creativity and connectedness,
and thus are part of what museums have always offered to their
communities, even if not articulated in these terms (Desmarais,
Bedford and Chatterjee 2018). Lackoi et al. (2016) suggest that
museums and heritage venues bring people together at the heart of
their communities, which helps both their physical and mental health
at every stage of life. One Creative Dialogues participant said:

I’ve found my time at Creative Dialogues both challenging and

engaging. It has pushed me creatively and personally. This has
been more than I initially expected. Continuing this group will
be a great journey. I feel I’ve grown... I’m looking forward to
continuing this journey. (Creative Dialogues 2016) 
CREATIVE DIALOGUES 153

This quote was a direct indication of the achievement of one of the

goals of the project, which was to have a legacy of the art group
continuing after the project. The outreach team at TWAM agreed to
support the participants by facilitating the group to continue meeting
on a weekly basis and providing museum staff and museum artists
to support the art-making. This continued for several months after
the project ended before the group progressed towards discovering
further interests within their lives. Some members of the group
started socialising outside the group and joined a debating group
together. Other members set up a visit to BALTIC contemporary
art gallery for their recovery group. As the project developed, some
participants arranged meeting points to travel to visit museums and
galleries together.

Discussion 
We started with some questions: 

• Does engaging in a ‘creative dialogue’ add something to

people’s recovery from drug and alcohol problems?
• How do we engage people meaningfully in arts and cultural
practice when they are in recovery, through using museum and
gallery spaces and artefacts?

Participants of Creative Dialogues reported that the workshops,

museum and gallery visits, and exhibition did add something to
their recovery – a sense of discovery and personal growth through
valued, shared experiences. Participants demonstrated meaningful
engagement in arts and cultural practice, gaining confidence in
receiving from and contributing to cultural activity. They came to
see themselves as people who could and should access museums and
galleries and began to value their own creative expression. 
Through linking people’s experience to the Creative Dialogues
themes informed by concepts of recovery capital (Cloud and Granfield
2008), we can see that the project seemed to enhance human, social
and cultural capital. The group members’ newly found knowledge of
art had developed their human capital (Cloud and Granfield 2008),
as was apparent in the focus group when members spoke articulately
154 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

and in depth about their artwork and that of their peers in the
group. Membership of the group generated reciprocal obligations
and social  capital ‘stock’ (Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992). These
social bonds seemed to benefit individual group members (Laub
and Sampson 2003) through forming relationships with others who
were supportive of recovery (Longabaugh et al. 2010). In addition
to the interpersonal relationships within the group, members
developed art skills. In doing so, group members enhanced both their
human and cultural capital (Granfield and Cloud 1999; Cloud and
Granfield 2001).
Participation in and creative engagement with museums and
galleries has great potential to support people who are in recovery
from substance misuse. Art therapists can play a central role in pro­
viding a safe framework for the participants, and enable artists,
museums staff and recovery staff to collectively support the social
needs, mental and emotional wellbeing and personal growth of par­
ticipants in projects of this kind. 

Acknowledgements 
Creative Dialogues was funded by Newcastle University’s Faculty of
Medical Sciences and the Newcastle Institute for Creative Arts Practice
EngageFMS fund. Special thanks to Fine Art staff Tracy Tofield,
Bridget Kennedy, David Butler and LifeWorkArt Fine Art students
Charlotte Cook, Lydia London, Anna Skulczuk and Clare Townley
from the School of Art and Culture, Suzanne Prak-Sandilands and Zoe
Brown from Tyne and Wear Archives and Museums, Changing Lives
staff at North Tyneside Recovery Partnership, and XL Gallery staff.

References
Aletraris, L., Paino, M., Edmond, M.B., Roman, P.M. and Bride, B.E. (2014)
‘The use of art and music therapy in substance abuse treatment programs.’
Journal of Addictions Nursing 25, 4, 190–196.
Bourdieu, P. and Wacquant, L. (1992) An Invitation to Reflexive Sociology.
Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. 
Brooker, J. (2010) ‘Found objects in art therapy.’ International Journal of Art
Therapy 15, 1, 25–35. 
CREATIVE DIALOGUES 155

Cloud, W. and Granfield, R. (2001) ‘Natural recovery from substance

dependency: Lessons for treatment providers.’ Journal of Social Work
Practice in Addictions 1, 1, 83–104.
Cloud, W. and Granfield, R. (2008) ‘Conceptualizing recovery capital: Expansion
of a theoretical construct.’ Substance Use and Misuse 43, 12–13, 1971–
1986.
Creative Dialogues (2016). Project Blog. Accessed at www.creativedialogue
sproject.wordpress.com. 
Desmarais, S., Bedford, L. and Chatterjee, H.J. (2018) Museums as Spaces for
Wellbeing: A Second Report from the National Alliance for Museums,
Health and Wellbeing. Accessed at www.museumsandwellbeingalliance.
wordpress.com.
Edwards, D. (2004) Art Therapy. London: SAGE.
Granfield, R. and Cloud, W. (1999) Coming Clean: Overcoming Addiction
Without Treatment. New York, NY: New York University Press. 
Hackett, S., Ashby, L., Parker, K., Goody, S. and Power, N. (2017a) ‘UK art
therapy practice-based guidelines for children and adults with learning
disabilities.’ International Journal of Art Therapy 22, 2, 84–94. 
Hackett, S., Taylor, J.L., Freeston, M., Jahoda, A. et al. (2017b) ‘Interpersonal
art psychotherapy for the treatment of aggression in people with learning
disabilities in secure care: A protocol for a randomised controlled feasibility
study.’ Pilot and Feasibility Studies 3, 1, 42.
Hennessy, E.A. (2017) ‘Recovery capital: A systematic review of the literature.’
Addiction Research and Theory 25, 5, 349–360.
Kurimanzutto (2018) Accessed on 12/7/2018 at www.kurimanzutto.com/en/
artists/gabriel-orozco. 
Lackoi, K., Patsou, M. and Chatterjee, H.J. et al. (2016) Museums for Health and
Wellbeing. A Preliminary Report from the National Alliance for Museums,
Health and Wellbeing. Museums for Health and Wellbeing.
Laub, J.H. and Sampson, R.J. (2003). Shared Beginning, Divergent Lives:
Delinquent Boys to Age 70. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. 
Lloyd, B. and Kalmanowitz, D. (2005) The Drawing Shed. Accessed on 24/7/18
at www.thedrawingshed.org/bobby-lloyd. 
London, L. (2016) ‘LifeWorkArt External Projects – Creative Dialogues.’
(Unpublished master’s dissertation). Newcastle University. 
Longabaugh, R., Wirtz, P., Zywiak, W. and O’Malley, S. (2010) ‘Network
support as a prognostic indicator of drinking outcomes: The COMBINE
study.’ Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs 71, 837–846.
McNiff, S. (1998) Trust The Process, An Artist Guide to Letting Go. Boston,
MA: Shambhala. 
O’Brien, F. (2004) ‘The making of mess in art therapy: Attachment, trauma and
the brain.’ Inscape 9, 1, 2–13. 
Putnam, R. (2000) Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American
Community. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster. 
Rothwell, K. and Hackett, S. (2018) ‘Violent Acts and Creative Responses:
Resilience Building Through Art Psychotherapy.’ In J. Adlam, T. Kluttig and
B.X. Lee (eds) Violent States and Creative States: From the Global to the
Individual. Volume II – Human Violence and Creative Humanity. London
and Philadelphia, PA: Jessica Kingsley Publishers. 
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Schaverien, J. (1999) The Revealing Image: Analytical Art Psycotherapy in

Theory and Practice (second edition). London: Routledge. 
White, W. and Cloud, W. (2008) ‘Recovery capital: A primer for addictions
professionals.’ Counselor 9, 5, 22–27. 
Winnicott, D.W. (1971) Playing and Reality. London and New York, NY:
Routledge. 
 CHAPTER 7

The Caring Museum/

Le Musée qui soigne
Art Therapy at the Montreal
Museum of Fine Arts

Stephen Legari, Marilyn Lajeunesse

and Louise Giroux 

Introduction
Entering the International Atelier for Education and Art Therapy
Michel de la Chenelière at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts
(MMFA) you are greeted by a broad corridor with dark tiled floors
and walls that climb to a vaulted glass ceiling more than 20 metres
high. The effect is cathedral-like and inspires the gaze to wander up.
There you will find Betty Goodwin’s sculpture Triptyche, featuring
a massive bronze ear and a bifurcated reflection that, along with its
accompanying text, speaks of the perils of language. This is a space
conceived for creative human activity. 
With more than 3500 square metres dedicated to the activities
of the Department for Education and Wellbeing (DEW), the Atelier
is  the largest of its kind in a museum setting in North America.
There are 12 studios, two venues for exhibitions, a community open
studio, a group dining area, and spaces to relax. This is also where the
art therapy programme is housed. The programme includes various
therapy groups, workshops, exhibitions, student placements, the

157
158 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Art Hive, several research partnerships, and a full-time art therapist

in residence. It is the culmination of nearly 20 years of engaged
community practice and stands as a bold response to a society’s needs
that are only growing in number and complexity.
On a given week, the Atelier is abuzz with school groups, spe­
cialised visits for wellbeing, workshops, and museum art therapy.
As it is one of Quebec’s major cultural institutions, French is the
common language of exchange, but the MMFA enjoys a multilingual
energy reflecting Montreal’s multicultural population and the one
million plus annual visitors. It is an ever-evolving hub that draws
the attention of educators, benefactors, researchers and those
seeking to connect through art. This chapter will report on the
theory, practice and evolution of art therapy at the MMFA. We will
identify the confluence of professionals, partners and stakeholders
who germinated a handful of pilot projects into a fully integrated
and sustained museum-based art therapy practice. We hope to
inspire both the international museum community and art therapists
worldwide to expand and develop museum art therapy.

A humanist fine arts museum 

In 2016, Nathalie Bondil, Director General and Chief Curator of the
MMFA, published a Manifesto for a Humanist Fine Arts Museum.
She wrote:

Rethinking the nature of our public means, above all, to consider

our visitors as living, experiential beings. The human need for
‘beauty,’ or at least for aesthetic sentiment, is physiological, not
just philosophical or cultural… We now have to think about art
as a force for social cohesion and individual wellbeing. (Bondil
2016, p.20)

Congruent with this manifesto, the orientation of the education and

art therapy team is Rogerian. Present-focused, empathic, authentic,
relationship oriented and unconditionally positive in regard are the
humanistic principles which guide the practice of the museum’s DEW.
When the team encounters the public, whoever that may be, the regard
is one of understanding, acceptance and welcome (Rogers  2003).
This theoretical framework allows for cohesive intention across the
The Caring Museum/Le Musée Qui Soigne 159

disciplines of group art therapy, open studio, mediation, gallery visits

and supervision.
The humanistic approach, however, is not practised to the
exclusion of other orientations. The museum’s full-time art therapist
is systemically and psychodynamically trained and oriented. While
the here and now informs the general practice of art therapy,
exploration of early experience, attachment, family of origin and
systemic stressors can be mobilised for the benefit of the participant,
when appropriate. Additionally, the art therapy training programme
at the MMFA accommodates the approaches of collaborating uni­
versities, whether psychodynamic/eclectic (Concordia University),
or gestalt/existential/humanistic (Université du Québec en Abitibi-
Témiscamingue/UQAT).

Museum art therapy 

The international literature on art therapy in museums and galleries
has been instrumental in illuminating the diversity of this specialised
practice and has inspired the art therapy programme at the MMFA.
While the exploration of the fine arts museum as a setting for art
therapy began to emerge in earnest in the 1990s (Alter Muri 1996;
Parashak 1997; Stiles and Mermer-Welly 1998), recent literature
details the increasing range of therapy activities possible in a museum
setting and the populations they can reach (Bennington et al. 2016;
Jury, Landes and MagSIG 2015; Spraggins Rochford 2017).
Art therapists have developed the notion that museums can be
therapeutic spaces (Coles and Harrison 2018; Hamil 2016; Ioannides
2016). The fine arts museum, historically a bastion of privilege, has
become a venue offering wellness and respite to those marginalised by
factors of race, gender, socioeconomics, intersectionality, sexuality,
mental health and physical illness. Museum art therapy finds footing
in this dynamic as a bridge to include marginalised communities in
museum programming (Canas 2011; Thompson 2012), as thera­
peutic benefit for people living with long-term illness such as cancer
(Deane, Carman and Fitch 2000) and for those living with psychosis
and severe mental health difficulties (Colbert et al. 2013; Coles and
Harrison 2018; Marin 2015; Thaler et al. 2017), as well as their
caregivers (Shaer et al. 2008). 
160 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Research in the arts and health has proliferated in recent years

(All-Party Parliamentary Group on Arts, Health and Wellbeing 2017;
National Institute for Arts in Health 2017). Within this momentum,
art therapy and wellbeing programming can be found sharing the
same venue in a museum. This is true for the MMFA, the Memphis
Brooks Museum of Art and the Indiana University Eskenazi Museum
of Art (Keller n.d.; Memphis Brooks Museum of Art n.d.). This co-
habitation of programming offers a collaborative resource and can at
times contribute to confusion for both the public and staff alike. For
instance, wellbeing as a concept is widely employed by the cultural
sector but evades common definition (Thomson et al. 2012). Van
Lith and Spooner (2018) report on important differences in practice
and expertise to delineate art therapy from wellbeing activities.
Their findings suggest that programmes share common ground in
seeking to improve the lives of participants, with art-making as an
essential ingredient, but differ in terms of objectives, facilitation and
qualification. Wellbeing projects are often facilitated by educators
or artists, and activities are associated with increased feelings of
enjoyment and happiness. Art therapy projects focus on individual
client objectives and treatment outcomes, and must include the
presence of a qualified art therapist (Van Lith and Spooner 2018). 

Art therapy at the MMFA 

In 2017, the MMFA launched a fully integrated art therapy prog­
ramme as a branch of the DEW. The department hired a full-time art
therapist, Stephen Legari, as programme officer. Based on available
research, this was the first time internationally that a museum had
created a full-time position for an art therapist. This position has
a mandate to develop programming, facilitate groups, collaborate
on research, supervise students and manage the museum’s Art Hive.
While innovative in its scope and implementation, the programme
benefits from nearly two decades of community outreach and
programme development in the DEW. 
When developing new art therapy projects, steps are taken to
guarantee the ethical treatment of each participant, with emphasis
placed on co-creation with partnering organisations. Each project is
 Figure 4.1 Ivan Aivazovsky, ‘The Ninth Wave’ (1850), oil
on canvas, © State Russian Museum, St Petersburg

Figure 4.2 Painted sculptures. ‘From monologue to dialogue’ workshop (1997)

Figure 5.1 Samuel Hirszenberg, ‘Sabbath Rest’
(1894), oil on canvas. Ben Uri Collection

Figure 5.2 Chana Kowalska, ‘Shtetl’ (1934),

oil on canvas. Ben Uri Collection
 Figure 5.3 Alfred Wolmark, ‘In the Synagogue’
(1906), oil on canvas. Ben Uri Collection

Figure 5.4 David Breuer-Weil, ‘The Edge’ (2007),

oil on canvas. Ben Uri Collection
Figure 5.5 Albert, ‘Waiting in Line’, pencil and pastel drawing

Figure 6.2 Collective collage workshop

 Figure 6.5 The exhibition: detail

Figure 7.2 ‘Totem-Muses’, collective artwork by participants from Le Cap

Figure 7.3 ‘Expérience de mort imminente’ (‘Near Death

Experience’), part of the contrasts project. Participant artwork
portraying experience as a patient with traumatic brain injury
 Figure 8.1 (detail) ‘4 casb 2 ’67’, 1967; Barry Flanagan
(1941–2009). Purchased 1976; © The estate of Barry Flanagan/
Bridgeman Images; Photo © Tate, London 2019

Figure 9.1 Participant artwork after viewing ‘The Rape of Europa’

 Figure 9.2 Participant artwork after visiting the
‘Messages from the Wall’ exhibition

Figure 9.3 Participant artwork after viewing ‘Albia’

 Figure 12.2 Stage-managing the boat

Figure 12.3 Postcard exhibition on the table

The Caring Museum/Le Musée Qui Soigne 161

planned according to objectives, theme(s), frequency, materials and

human resource. Projects might benefit from collaboration with other
professionals including museum mediators and health or mental
health care professionals. However, the art therapy component of
each session is always facilitated by an art therapist and all projects
are built on the foundation of art therapy practice. In the dynamic of
this therapeutic relationship, the art-making and the encounters with
works of art, a participant may experience an improvement in health
alongside a recovery/discovery in their sense of self, and/or a respite
from burdens of chronic illness. The following is an outline of the
best practice tenets for art therapy projects at the MMFA, developed
from programme evaluations in community partnerships, which are
discussed later.

Co-creation 
Each project is treated as a stand-alone collaboration requiring the
expertise of the partnering organisation. Their knowledge and under­
standing of their membership help the museum team understand the
motivations, needs and abilities of participants. The process begins
with important questions for the partner that include previous
experience with art therapy, previous experience with the MMFA,
participant needs, frequency of sessions requested, and whether
the museum setting has been fully considered. This is followed by
a series of meetings at the museum and the partner’s setting. As the
partnership develops, the museum relies on the partner to recruit,
typically, eight participants per therapy group. When a project is
in pilot stage, it is clearly stated so that the participants know they
are contributing to something new and can impact its development.
Standard practices of informed consent are conducted when the
group begins. 

Roles 
The roles, field of expertise and limitations of each stakeholder are
made clear at the outset of the project. Responsibilities are defined
both at a logistical level (e.g. transport for participants), and at a
professional level (e.g. facilitation of group art therapy). Initial
162 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

meetings help to establish these roles, serving to limit miscommu­

nication between team members when the art therapy project is
under way.

The museum collection

Projects are related to artworks in the MMFA’s collection. Art
therapy at the MMFA takes as its point of departure that interacting
with works of art in the gallery adds a unique dimension to the art
therapy process and is believed to enhance participant experience.

Evaluation and record keeping 

Feedback, evaluation, and debriefing are essential tools for resolving
problems and improving delivery of the programme. Team members
must communicate about the project’s progress throughout in order
to serve the participants well. This includes celebrating successes and
planning for subsequent sessions. Similarly, paying careful attention
to participants’ feedback is essential. Written reports are produced
and maintained by the art therapist and programme officer. While
reports on participants’ therapeutic progress are not shared as they
are confidential clinical material, reports on the project’s progress
are, thereby respecting the confidential boundaries of the project. 

Exhibitions 
Exhibition of participants’ artwork must be preceded by fully informed
consent by all participants at the outset of a project. This begins
at the recruitment stage when partnering agencies communicate the
mo­tivation, potential benefits and risks involved in exhibiting work
made in an art therapy context. Not every project will result in an
exhibition, but the experience of exhibiting in the fine arts museum
milieu can be validating for participants and educational for the
public.
The Caring Museum/Le Musée Qui Soigne 163

Early collaborations 
In 2014, a regional community mental health centre (Le Centre
d’Apprentissage Parallèle de Montréal1) that provides services to
adults living with psychological or emotional difficulties proposed
a collaboration with the MMFA. The centre emphasises artistic
creation as a means of personal recovery and socio-professional
reintegration, and includes art therapy with the pioneering Quebec
art therapist, Yvon Lamy. 
For this pilot project, ten participants made ten visits of two-and-
a-half hours to the museum, including visits to galleries facilitated by
a museum mediator and art therapy workshops facilitated by Lamy.
Themes, which ran for two weeks each, were co-developed and
included: the self-portrait, the artist and his/her environment, symbols
and what they represent, and ‘a work that fascinates me’. The project
culminated in a 12 x 7 collective mural that was exhibited in the
museum’s education pavilion and a short video filmed at intervals,
with the full consent and voluntary participation of the participants.
The objectives of the project were congruent with the centre’s
own strengths-focused approach. The centre’s programme includes
the regular exhibition of work in its gallery space that highlights the
work of its members. The centre also makes regular use of video to
educate the public, destigmatise mental health problems, and offer
testimonial opportunities to its members. The video filmed at the
MMFA was made available to the centre for its purposes.
While the gallery visits were theme-based, participants were
encouraged to identify works that resonated with their personal
experience. One participant identified with proto-surrealist Alberto
Martini’s ‘Self-Portrait’ (1929) (Figure 7.1). The participant likened
the darkness and nude figures to her experience of incest. She later
incorporated these themes into her own work, which showed stacked
figures in a totemic style. She reported:

It needs to be talked about because it happened to me…the way

that I imagined my project was in stages. That’s my life. The
adult [figure], she suffered. Up higher we find the child. That’s to
show that there is more to come than what she survived. (MMFA
2014)
1
www.ateliersducap.org/en/who-are-we/mission
164 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Figure 7.1 Alberto Martini, ‘Self-Portrait’ (1929), oil on canvas.

The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, purchase, Horsley and
Annie Townsend Bequest. Photo MMFA, Brian Merrett

The exhibition of the collective mural would be the museum’s first

presentation of work done in an art therapy context. Work produced
in art therapy can often be raw, unrefined, honest and devoid of the
constraints of an academic approach. These qualities were a challenge
to the previous administration of the education department, who
were not accustomed to the process-orientated nature of art therapy
art-making. This tension necessitated collaboration and education
The Caring Museum/Le Musée Qui Soigne 165

between partners. In the end, the work was prominently displayed

in a public space joining the educational pavilion and the galleries.
An art opening was held and the participants were invited to speak.
Attested by art therapist Yvon Lamy, for many participants the
experience was transformative: ‘There were people who were in crisis
during the process, who continued the process despite everything…
An experience like this is a support, a means of survival, in the midst
of profound difficulty’ (MMFA 2014). Thus, the opportunity to
exhibit their work and speak publicly about their lived experience
was an opportunity of validation for the participants (Figure 7.2). 

Figure 7.2 ‘Totem-Muses’, collective artwork by participants from Le Cap

Another project which informed the development of the art therapy

programme was a research collaboration between the MMFA, the
Eating Disorders Program of the Douglas Mental Health University
Institute, and the Art Therapy Graduate Program in the Department
of Creative Arts Therapies at Concordia University (Baddeley et al.
2017; Thaler et al. 2017). The groups are closed, but to accommodate
the structure of the clinical programme, returning participants join
those coming to the museum for the first time. In addition to the art
therapist and mediator, the group is accompanied by two psycho-
educators who are responsible for the continuity of the behavioural
clinical protocol, including the monitoring of breaks and calorie
intake.
166 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Each session begins with research questionnaires (Thaler et al.

2017) that include scales rating eating preoccupation and urges,
body satisfaction changes and mood. Another scale for museum visit
satisfaction is completed at the end of the day. Snacks and check-
in follow the questionnaires before the mediator guides the group
through the gallery, where she elicits the personal associations of the
participants while providing historical and anecdotal information on
the works of art. As with all art therapy groups at the MMFA, the
visits take place during regular museum hours. Many agencies have
a social integration objective for their populations which the visits
can help to fulfil. Participants consent to visits ahead of time and all
groups remain unidentified. Feedback on the visits is incorporated
into future sessions.
Themes are chosen based on the evolving goals for the group,
whether to encourage respite from preoccupying thoughts (e.g. the
imaginary) or issues closer to the group’s shared experience (e.g.
the female figure). Themes are believed to help contain an experience
that can otherwise be anxiety-provoking. Themes are also flexible
enough to allow for a variety of associations. The clinical goal of
normalising eating together in a public space means that following
the visit, lunch is shared by both participants and staff.
After lunch, the art therapist reintroduces the theme by inviting
links between the morning’s visit and the choice of materials provided.
If working with a theme such as the container and the contained, the
art therapist might provide craft boxes and a variety of materials
to explore the inner and outer world of the participants. On other
occasions, non-directive, media-focused approaches are used, such
as working with clay, natural materials and fluid media. It has been
observed that semi-structured interventions provide a container that
helps to minimise anxiety. Participants are always encouraged to
explore the materials in any way they choose.
Shared reflection on personal process follows the art-making.
Moments of ease can be hard won by these participants, who contend
with the psychological impact of distorted self-image, anxiety,
depression, fatigue and other symptoms. Qualitative data suggests
there are discernible benefits to the museum art therapy programme.
The Caring Museum/Le Musée Qui Soigne 167

As Thaler et al. (2017) report, ‘patients often noted that visits helped
distract them from troublesome thoughts and feelings. In addition,
many patients noted enjoying the exposure to an alternative way of
letting feelings out, or of being more present in the here and now’
(p.5). Further findings are discussed later. 

2017 to present 
The art therapy programme has enjoyed a robust development, with
opportunities to collaborate with community organisations, clinics,
agencies and universities. The following is a sample of the projects
realised since its full-time inception.
The programme ran a weekly two-month pilot project for women
living with breast cancer. Following the group, voluntary feedback
was sought from participants through an anonymised questionnaire.
The results were predominantly positive, and the comments helped
refine themes and length of components. One example of the feedback
received was from ‘Claire’ (pseudonym): 

The project has helped me significantly with the ordeal of my

breast cancer, and each week has allowed me to regain the serenity
and acceptance of illness needed to get through these difficult
times. In addition, sharing with women with similar experience
was extremely important and provided me with significant moral
support. The eight weeks passed too quickly and I would have
needed more to continue to benefit from the therapy. 

A collaboration with the Centre de Services de Justice Réparatrice

(Centre for Services in Restorative Justice)2 is structured as a monthly
semi-closed group for adults whose lives are impacted by violent
crime. A theme is chosen each month (e.g. reconciliation, navigating
the storm) and one or more artworks from the collection are selected.
Up to eight participants are recruited for the three-hour group, which
includes check-in, reflection on the theme and artwork, art-making,
and reflection on the process.

https://csjr.org/en
2
168 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Another partnership, with Autisme Sans Limites,3 an organisation

supporting young adults with high-functioning autism, runs a weekly
group focusing in equal parts on psycho-education and art therapy,
with the time divided between the galleries and the studio. The
24‑week programme emphasises the exploration, identification and
experience of emotions and their nuances, and strives to help the par­
ticipants reduce social barriers. This project is now in its second year.
The art therapy programme was invited by an association
of Francophone doctors, Médecins Francophones du Canada
(MFdC), to present an exhibition of client artwork at their annual
conference. To respect client confidentiality, a project was conceived
in collaboration with the Centre for Excellence in Patient Partnership
with the Public,4 with the express purpose of communicating patient
experience through art to a community of physicians. The participants
co-designed the project with the art therapist and included the theme
of contrasts (life before and after diagnosis), and consented to an
exhibition of artwork. Inspired by the benefits of museum-based
social prescribing (Chatterjee and Camic 2015; Chatterjee et al.
2018), this project coincided with the development of a collaborative
pilot project between the MFdC and the MMFA (MMFA-MFdC
n.d.) (Figure 7.3).
The art therapy programme also collaborated with an agency
providing end-of-life care and bereavement services (Welcome to
NOVA Montreal5) to create a museum-based, eight-week, art therapy
and bereavement support group pilot project. The group followed a
certified bereavement protocol that included viewing artworks and
tailored art therapy interventions. The group was co-facilitated by the
MMFA’s art therapist and an agency social worker and is scheduled
for relaunch following a project evaluation.

3
www.autismesanslimites.org/en
4
www.ceppp.ca/en
5
www.novamontreal.com
The Caring Museum/Le Musée Qui Soigne 169

Figure 7.3 ‘Expérience de mort imminente’ (‘Near Death

Experience’), part of the contrasts project. Participant artwork
portraying experience as a patient with traumatic brain injury

Other ongoing projects include a monthly group for young adults

living with language and communication difficulties (Installation
Raymond-Dewar6), retreat workshops for healthcare providers,
a dance movement therapy collaboration for people living with
Parkinson’s (Parkinson en mouvement7), and collaborating art
therapists’ facilitated groups for young adults living with cancer, and
another for trans and non-binary youth.

www.fondationrea.ca/en/ird
6

www.parkinsonenmouvement.org
7
170 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Museum art therapy: training,

education and scholarship 
Training 
Students of art therapy have made valuable contributions to the
theory and practice of art therapy in museums with several theses
on the subject (Babock 2011; Hamil 2016; King 2018; Klein 2015;
Moreau 2017; Sloan 2013). The museum has also become a legitimate
milieu for the training of art therapists (Treadon 2015). In its full-
time status, the art therapy programme of the MMFA has welcomed
both student scholars and interns.
In 2017, the MMFA was recognised as a training setting for art
therapy, with two students from Concordia University beginning
an eight-month placement. This included facilitating two groups
weekly, one with women living in transitional housing (Y des
femmes de Montréal8) and a second with young adults living with
high-functioning autism. In February of 2018, a student from the
francophone university UQAT facilitated a ten-week group for
women living with breast cancer. Students were supervised both
on‑site and at the university.
For training purposes, the students from Concordia University
also follow one individual in art therapy during the school year,
referred by a collaborating agency. Individual art therapy in a mu­
seum setting is both of interest and problematic. While those who
participated may have benefited from a therapy they could not
otherwise access, the resources to provide such a service to a larger
public do not yet exist. For the time being, individual art therapy will
remain within the practicum frame.

Art therapy courses at the museum 

In 2017, the MMFA housed its first master’s course in art therapy.
Taught by Dr Janis Timm-Bottos, the course titled Symbolic Imagery
and Art Therapy benefited from the museum setting to provide access
to both the studios and collections, for experiential learning. In her
syllabus, Timm-Bottos writes: ‘through experiential art workshops

www.ydesfemmesmtl.org/en
8
The Caring Museum/Le Musée Qui Soigne 171

and readings, symbols and the symbolic/metaphoric function are

examined with reference to various psychological models, including
Freudian psychoanalysis, Jungian analytical psychology and Hill­
man’s archetypal/imaginal psychology’ (Concordia University 2017).
The course in symbolic imagery is a core course of the master’s cur­
riculum (Concordia University n.d.).

Art therapy research at the MMFA 

The Art and Health Advisory Committee of the MMFA is helmed
by Quebec’s Chief Science Officer, Rémi Quirion, and comprises
recognised researchers, philanthropists, museum and departmental
directors, and art therapists. The role of the committee is to guide
and advise research projects developed for the museum, which
includes art therapy research. For each project, qualified researchers
and art  therapists are responsible for the holding of participant
experience, therapy frame, data analysis and sharing of findings.
Whether arts-based, qualitative or mixed-methods, the projects
employ the same protocol of co-creation as other art therapy groups.
Concordia University Creative Arts Therapies Associate Professor
Yehudit Silverman brought the challenging research project, Seeds of
Hope: An arts-based approach to raising awareness about suicide
and fostering resiliency. Silverman, who had previously produced
both literature and a film on the subject of suicide (Silverman and
Firm 2014; Silverman, Smith and Burns 2013), invited 20 adult
participants, including those from the Inuit community, to explore
the impact of suicide on their lives through guided museum visits and
mask-making. The project culminated in a group exhibition.
Beginning in 2017, Vera Heller, Professor of Art Therapy at
UQAT, employed the myth of the hero’s journey as a foundation for
her heuristic research project, Imagined Journeys. Working with a
group of adult individuals who had migrated voluntarily from their
home nation, the group explored the existential complexities of
migration and hybrid identity. The group was led through various
eras of the museum's collection to explore the personal, the symbolic
and the metaphoric by museum mediator Sayeh Sarfaraz who drew
upon her own lived experience of migration as well as her expertise
172 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

as a contemporary artist. Over 20 sessions, Heller invited the group

to enter the realm of the imaginary to bring transformation to
their real-life journeys. A group exhibition at the museum completed
the project.
In 2017, two articles were published on the project with the
Douglas Mental Health Institute (Baddeley et al. 2017; Thaler et al.
2017) looking at the museum experience as an adjunct for people
living with eating disorders. The first evaluated the potential for art
therapy to produce short-term benefits in self-image and mood. Data
was collected during each visit, with a total sample of 78 patients.
Measurements included the Profile of Mood States (POMS-BI) (Lorr,
McNair and Fisher 2010), eating disorder preoccupations and urges
using a visual analogue scale, as well as body image concerns using
the Body Satisfaction Scale (Slade et al. 1990). The participants also
completed a questionnaire at the end of the day for thematic analysis.
Questions included: ‘How did you find your experience of being
at the museum?’, ‘What could be improved?’ and ‘How was your
experience during the art therapy workshop at the museum?’ (Thaler
et al. 2017).
The study found that art therapy was a suitable adjunct for
adults with eating disorders with no significant short-term impact
on eating preoccupations or body image, either positive or negative
(Thaler et al. 2017). The qualitative data suggested nearly uniformly
positive support for the museum protocol, with participants reporting
increased calmness following the art therapy sessions. A sampling of
participants’ comments included, ‘I love the opportunity to let out
my emotions in another way than speech or writing’ and ‘I liked
the therapy workshop as it helped me change my mind and be more
present’ (Thaler et al. 2017, p.3). 
Complementary to this study, Professor Laura Evans from the
University of North Texas reported on the project design from a
museum education perspective (Baddeley et al. 2017), conducting
interviews with the museum team, including the programme officer,
mediator and art therapist. From the interviews, she identified salient
thematic challenges for constructing such a project in a fine arts
museum setting. These included the necessity of careful collaboration,
developing strategies for responding to participants’ experiences,
The Caring Museum/Le Musée Qui Soigne 173

appreciating the challenges of the population, and the intersection of

museum education and art therapy (Baddeley et al. 2017). 
Art therapy graduate student Ellen Smallwood developed a
museum-based protocol for adolescents and young adults living with
epilepsy, inspired by the approach of the art therapists of Studio E
(Stafstrom, Havlena and Krezinski 2012). Smallwood’s mixed-
methods study followed a group over eight weeks at the MMFA.
The protocol included four theme-based visits to galleries, art
therapy, and before-and-after testing at the Sheldon Memory Lab
of McGill University (Sheldon Memory Lab9). Smallwood’s data for
the attend group showed decreased scores of depression and stress
and increased scores in quality of life compared to the no-attend
group, with interviews revealing themes of social connection and the
externalisation of the impact of epilepsy (Smallwood 2019).
In 2019, the art therapy programme conducted a research col­
laboration with UQAT art therapy Professor Jacinthe Lambert in
collaboration with the Quebec Breast Cancer Foundation. Lambert,
who is both an art therapist and psychologist with an expertise in
positive psychology (Lambert and Ranger 2009), serves as lead
researcher looking at the lived experience of women living with
breast cancer. Existing literature supports the positive impact
of art therapy for women with breast cancer (Collie Bottorff and
Long 2006; Thyme et al. 2009). There is, however, little literature
exploring a museum-based art therapy programme (Deane et al.
2000). The study followed two consecutive groups of eight women
over ten weeks with sessions lasting three hours per week and gallery
visits on every other week.

The Art Hive of the MMFA 

Art therapists at the MMFA are also active in non-clinical work at
the Art Hive. This community studio, the first of its kind in a museum
setting in the world, is a partnership with Concordia University and
builds on the applied research of Art Hive founder and art therapy
professor Janis Timm-Bottos. With a mandate of arts-based social

www.sheldonmemorylabatmcgill.com
9
174 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

inclusion, the Art Hive opens its doors twice weekly to the general
public and provides free access to materials, space, the support of an
art therapist and a museum mediator, and the opportunity to freely
explore art-making and social connection. At the time of writing, there
were 135 art hives worldwide with more than 30 in Montreal alone.10
At first glance, the Art Hive appears to be the synthesis of both
open studio and community practice (Deco 1998; Hosea 2006). Studio
practice is sometimes conceived of as a polarity to clinical art thera­
py practice (Wadeson 2002) with its emphasis on the art-as-therapy
pro­cess and its recognition of participants as artists rather than
patients or clients (Allen 1995; Malchiodi 2007). In Timm-Bottos’s
vision, the Art Hive transcends its association with the psychiatric
milieu to truly connect with its roots in community organising, and
takes its place as a co-constructed, community-driven third space
(Timm-Bottos 2006, 2016; Timm-Bottos and Reilly 2014). While the
Art Hive is often facilitated by art therapists, Timm-Bottos calls for
an egalitarian dynamic wherein the professional is as much a learner,
art-maker and community member as those who make the hive their
public homespace. The Art Hive of the MMFA occupies a unique
space at the intersection of the museum, the community, education
and art therapy. The number of visitors varies each time the Art Hive
opens, with an average of 20 participants. In its first year, the Art
Hive of the MMFA welcomed more than 3000 participants.

Programme origins: sharing the museum 

Several art therapy projects have enjoyed development through their
affiliation with museum educators (Deane et al. 2000; Parashak 1997;
Rochford 2017; Treadon, Rosal and Thompson Wylder 2006). This
is true of the art therapy programme at the MMFA. The following
describes the expansion of the MMFA’s educational activities be­
tween 1997 and 2017 and its impact on the education department’s
identity and public role. We hope that through this description, other
museums and art therapists will find ingredients to realise their own
ambitions in museum art therapy.

10
www.arthives.org
The Caring Museum/Le Musée Qui Soigne 175

In 1997, the MMFA embarked on a humanist mandate to broa­

den its educational and cultural mediation reach to the widest
possible audience. The foundation of this initiative, entitled Sharing
the Museum (Le Musée en partage), was built on the following
tenets: to establish a programme of free, ongoing activities for the
public that included access to both the museum’s collections and
creative activities; to develop and provide specially designed projects,
both short and long term, to community groups; and to adopt a
socially progressive approach based on openness, attentiveness and
action. The programme became the foundation for the co-creation
of community partnerships at the MMFA and is the template on
which the art therapy programme was later built. Programme Officer
Marilyn Lajeunesse has been Sharing the Museum’s steward since its
inception and remains so today.
In its first five years, the programme mobilised the reach of the
MMFA’s collection and expanded the presence of community exhibi­
tions through co-created partnerships. These diverse groups included
children from disadvantaged neighbourhoods, young families on
limited incomes, people with disabilities, at-risk youth, older adults,
immigrants, literacy groups and various ethnic communities from
across Montreal. The breadth of these projects demonstrated a move
towards the inclusion of wellbeing objectives as opposed to strictly
traditional educational ones. 
In 2002, a major five-point evaluation of the programme was
launched consisting of interviews with administrators, focus groups,
a series of in-depth interviews with a sampling of participants, and
the distribution of 1000 free tickets to a sampling of those who had
participated in group activities in order to evaluate individual return
visits. The entire education team was involved in this process. The
results yielded invaluable feedback from partners and participants
and produced salient themes that came to inform the future of all
community collaborations. These included: the quality of welcome
and the closing process of each group are important; the programme
is congruent with other community work and complements the work
in holistic health management/prevention; the arts are not a luxury –
they are a means to feed spiritual and emotional health; exhibits offer
other perspectives and important links to history.
176 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

By the end of 2004, an average of 38,154 individuals had par­

tici­
pated in the programme. From 2004 onwards, the wellbeing
dimension of the activities expanded as did the populations that
were involved. These included children with terminal illness, various
mental health associations, major hospitals, participants with autism
spectrum disorder and others with pervasive developmental dis­
orders, people impacted by homelessness, people with Alzheimer’s,
indigenous groups, and senior citizens groups which eventually took
the form of weekly free activities for those 65 and over.
As the number of partnerships expanded, a new position was
created in 2014 to coordinate them. Louise Giroux, now Programme
Officer for Well-Being, is a former museum educator at the MMFA
herself and develops and implements partnerships with several
communities, hospitals and populations (Figure 7.4). 

Figure 7.4 Sharing the Museum (Le Musée

en partage) (Photo: Pierre Arsenault)

Philanthropy 
Philanthropy has been the lifeblood for the development and expan­
sion of the MMFA’s education, wellbeing and art therapy initiatives.
Increasingly, family foundations, corporations and individuals have
The Caring Museum/Le Musée Qui Soigne 177

sought to direct their funding towards programmes that are impact

oriented and socially conscious. The art therapy programme owes its
sustainability to the relationship between donors and the museum’s
foundation, which are charged with communicating the programme’s
activities and ambitions.

Conclusion
As a unique model of fully integrated art therapy in a fine arts mu­
seum, the MMFA’s programme continues to innovate and expand its
activities in therapy groups, research, training and new partnerships.
New students arrive every autumn to begin their placements, research
projects help to expand both our appreciation and understanding
of the art museum as a legitimate milieu for art therapy, and the
expanding presence of collaborating creative arts therapists contri­
butes invaluable expertise to the programme’s development. The
programme has gained attention in the press both locally and
internationally, and the future of art therapy at the Montreal Museum
of Fine Arts looks flourishing.

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 CHAPTER 8

Expanding the Frame

Developing and Sustaining a Long-
Term NHS Art Museum Partnership Within
a Workforce Development Strategy
for Enhanced Quality of Care

Sheila Grandison

Introduction
The right to take part in cultural life is explicitly stated in Article 27 of
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (United Nations 1948):
‘Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the
community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement
and its benefits.’ It is perhaps surprising then that some 70 years
later widening access to cultural institutions and diversification is
seen to be in need of urgent attention at a policy level. The report
Equality, Diversity and the Creative Case (Arts Council England
2018, p.40) asserts:

In our strategy we acknowledge that there are significant differ­

ences in how much people engage with arts and culture – and the
opportunities they have to do this. Those most actively involved
tend to be from the most privileged groups; engagement is heavily
influenced by levels of education, socio-economic background
and where people live.

181
182 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

This chapter discusses a long-term NHS art museum partnership that

appears to contradict these assertions. It considers the development
of the opportunity for an underprivileged and vulnerable group of
people to access modern and contemporary art in an art gallery
setting, in a way that diversified visitor demographics to an iconic
London gallery. It also advanced an NHS workforce directive  for
delivering compassionate care, and expanded the contextual  frame
of art therapy. Art therapy and museum education are both rooted
in practices promoting dialogue when looking at art objects and
artefacts. These two specialised fields have come together in this
innovative partnership to bridge the different environments of hos­
pital ward and art gallery in a way that has benefited NHS patients
and staff of both institutions alike.
The partnership between the East London NHS Foundation Trust
and Tate Modern (the ELFT/Tate partnership) enables access to a
major London public art gallery for adult mental health service users
resident in three areas of east London that fall within the five per cent
of most deprived areas of England, namely Newham, Hackney and
Tower Hamlets (Greater London Authority n.d., p.515). Many of the
service users are first-time visitors to an art gallery and the partnership
enables them to engage directly with the collection displays in one of
the largest galleries of modern and contemporary art in the world.
The ELFT/Tate partnership is ongoing, but the time-frame considered
here is 2007–2017. During this period, significant policies from the
health and culture sectors helped shape the partnership’s flexible
working model for delivering gallery-based groups with service users
in line with recovery-focused practice, alongside training workshops
for nursing staff, arts therapists, specialist psychiatric registrars and
consultant psychiatrists.
Reclaiming the rights of people with mental health problems
drives recovery-focused practice in its shift away from recovery in the
narrow sense of receiving treatment for symptoms, to the recovery
of values defined by individuals themselves. When drawn from a
common sense of humanity, these values include expressing the right
to culture. Cultural rights are embedded in human rights and what it
is to be human. Supporting access to art and culture, Michael Rosen,
the children’s author, states (Arts Council England 2013, p.11):
Expanding the Frame 183

The arts are a means by which we can investigate and understand

the past and the present, our world and our feelings. We can do
this by ‘doing’ it or by ‘spectating’ it or both… This is one of the
ways in which we can discover the history and shape of humanity
and where or how we fit into it.

Additionally, through its capacity to create connections between

individuals and groups, the museum director Diane Lees (Arts
Council England 2013, p.37) refers to art and culture as providing ‘the
context for the richest of social interactions’. These reported effects
concerning ‘how we fit into’, within a context of social interactions,
chime with the desired psychotherapeutic goals of group art therapy
when reflecting on cultural difference, expressions of social identity
and power relations in group process.

The art therapy context

In 2007, before the Olympics came to east London in 2012, and as an
art therapist working in acute clinical settings at the Newham Centre
for Mental Health, I found that reflecting on clinical practice in this
specific geographic location raised a particular issue: how to connect
service users to the collections of an art gallery or museum, given
neither a gallery nor a museum existed in the borough at that time.
Newham, a deprived outer London borough in east London, is
an area characterised by immigration, which is mirrored in the local
population of mental health service users. For inpatients, the group
art therapy table could function as a symbolic hospitable space,
around which people were enabled to express themselves through
sensory engagement with art materials to start a process of defining
their worlds. Through making, using and learning from the artworks
made, new forms of seeing and understanding were made possible.
Being with, and being curious about, cultural diversity was a live
dynamic in the group matrix. Openness and tolerance may not have
matched the lived experience of group members from incoming
communities, so looking first to the immediate environment of the
ward community, and how to engage service users more fully in their
social relations with ward-based staff (also a culturally diverse group),
was an important first step for building the ELFT/Tate partnership.
184 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

The 2011 Census showed Newham to have the most diverse

population in the UK, with higher rates of patients recorded with
diagnoses of schizophrenia, bipolar affective disorder and other
psychoses (Aston-Mansfield 2017). Hand-in-hand with ethnic diver­
sity is a high turnover of the local population, mirrored in a rapid
changeover of service users in the throughput of admissions and
discharges to and from the inpatient wards. While English continues
to be the main language spoken, many in Newham report they
cannot speak English well, or at all. With 103 different languages
identified, Bengali, Urdu, Gujarati, Lithuanian, Tamil, Polish,
Punjabi, Romanian, and more, can all be heard on the streets, in the
shops and in the local mental health centre.
Despite no local art gallery to draw on in Newham, it was the
steadfast belief in the capacity of art to connect, contain difference
and promote cultural understanding that guided the strategic
development of the ELFT/Tate health and culture partnership, with
diversity at its core. How might engagement with the community
resource of Tate Modern, an art gallery some eight miles away, assist
in vitalising socialisation between service users and staff working
alongside them in the East London NHS Foundation Trust? What
bridges, symbolic and concrete, would need to be crossed?

Figure 8.1 Connecting: Art as a bridge across site and context

Left: Entrance to the Newham Centre for Mental Health. Supplied courtesy of
East London NHS Foundation Trust. Photo credit: © Sheila Grandison, 2012
Centre: Tate Modern from St Paul’s, 2016, Tate
Photography. © Tate, London 2019
Right: ‘4 casb 2 ’67’, 1967; Barry Flanagan (1941–2009). Purchased 1976;
© The estate of Barry Flanagan/Bridgeman Images; Photo © Tate, London 2019

The three photographs in Figure 8.1 show the ELFT/Tate partnership

in compressed visual form. On the left is the reception area of the
Expanding the Frame 185

Newham Centre for Mental Health, the middle image is a view of

Tate Modern from St Paul’s looking across the River Thames with
the Millennium Bridge in the foreground, and the image on the
right shows a gallery installation at Tate Modern, with the floor
sculpture ‘4 casb 2 ’67’, 1967, by the Welsh sculptor Barry Flanagan
(1941–2009). If the four, over life-size, conical shapes of Flanagan’s
artwork were transposed from gallery space to the entrance space of
the mental health centre, their identity would no doubt shift from
artwork to objects of risk. A further, imaginative shift is also possible
– from risk to curiosity – about these unexpected and unusual objects
formed of blue canvas sacks filled with sand. The affect of interest
comes into play, transcending the confines of site and context.
How are the disparate materials of canvas and sand related? Helen
Delaney (2002) refers to their mutual support ‘by which the sand
holds up the canvas, while the canvas contains the sand’. For the
viewer, this intriguing interchange arouses curiosity and inquisitive
interest. Choosing to look at contemporary artworks, not so much for
determining their place and value within the cultural establishment,
but for their provocative open-endedness for stimulating engagement,
enquiry and reflection and the exchange of ideas, was central to the
ELFT/Tate partnership.
In the early stages of developing the partnership, 2007–2009,
the role of the arts therapies in inpatient care was coming to the
fore at ELFT, with art therapy and music therapy recognised as
contributing to high-quality care and good practice on the wards in
a rigorous programme of standards known as AIMS (Accreditation
for Inpatient Mental Health Services), regulated by the Royal College
of Psychiatrists (2017). Also, the National Institute for Health and
Care Excellence (NICE) included, first in 2009 and again in 2014,
the recommendation: ‘Consider offering arts therapies to assist in
promoting recovery, particularly in people with negative symptoms’
(NCCMH 2014, 9.3.8.4, p.221) in clinical guidelines for psychosis
and schizophrenia in adults.
Group art therapy was being practised at the time in the inpatient
clinical settings, offering a regular safe space for service users for
whom the capacity to be with others, their families and communities,
had broken down. Therapeutic focus was on restoring interpersonal
186 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

relating, informed by the group analytic objective to achieve a

healthier integration of individuals in a network of relationships.
The ELFT/Tate partnership provided an opportunity to expand the
network beyond the boundaries of inpatient group art therapy, to
the larger group of staff and service users in the immediate ward
community and beyond – to social groups with members of the
public at Tate Modern.
In group art therapy on the wards, the group size was small (six
to eight service users), allowing people to express themselves and
promote individuation. While on the ward, the daily lives of service
users and staff are inextricably linked. It was envisaged that to increase
the size from a small group in a clinical ward setting to a median
group in a public gallery space (with a membership of at least 13,
composed of service users and ward-based staff), would be a means
to promote an atmosphere of social interaction and participation,
involvement and sharing. Pisani (2009, p.287) describes the median
group’s objective as: ‘not so much to socialize the human indivi­dual
as to humanize the socio-cultural context’ (my italics), and cites the
essence of the median group in this endeavour to be ‘free floating
dialogue’.
Through the visual and verbal dynamics of inpatient group art
therapy, issues of loss through the trauma of social upheaval, in­
stability of identity formation, and the abjectness of social isolation
were being explored. People from different parts of the world were
making connections to the personal lived experiences of others, with
the felt loss collectively shared. International, contemporary visual
art is often produced in contexts of conflict and trauma, with the art
used to offer reflections and bring people together. By maintaining
the relationship between the individual and the group, and the
essentially social nature of human experience, the question was how
a partnership with Tate Modern might contribute to understanding
trauma empathically. Also, by expanding the therapeutic frame to
include the social space of a public art gallery, whether it was possible
to look at the quality of relationships with others in relation to the
reported benefits of ‘improved social functioning and improved men­
tal health’ (Crawford and Patterson 2007, p.70) evidenced in group
art therapy for people diagnosed with schizophrenia. The combined
Expanding the Frame 187

membership of service users and staff in an off-ward group would

reflect the wider norms of society, not only the conventions of role
while on the ward.
The selection of artworks from Tate Modern’s collection was key
to reflecting on these questions in the ELFT/Tate groups. In their
pre-group preparation and dynamic administration, curator and
art therapist, as co-facilitators of the groups, identified artworks
specifically for their potential to enhance the engagement process
for first-time viewers, and to resonate with contemporary social
concerns. One such work was ‘No Woman, No Cry’, 1998, by Chris
Ofili (born 1968), the British Turner Prize-winning artist. The title is
taken from the song by Bob Marley, the Jamaican reggae musician,
where the persuasive, repetitive chant of the lyrics urges an unseen
female listener not to be sad. In Ofili’s painting, the female made
visibly manifest is the mother of Stephen Lawrence, the black teenage
boy murdered in an unprovoked racist attack in London in 1993. At
the centre of the tears falling from her eyes, Ofili has collaged a small
photograph of her son’s face and written the words ‘RIP Stephen
Lawrence 1974–1993’ across the canvas.
Access to cultural rights and the right to freedom of expression
underpins Tate’s commitment to achieving equality and diversity.
Viewing Ofili’s painting prompts awareness of the findings of the
judicial inquiry into the teenager’s tragic death that exposed pro­
fessional incompetence in police conduct and institutional racism
(Macpherson of Cluny 1999). An overhaul of Britain’s race relations
followed the inquiry’s recommendations. The viewer engages in the
gravity of the social content through the range of unexpected mixed
media used. Resting on two large lumps of elephant dung placed on
the floor, the painting leans against the gallery wall, inviting the viewer
to look ever more closely at the detail and into the pale blue tears,
which is what the groups did. The group dialogue that developed
around viewing contemporary artworks was as much about the
curiosity of seeing work that stretched personally held definitions and
stereotypes of what art might look like, to the enjoyment of finding
intriguing visual details, to exploring cultural resonances pertinent to
both personal lived experiences and wider social issues evoked in the
narrative of artworks such as ‘No Woman, No Cry’.
188 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

The opportunity to experience the alternation of spatial, psy­

chological and cultural displacement and transformation in a gallery
setting, as a viewer was made possible by looking at large-scale
sculptural environments in particular. Personal memories of the
South Korean artist, Do Ho Suh (born 1962), are conveyed through
his artworks based on the architectural spaces he has occupied at
different times. In ‘Staircase-III’ (2010), the memory of the space
of his parents’ traditional Korean house in Seoul is fused with his
Western-style living as an adult. Using diaphanous red material, a
replica of the staircase in his New York apartment is suspended from
the ceiling but does not reach the floor – it is dreamlike. Suspended,
too, is the theme of migration and cultural displacement specific to
the artist, and the feeling of estrangement he associates with a divided
cultural background. As an installation that occupies an entire room
at Tate Modern, the staircase floats in gallery space. In psychological,
in-between space, the viewer is invited to connect with the staircase
as an object of transition, captivated by the multitude of associations
it conjures up.

The policy context

Significantly, the ELFT/Tate partnership is focused on acute adult
mental health, involving service users and staff from inpatient wards,
rather than community outpatient services. This deliberate choice
was to address the state of acute mental health care in the mid-
2000s and to work innovatively with a representative cross-section
of the multicultural local population and the multiple psychosocial
dimensions associated with it. Policy reviews from this period, for
example from the Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health (1998, 2005),
had highlighted widespread difficulties in acute inpatient mental
health care, neglected as a consequence of prioritising community
services. Service users were reported as describing a lack of regular
and meaningful engagement with ward-based staff and feelings of
not being treated with due respect, dignity and understanding during
acute admissions. A strategic swing to address concerns regarding
standards of care in inpatient mental health settings was shown to
be pressing.
Expanding the Frame 189

During the same period, the culture sector was looking to engage
a broader audience in recognising that national cultural institutions
belong to everyone. In Culture on Demand, the Department of
Culture, Media and Sport (2007) had confirmed the challenge to
cultural engagement in three identified priority groups: disabled
people (covering both physical and mental disability, or infirmity),
black and minority ethnic people and people from lower socio-
economic backgrounds (Department of Culture, Media and Sport
2007, p.6). From the outset, the ELFT/Tate partnership was clear
that its work together would not consist of ‘tick-the-box’, one-off
days out for service users to an art gallery which, although they might
well be enjoyed, could perhaps be forgotten and therefore were of no
real consequence. Furthermore, we wanted ward-based staff to be
integral to the partnership’s work.
What started in 2007 as a local initiative within the context of
group art therapy practice at the Newham Centre for Mental Health,
has over ten years become integrated into a Trust-wide workforce
development strategy intent on delivering creative approaches for
compassionate care by all, and for all. Art therapy remains central to
the ELFT/Tate partnership and as the initiating art therapist, I remain
actively involved in my role as Trust-wide Training & Development
Lead for Arts Therapies. Facilitation of the ELFT/Tate partnership
groups is held jointly by me and the Curator of Public Programmes at
Tate Modern, currently Michèle Fuirer, and formerly Liz Ellis (then
Curator, Community Programme, Tate Learning), with invaluable
support from Assistant Curator, Emily Stone.
Another key colleague in the partnership was Barbara Rice, a
former Borough Lead Nurse for Newham. She first endorsed the
partnership’s visual arts programme as continuing professional
development for ward-based nursing staff to enhance reflective
thinking and promote new ways of relating to service users. Through
her innovative recruitment programme in Newham, 2007–2010, the
promotion of creative approaches to mental health treatment and
recovery became integrated into the job plans of nursing support
staff. These new staff members worked alongside nurses and arts
therapists at the Newham Centre for Mental Health in supporting
190 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

creativity-based solutions for service user engagement in daily one-

to-one contact.
Pioneers from the first recruitment cohorts, and in particular,
Rose Hall, Stephanie Hands, Aimee Neale, Claire Vestergaard and
Jamie Williams, were colleagues actively involved in the ELFT/Tate
partnership groups who contributed to promoting the partnership
with staff and service users on their respective wards. Support for
the working model of the ELFT/Tate partnership to develop creative
initiatives in staff development programmes continues at a strategic
level with the Lead for Nurse Development Programmes (Rebecca
Lingard), the Professional Lead for Allied Health Professions (Stephen
Sandford) and colleagues in the People & Culture directorate.
The ELFT/Tate partnership has three phases. Thinking about
Looking, 2007–2014, was funded through the East London NHS
Foundation Trust, with Tate Modern Public Programmes providing
curatorial staff expertise and material resources for use in the work­
shops. Groups were limited during this first phase to nursing support
staff and adult service users from the Newham Centre for Mental
Health. The second phase, Creative Approaches to Compassionate
Care, 2014–2017, was scaled up as a training model for nursing
support staff across the Trust, with external funding received through
Health Education England. The current phase continues enquiry
into how creativity fits with compassionate care, with the McPin
Foundation, a specialist mental health research charity, undertaking
an external evaluation of the ELFT/Tate groups with nursing and
medical staff in the period 2015–2019.
Following the public inquiry into the scandal and failings of care
at the Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust (Francis 2013), the
Cavendish Review (Cavendish 2013) flagged attention to training,
finding that training and development of healthcare assistants
and support staff was often not consistent or good enough. It was
similarly noted (Health Education England 2015, p.39) that in
providing approximately 60 per cent of hands-on care, healthcare
assistants ‘must be a significant focus for investment because they are
so important to patient safety and wellbeing’, noting ‘yet often have
little access to training or personal development’.
Expanding the Frame 191

ELFT/Tate Creative Approaches to Compassionate Care train­

ing workshops for developing observation and empathy skills are
now included in ELFT’s Care Certificate for nursing support staff,
life skills recovery workers and social therapists working across
the Trust in adult, MHCOP (mental health care of older people),
CAMHS (child and adolescent mental health services), forensics,
and other specialist services. What started as a localised art therapy
initiative has developed into a Trust-wide training initiative, at the
centre of which is looking together at artworks in a gallery. The use
of art materials in response to what has been seen, and in relation
to the process of spectator participation – of noticing, recognising,
connecting, taking-in and reflecting – remains paramount throughout
the programme. The partnership holds central the potential for art
to make a difference to the individual and the collective through an
intensive and subtle process of making meaning from art. Enhanced
observation and listening ability and the exchange and exploration
of ideas in group dialogue are transferable skills to take back to
the workplace.
Improving the experience of inpatient care is a key target for
all. For service users in acute states of mind, communication can
often be through challenging behaviours, including verbal abuse,
withdrawal and apathy, unpredictability of mood, and self-neglect.
Staff can feel devalued and helpless, finding it difficult to think and
reflect in the face of resistance and the cross-fire of projections.
Nevertheless, delivering compassionate care is paramount. With a
view to supporting staff to maintain the capacity to be resourceful
and reflective with service users, the partnership aims to encourage
creative approaches and new ways of relating. The East London NHS
Foundation Trust is committed to testing out innovative training
opportunities and considering creative ways to expand and support
the existing workforce through the fusion of arts and health skills.
One question for ELFT is how being together with service users
in a group in the gallery might help with risk management and work­
ing with resistant behaviours on the ward. Overall, we found that
the experience of speaking more freely in groups at Tate promot­
ed better communication back on the ward – for all  involved.
192 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Clinical  vignettes written by nursing support staff include both

pre- and post-group information. They include the anxiety of multi­
disciplinary team colleagues regarding the suitability of service users
to attend the ELFT/Tate groups, as well as the positive feedback
from the staff and service users after attending. Vivid accounts of
how service users stayed focused, contributed to group dialogue,
shared their own artwork and made personal links with the artworks
seen in the gallery are reported. Important too, are the reports of
increased cooperation in the care planning process back on the ward.
For example, a service user struggling with personal hygiene may be
more receptive to assistance from nursing staff, in contrast to being
previously aggressive or resistant to support.
As the partnership looks ahead to the next five years, its focus
will be on the area of staff retention, as much as on direct service user
benefit. Patient care and workforce development go hand-in-hand.
In her response to the recent report, Leading Change, Adding Value:
A Framework for Nursing, Midwifery and Care Staff (NHS England
2016), Karen Deeny from the NHS England Patient Experience Team
pertinently asked in her blog (Deeny 2017):

When we talk about staff and about patients, should we think of

them as separate groups of people delivering care and groups
of people receiving care? Do we need to make better connections
between the two sides of the coin, the two sets of experiences,
in order to make better sense of how they relate and what this
means for our work together to improve them?

Deeny’s (2017) question envisages patient experience and staff expe­

rience as a co-creation. For improvement of each to be possible
she advocates looking purposely at ‘the two sides of the coin to­
gether’; holding the two-way tension, rather than considering each
side separately. For the ELFT/Tate partnership, conceptualising
enhanced quality of care as a relationship, seeing two different sets
of experiences and holding in balance their meaningful relatedness,
has always been central to the partnership’s development.
Providing opportunities for mental health service users and health
staff to be together in a public art space was the keystone for bridging
two very different environments of psychiatric ward and art gallery.
Expanding the Frame 193

Exploring what it means to embed patient groups in the delivery

of staff training programmes was made possible by this bridge.
The patient voice is integrated through service users reporting on
the positive impact of the public gallery space, with its rich sensory
stimulation of the artworks, in contrast to the starker environment
of wards. Reports from service users feeling respected when viewing
art with ELFT and Tate staff corroborated this, as did their feelings
of being nourished, symbolically through group dialogue and the
transformative power of art, as well as through good food at Tate.
Collaboration between experts of experience and experts by
training – co-production – is a means for transforming mental health
care and the direction towards which the ELFT/Tate partnership
is moving. In supporting new collaborative relationships between
frontline professionals and service users, the ELFT/Tate partnership
actively contributes to this significant attitudinal shift by innovatively
engaging the resources of both groups in an off-ward environment.

The ELFT/Tate working model

The ELFT/Tate partnership looks to bridge the worlds of two very
different public service institutions, to connect and break down
barriers to contribute to the better understanding and functioning
of each. From a health perspective, the ELFT/Tate working model
addresses the needs of service users and staff from inpatient mental
health settings. For service users, the need for more direct time with
staff had been flagged, and for ward-based staff, innovative staff
development training programmes were required to meet national
standards for compassionate care. From a cultural perspective, there
was the opportunity to develop links with the healthcare sector and
consider an audience-engagement initiative for diversity and inclusion
in relation to current issues and practice in the field of mental health.
Both the East London NHS Foundation Trust and Tate Modern
could consider the impact of cultural access and patient care from
the partnership’s working model. 
Tate Modern had been running the workshop programme Art
into Life since the gallery opened in 2000, offering free gallery
introductions that attracted a wide range of adult groups from social
194 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

and health settings. The aim of the ELFT/Tate partnership was to

develop a bespoke programme that fostered a two-way bridge
between psychiatric ward and art gallery. An inquiry into diversity
policy and practices in the cultural sector was undertaken between
2007 and 2009 by Dewdney and colleagues in the extensive research
project Tate Encounters: Britishness and Visual Culture (Dewdney,
Dibosa and Walsh 2013). The recommended direction for cultural
policy regarding diversity was to move closer to a model of relational
reflexivity, rather than educational pedagogy. The combined thinking
of gallery educator and art therapist could move creatively between
these two conceptual frames of reflexivity and pedagogy.
From a psychotherapeutic stance, Burnham (2005, p.4) describes
relational reflexivity as how therapists and clients ‘explicitly engage
one another in coordinating their resources so as to create relation­
ships with therapeutic potential’. Reflecting further, he states: ‘it takes
hard work as well as imagination to coordinate the resources of client
and therapist to create and maintain a relationship that is experienced
as therapeutic for the client’. Exploring ways of relating to service users
that could be ‘experienced as therapeutic’ (my italics), and as co-created
with ward-based staff, has defined the ELFT/Tate working model.
Tate, with its expertise in museum and gallery education, and
informal learning programmes for including multiple voice perspec­
tives, and ELFT’s expertise in understanding the remit of inpatient
care and group dynamics, came together to dissolve rather than
reinforce boundaries associated with imbalances of power between
service users and ward-based staff. The groups did not aim to work
with service users as practised in small group art therapy in a clinical
setting. The objective was to enhance curiosity, thinking and dialogue
through engaging with contemporary artworks in a gallery setting,
for a richer understanding of sense of self and others, by experiencing
how anxieties and social issues may be revealed and aesthetically
reconciled in contemporary artworks.

Group dialogue
The ELFT/Tate partnership looks to the everyday to understand better
how to balance the opposites of site and context. The performance
artist Naomi Kashiwagi asserts (Arts Council England 2013, p.57):
Expanding the Frame 195

‘The arts have the potential to show that the everyday can be
reinvented and that the ordinary is usually extraordinary and that
the extraordinary can become part of or intervene and wonderfully
interrupt everyday life.’
To conceptualise and bridge art gallery and mental health settings,
the link to the everyday is pivotal. Referring to visitor participation
in museums, the American Museum director Nina Simon urges
us to ‘Imagine looking at an object not for its artistic or historical
significance but for its ability to spark conversation.’ (Simon 2010,
p.127). Such an ethos chimes with the aims and objectives of the
ELFT/Tate partnership. The gallery displays, the public spaces and
the collection at Tate offer a unique social space for participatory
learning. Opportunities are made for group members to reflect
together in the shared public space, building connections together
through imaginative thinking and high-quality art-making activities.
The transformation of everyday, commonplace materials taken
from natural and industrial worlds made for new connections
between art and life. In response to ‘Tree of 12 Metres’, 1980–82,
by Giuseppe Penone (born 1947), an Italian artist of the Arte Povera
group, group dialogue ranged between curiosity about the enormous
scale of the sculpture, the dwarfing of their human scale next to it
and how that felt, to thinking about wood as a material in everyday
objects around them – the doors they walked through, the tables
they sat at, the paper drawn on, and books read. Through making
connections with different materials and moving between general
and personal associations, group dialogue held new and embodied
narratives. Participants travelled imaginatively through associations,
memory, hopes and dreams.
Central to the ELFT/Tate groups were visual art dialogues and
creative interactions facilitated in the gallery with the nursing staff and
service users, for building forms of shared meaning. These dialogues
were developed through looking at and making artworks together,
then exported to the wards for further one-to-one development in
the context of the care planning process and so work which began
at Tate Modern continued back on the wards in a cooperative and
collaborative way. For the service user participants, the Tate groups
were destigmatising, providing the opportunity to be in a public
space as equal members of the public. For the nursing support staff,
196 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

the groups challenged preconceived ideas about contemporary art

and questions concerning what, if anything, partnership with an
art gallery could achieve. By interacting with service users away
from the risk-averse environments of the ward, nursing staff came
to experience the ELFT/Tate groups as an example of positive risk
management in providing an opportunity to be with, experience and
understand service users anew. For both service users and nursing
staff, talking freely and discussing artworks together was experienced
as optimistic and constructive.
In the first phase of the ELFT/Tate partnership, Thinking about
Looking, four group days were facilitated annually at Tate Modern.
In-between, nursing support staff received group supervision from
an art therapist in relation to their work with service users on the
wards, and follow-up sessions at the Newham Centre for Mental
Health were arranged with the Tate curator. Service users who had
participated in the ELFT/Tate groups helped facilitate an inpatient
group for service users who had been unable to make the journey to
Tate Modern. By projecting large-scale slides of artworks during the
cross-ward Living Gallery Group, service users were able to share
their experiences and continue discussion of artworks they had seen
at Tate Modern with others who had not been there on the day.
The role of the facilitators in the ELFT/Tate groups was to work
with the many projective threads and resonances in the group, to faci­
litate group cohesion and the development of group narrative. The
fluidity of the free association conversations, and interest taken in
the personal and subjective responses of all, enabled marked changes
in levels of engagement, concentration and articulation. In enabling
connections to be made, the co-facilitation of museum educator and
art therapist provided a sense of security for participants to develop
dialogue. Positive experiences relating to being in a group featured
prominently in the thematic analysis of post-group feedback forms.
When working with people with histories of psychosis it was found
that the simplicity of a statement such as, ‘I was part of a group’,
speaks loudly of achievement in awareness of self and orientation
to others. Feedback also referred to the joy of being in a group and
recognising that coming to an art gallery on one’s own would not be
the same. Being in a group with different people raised awareness,
Expanding the Frame 197

cooperation and patience. Seeing more through looking and talking

about art together in a group increased confidence and self-esteem.
Some ELFT/Tate groups in the second phase of the partnership,
Creative Approaches to Compassionate Care, were designed speci­
fically as training workshops for staff. Keeping the emphasis on
creative responses to the everyday, nursing and medical staff were
asked to make use of a range of throwaway, abject – or found – objects
picked up from everyday clinical environments. Examples included
tops of biros, perforated tear strips from salary slips, paperclips,
coffee cartons, empty food containers, elastic bands, straws, dried up
whiteboard pens; an eclectic variety of objects not regarded as having
creative potential. The staff group’s task was to transform abjectness
through creative responses. While working concretely with the found
objects and playing with them creatively, language used in response
to these objects could be worked with metaphorically. A vocabu­
lary describing the discarded, abandoned, broken, overlooked and
forgotten objects could then be linked to what it is to work with
powerful projections of worthlessness and rejection, unconsciously
communicated by service users and experienced negatively by staff in
their daily lives in clinical environments. Seeing and discovering how
artworks displayed at Tate Modern could be as much about small-
scale gesture as about large-scale physical presence was significant
for building the confidence of nursing and medical staff to make
use of everyday and commonplace things in their conversations and
interactions with service users back on the wards.
Metaphorical resonances to mental health care informed the
selection of artworks for use in the staff training workshops. ‘Babel’,
2001, by the Brazilian artist Cildo Meireles (born 1948) (Figure 8.2)
speaks of interference, conflict and the inability to hear, listen and
communicate with one another. Constructed of radios, lighting and
sound, it is playful, yet disturbing in its cacophony. Hundreds of
radios are stacked together in layers, each radio tuned to a different
wavelength frequency and volume. The mix of voices and music emits
a confusion of sound information as they compete with each other
to be listened to. Links were made in the group dialogue to what it is
like to work on often chaotic psychiatric admission wards, and the
phenomenon of hearing voices in psychosis. With its immersive multi-
198 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

media of sight and sound, this installation repels communication, yet

simultaneously invites touch and participation to tune in.

Figure 8.2 ‘Babel’ 2001; Cildo Meireles (born 1948). Purchased jointly
by Tate, London (with the assistance of the Latin American Acquisitions
Committee) and the D. Daskalopoulos Collection, 2013, as a promised
gift to Tate; © Cildo Meireles; Photo © Tate, London 2019
Expanding the Frame 199

In contrast to thwarted attempts at attunement set up in ‘Babel’,

the 2015 Hyundai Commission for Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall,
entitled ‘Empty Lot’, by the Mexican artist Abraham Cruzvillegas
(born 1968), was more hopeful. Describing his artwork in terms of
hope, Cruzvillegas explained: ‘everything is usable, nothing is dead
– everything is alive’ (Cruzvillegas in Tate 2015). Included in this
installation is soil collected by the artist from different parks across
London and discarded materials from building sites. Cruzvillegas
refers to the possibility that something might grow as well as not
grow in the plots of soil, affording opportunity for hope. An artist’s
capacity for patience in tolerating both possibilities, of new growth
or not, resonates metaphorically with what it is to be with people in
disturbed states of mind, and to be in relation with them hopefully,
respectfully, and creatively.

Conclusion
The challenge of supporting adults experiencing complex presenta­
tions of mental ill-health in ways which recognise the individuality and
cultural context of each person at a time of shrinking budgets, raises
significant issues. The policy briefing The Role of Arts and Cultural
Organisations in Health and Wellbeing (All-Party Parliamentary
Group on Arts, Health and Wellbeing 2017) confirms:

Museums and galleries offer a non-clinical, non-stigmatising

environment in which to undertake journeys of self-exploration…
and the case is being advanced for them to be considered part of
the public health landscape. Cultural institutions could do much
more to address health and wellbeing.

Galleries and museums are spaces in which subjective experiences of

diversity are made manifest, held in the artworks by a diverse range
of international artists as well as in the diversity of the audience
viewing them. Delivering small group art therapy for service users
at Tate Modern was not a part of the ELFT/Tate partnership, but
facilitating median groups, with a combined membership of service
users and ward-based staff, and Tate gallery staff, was central to it.
Trust, confidence, knowledge and relationships have been built with
200 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

gallery staff, health staff and service users over the long duration of
the partnership. The opportunity developed for Tate to more fully
belong to the neighbourhood of London, and be part of the lives of
adults in east London who would not previously have been aware
of the gallery.
The ELFT/Tate partnership looked to emphasise the potential
for social engagement through conversational enquiry in front of
artworks, with a view to enabling humanising experiences and dia­
logue to find their way back into the working life of busy inpatient
wards of acute mental health units. Understanding playful, interactive
and improvisational ways of establishing hopeful and compassionate
emotional contact with service users, how to be with them and how
to be in relation with them creatively, was the work we did together.

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 CHAPTER 9 

Art Therapy at the Bilbao

Fine Arts Museum
A Gaze Through Emotions, Culture
and Social Integration 

Karen Lund 

Background and basic principles

The intention of this chapter is to show the interrelation between
art therapy and social projects in a museum context through the
design, setting up and execution of the programme Let’s Include
the Museum, carried out by the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum (BFAM),
which has shown a continued interest in creating a participatory
meeting space for people at risk of social exclusion. The programme
began with a three-month pilot project in January 2011 and has
continued ever since. 
Art therapy in a museum context offers a therapeutic approach to
help enhance the individual and social integrity of socially excluded
groups in relation to their community (and in this case, to the BFAM
as an institution at the service of society). By mediating through
artistic appreciation and process in the presence of an art therapist
and providing a secure ‘holding’ setting, it facilitates and contains the
expression of emotions. Without the support of a therapist to con­
tain these emotions there is a potential risk that the activity would
be experienced as destabilising or disturbing, as argued by Shaer
et al. (2008). The presence of an art therapist helps to establish a

202
Art Therapy at the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum 203

confidential setting of trust, an important ethical consideration when

working with these groups. Additionally, throughout the programme,
particular attention has been paid to understanding and adapting
to the clients’ emotional needs, for example by choosing paintings in
the gallery that will most interest them and will help to foster their
personal, emotional and social responses so that they might have the
opportunity to be transformed by the experience. The importance
of the role of a professional art therapist in creating an appropriate
setting and carrying out suitable interventions with these specific
groups cannot be understated and is explored further later. 
In 2010, meetings were held between me, as an independent art
therapist with prior experience of working with diverse groups, and
the BFAM to explain exactly how art therapy works (something the
institution was unfamiliar with), with a view to creating a programme
proposal based on the considerations already mentioned above. The
mutual interests of both parties led to a working agreement whereby
the museum took me on as a member of their staff to develop the
project and carry out the future programme.
The programme, Let’s Include the Museum, was structured
around two fundamental aspects agreed between the Department of
Education and Cultural Action (DECA) of the BFAM and the art
therapist. First was the museum’s desire to be seen as a public space
for the benefit of the whole community and its interest in creating a
collaborative resource that encourages centres working with groups
at risk of exclusion to make use of art as a means of personal growth
and integration. This was achieved through programmes such as Let’s
Include the Museum that prioritise the active participation of socially
less considered groups and help to fulfil the museum’s commitment
to combatting stereotypes and social isolation. Second was the
importance of the incorporation of an art therapist to design and co­
ordinate interventions based on an understanding of the emotional
and interrelational needs of the group, as well as knowledge about
art and its creative processes. By focusing on non-verbal and mainly
visual language and communication, art therapy offers a valuable
alternative to the written and spoken word, as argued by Dalley (1987).
The dialogue that is established through symbolic, metaphorical and
creative processes facilitates understanding because it allows the
204 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

artistically expressed contents of the artwork to sometimes become

accessible to both the participant and the group long before they
are consciously recognised. This process, mediated through the art
object, facilitates contact and the expression of feelings or thoughts,
at times difficult to verbalise (Dalley 1987). The art therapist plays an
important part in helping to open up an individual’s creative process,
accompanying them in the process and accepting the outcome in
a non-judgemental way, so that both the creative process and its
product occur without outside influence, opinion or preconception.
This neutrality helps encourage spontaneous creative expression and
offers a secure environment for exploration of both the process and
the finished artwork.

Objectives of the programme 

Considering the fundamental aspects mentioned, the main objectives
of the ongoing programme can be summarised as follows: 

• To bring these groups to the museum to enable them to

discover its artistic heritage, and to allow them to respond
to the artworks themselves through the group’s own artistic
expressions. 
• To empower these groups by welcoming their personal
contributions through contemplation and dialogue concerning
the artwork displayed. 
• To provide opportunities for people to give their own voice to
their feelings and opinions through the creative expression in
the workshop. 
• To aid personal growth. 
• To promote the integration of these groups in public life,
counteracting a tendency towards isolation, and emphasising
the relationship between the individual and their environment
to promote a path towards healthy emotional development. 

Once the basic principles and objectives of the programme were

established, between me, as the art therapist in charge of the project,
along with the Director of the DECA who acted as a co-facilitator in
its setting up, we agreed to start the programme with a pilot project
Art Therapy at the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum 205

for a period of three months focusing on individuals with mental

health difficulties. 
First, we held meetings with: Osakidetza, the mental health
network of the Basque Public Health System; Lantegi Batuak,
the organisation that generates job opportunities for people with
cognitive and physical disabilities and those with poor mental health;
and Avifes, an association of people with mental health problems
and their families. We explained the idea of the programme and the
institutions contributed with their opinions and experience. Our
proposal was novel because their existing extra-clinical activities
focused on occupational workshops, leisure workshops or recreational
outings, and did not in most cases involve any psychological therapy
outside the institution. They were particularly interested in the
idea of both opening up the museum to their users and providing
them with the opportunity to actively participate through their own
artistic creation. In their own words, the programme was seen as
‘innovative, interesting and necessary’. 

Implementation of the programme 

The pilot project, as a first step in the overall programme, started
in January 2011. The BFAM allocated funds from its budget, and
for the first time incorporated into its team, formed of historians,
educators and artists, an art therapist as a professional in charge of
planning the practical details of the programme in cooperation with
the DECA. 
It was agreed that the activities of the programme, starting with
the pilot group, would be carried out every fortnight for a minimum
of three months, unlike the one-day activities usually offered by the
museum. This frequency was established in order to obtain better
results in terms of encouraging deeper engagement in the activity by
the groups and to promote interrelation within the individual groups.
As Case and Dalley (2006) argue, group therapy enables members to
improve their interpersonal skills; participants can try out new roles
and through mutual support discover new aspects of themselves,
especially in terms of taking their own initiative and discovering a
new sense of independence. At the same time, the feeling of being
206 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

accompanied by the art therapist and the whole group helps to

encourage members to see change as a real possibility. In short, the
interactive group experience can help members to internalise positive
group experience.
It was agreed that each session would be two hours in length
and the number of participants would be no more than ten. Case
and Dalley (2006) argue that the size of group is important so that
everyone can maintain visual and verbal contact with each other.
In addition, a small group provides an opportunity for each person
to have an adequate share of time in discussion, reflection and
exploration. At the same time, the DECA prepared an organisational
chart regarding schedules, availability of halls and workshop rooms,
and any necessary artistic materials. The participating institutions
committed themselves to collaborating by taking into consideration
the characteristics of the programme and informing their users clearly
about the creative and therapeutic nature of the project. They also
explained that participation was voluntary.
Since all of the participants were referred to the programme by
the participating organisations, it was impossible for me, as the art
therapist, to organise prior assessments, request consent forms or
consider the make-up of the groups prior to their formation, as might
have been customary in a clinical setting. Consequently, before the
commencement of the project I did not know the participants per­
sonally, and so meetings were held between me and one professional
from each institution (psychologist or social worker) to better
understand the profiles of future participants, to understand and
consider their emotional presentation and diagnosis, their capacity to
tolerate and carry out work in a group and their level of compatibility,
motivation and commitment. This information was necessary before
we decided the final configuration of each group, to ensure maximum
group cohesion. In this way, we achieved agreements that respected
the criteria and the professional objectives of both parties, which
during the course of the programme has turned out to be particularly
enriching through the interchange of professional knowledge and
shared views. 
The details of the programme were then explained again by me
and the Director of the DECA in the first meeting with the groups
Art Therapy at the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum 207

to highlight the voluntary, therapeutic and cultural nature of the

programme, the importance of confidentiality and the timing of
the programme, and to offer an opportunity for individuals to ask
questions. The participants gave their verbal consent to take part
in both the project and the evaluation at the end. As we did not
have written consent from the participants before the start of the
programme pilot, appropriate consents were requested before the end
to conform with data protection. It was made clear to all individuals
that their comments would be recorded and might be used, for
example, in internal reports and academic articles or publications,
their confidentiality and anonymity being maintained at all times. 
In addition, as requested by the centres, it was agreed that there
would be one accompanying professional from each institution
(psychologists, social workers) for each group of a maximum of
ten people. This was part of the institution’s policy to monitor the
participation of their users in activities outside the centre to ensure
their safety. The importance of establishing the role of the person
accompanying the group as a non-participating observer was
emphasised. Since from my personal experience I knew that their
presence would influence the activity, as argued by Kislev (2015), it
was essential to try to minimise the possible effect of their role on the
participants’ responses to the group, and on development of creative
processes in the workshop. For me, as the art therapist, this aspect
was fundamental to create a sense of trust and a strong bond with the
group in order to facilitate their emotional expression. In this respect,
the way the art therapist facilitates the group plays a key role in the
nature of the group, as argued by Waller (1996). Lack of clarity in
the role of the observer, resulting in observers making interventions
contrary to the art therapist, can result in ambiguity and confusion.
In particular, comments about the art-making process, or passing
aesthetic judgement on the artworks, can feel intrusive and inhibit
group members from voicing their feelings and opinions through
their creative process. ‘If the interventions of the facilitator help the
group to achieve their tasks, we could say that the group is going in
the right direction’ (Ramos i Portas 2003, p.4).
It was also agreed that the professional accompanying the group
would submit a written report after the workshops, providing
208 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

additional information for the art therapist by observing what went

on before and after the workshops. For example, the professional
might note any changes in the emotional state of the participants,
observations or knowledge about the participants that could affect
the group work, or anything they noticed during the activity which
they considered to be important, bearing in mind their understanding
of the participants.

Structure of the activity 

Each meeting of two hours was divided into three phases: 

1. Visiting the gallery: contemplation of a previously selected

artwork within a thematic selection chosen by myself and
bearing in mind the characteristics of the group. 
2. Creative-experiential workshop: non-directive workshop
where the group could freely explore their own interests and
resources, inspired by their visit to the gallery. 
3. Sharing session within the group: time for group reflection,
always voluntary, on their artwork and the feelings evoked. 

The activity, both in the pilot and in the subsequent programme, began
by going to the museum gallery to contemplate a single artwork. The
purpose of viewing a single artwork was to create a space for focused
visual attention in order to facilitate free associations, especially
for groups not used to visiting museums. Bearing this in mind, I
considered it important to adjust the museum visit to the participants’
needs. Many people feel excluded from museums, thinking that they
are only for people who know about art, to the extent that a museum
visit may be intimidating. In order to minimise these effects, the
experience of viewing art needs to be as accessible and comfortable
as possible to motivate the group participants to view the work with
confidence, to feel relaxed about their reaction and comments, and
to feel that these are as relevant as any theoretical understanding of
the artwork. For this reason, our approach has been to not influence
the group with prepared comments about the artwork so that the
engagement with it can be as free and spontaneous as possible. Seated
in silence, observation was invited with questions such as: ‘What do
Art Therapy at the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum 209

we perceive in it? What emotions are awakened? What impression

does it make on you?’ This first contact with an artwork, as Gilroy
(2007) argues, is an aesthetic moment where there is a non-verbal
state, a fusion between subject and object. Works of art are dynamic
entities that allow the viewer to project their feelings and thoughts
while exploring the meanings and narratives to explain private and
social experiences. 
In the observation and dialogue, various processes occur, as
mentioned by Maclagan (2005). First is the description that allows
us an initial contact to discover and get to know the object of our
attention. Then there is the elaborative process when we begin to
relate to and expand on what we see, when the observed image invites
us to form different associations and create new narratives. This is
followed by interpretation, when we make connections between the
artwork and individual or collective symbolism. These processes
tend to be mingled so that ‘what might appear as merely suggestive
or indecisive can have the advantage of keeping things open and
preventing meaning from being foreclosed’ (Maclagan 2005, p.27). 
The viewing process in the activity relates to heuristic theory
by proposing practical or informal strategies that guide the act of
discovery. As Mahony (2001) says, ‘the direct experience of the
process being investigated strengthens the validity of the findings’
(p.52). In this case, and in order to clarify this idea, the investigation
or discovery is understood in terms of the personal appreciation
of the artwork by the members of the group, based on their own
discoveries which then validate the artistic process later. In the viewing
process, the observer projects their experiences and perceptions onto
the artwork and finds meaning in what is being observed. Starting
from their own emotions, the viewer resonates with what they feel
they see in the artwork. The viewer involves the whole self in the
process, identifying personally with the artwork and at times seeing
aspects of the self, or personal experiences, reflected in the artwork.
When this process is shared in a group, not only is the perception
of the work enriched, but also the viewer’s self-perception. In this
sense, understanding the artwork represents an encounter with the
self. This process of personal and group connection also occurs with
artworks created in the past. These artworks can become relevant to
210 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

a contemporary understanding, opening up to new interpretations as

the observers confront themselves and their reality in a new context.
Despite the historical time lapse, the observer appropriates the
artwork and brings it closer to their own life. 
After visiting the gallery, we moved to a museum workshop to
carry out our creative activities. The well-illuminated space was
equipped with tables and chairs, a great diversity of artistic material,
access to water, and nearby bathrooms, and cupboards to keep
the participants’ artwork safe as these were not works for visual
exploration by others, but were treated as clinical work. This space
had no external interruptions, allowing the art therapist to foster
an environment of trust and security so that the participants could
express personal feelings and thoughts. This process was framed by
confidentiality, understood as the ethical commitment to protect the
privacy of the individual/group. As the accompanying worker was
present here too, it was important that they remain outside the group
process, purely as an observer and respectful of the confidentiality
of the setting so that they did not compromise the free expression of
the participants. Despite my initial reservations as the art therapist,
I was able to ensure that the presence of outside observers did not
impede the free creative expression nor the verbal interventions of
the participants.
The artistic creation in the workshop was one of free expression.
The purpose was for the group to explore what interested them, to
express their own personal concerns, which may or may not have
been connected to the experience lived in the gallery. It represented
a space for the participants where their images could ‘create clarity
of expression, especially with regards to certain difficult things to
say’ and at the same time, could ‘make such feelings become less
threatening’ (Dalley 1987, p.16). On occasions, repressed memories,
painful emotions, or past traumas may appear in the artworks. In art
therapy, ‘the ensuing art object may act as a container for powerful
emotions that cannot be easily expressed’ (Waller 1996, p.3) and,
unlike verbal descriptions which can be too direct, artistic language
permits a more indirect communication where ‘the most important
thing is for the creator to find his or her own meanings’ (Liebmann
2000, p.14). The art therapist provides containment based on her
Art Therapy at the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum 211

capacity to tolerate and hold with empathy any overwhelming feel­

ings expressed by patients. Casement (2013) argues that when the
patient is met by the response of the therapist, their initial painful
emotions become more manageable because the therapist witnesses
them and contains them. For this reason, the art therapist needs
to be authentically in touch with what the other person is feeling
and with what is being expressed, but at the same time maintain
neutrality towards preconceived ideas to ensure they do not influence
the process.
Workshops also provide a time for reflection on the artwork
produced, where the participants can enter into a dialogue both with
their artworks and with the group. The resulting images act as inter­
mediaries, favouring communication between the unconscious and
the conscious mind; between the participant, the art therapist and
the group. It is a moment to distance oneself and view the artwork
objectively, letting it speak for itself and allowing a time of internal
dialogue. It also provides a time to use words, to express oneself ver­
bally, and through which the participant and the group as a whole
can continue associating with dimensions of new senses of self. 

Evaluation 
At the end of the pilot project, anonymous surveys were conducted
with the participants to compare their opinions with the assessment
of the experience by the institutions (explored later), providing the
museum as well as me with an internal qualitative evaluation.
The evaluation centred on two main aspects to assess the
participants’ level of satisfaction with the project. The first aspect
centred on assessing the participants’ perception of the museum in
terms of accessibility and approachability. The second centred on
analysing their appreciation and their experience of the visit to the
galleries and the workshop.
On the first point, 90 per cent of the participants felt well received,
and viewed the museum as being approachable. On the second point,
the percentages were the same, with 90 per cent showing a favou­
rable response. The viewing in the gallery was valued as being very
interesting and participative; for example, participants commented
212 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

that they enjoyed ‘learning to look at a painting and interpret it from

our own observations’, that there was ‘relaxed, good communication’
and that ‘I felt I understood and shared things, I didn’t expect looking
at art to be so interesting’. With reference to the creative workshops,
which included both art-making and verbal exploration, they valued
both the creative liberty and the subsequent personal and group
reflection as being motivating, enriching and respectful: ‘I really
enjoyed it, it has helped me overcome a little my fear of drawing
and painting’; ‘I didn’t expect that we would open up so much and
talk about such personal things, I would definitely do it again’; ‘Very
positive, artistically and psychologically’. 
As the art therapist, I prepared a report on the results at the end
of the pilot project, which was evaluated with the museum. The
conclusion was that the level of satisfaction was very positive in
general, and that in particular the incorporation of the role of an art
therapist had been very beneficial. 

Formation of the ongoing group 

In March 2011, we finished the three-month pilot project, during
which we worked with three different groups from each of the three
institutions already mentioned earlier in the chapter. The most rele­
vant aspects of the assessments presented by the centres at the end of
the experience were as follows. They highlighted the dialogue in the
gallery that allowed ‘deepening and expanding bonds among the group
and with the artwork displayed’. Regarding the artwork, they valued
with astonishment ‘the emotional force and the personal meaning
of the images produced and their reflection’. They also appreciated
the great potential of the artistic production as a ‘communicative
means, demonstrating its value in the face of feelings of loneliness
and isolation’. They assessed very positively ‘the relationship they
established with the art therapist and the atmosphere of trust and
participation generated’. Above all, they appreciated ‘the group work
accomplished and the decrease of the anxieties in the groups when
they were in a different space from their centres, which generated an
increase of personal confidence and in the environment’.
Art Therapy at the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum 213

Some of the participants who took part in the pilot project showed
great interest in continuing, and due to the positive outcomes, the
museum, the art therapist and the centres decided to create a group.
For the structure of the new group workshops, I as art therapist
outlined two changes: first, to do without the presence of personnel
from the centres to enhance the personal autonomy of the group;
second, to increase the number of biweekly sessions to a period
of one year. These changes were based on the desire to deepen the
cultural and therapeutic benefits by making the programme longer,
and to assure the establishment of a safe and secure environment to
promote a sense of trust, without the presence of an outside observer. 
So that group members should benefit from the experience it was
agreed that all participants must understand their condition and be
in a position to manage their symptoms in order to be better able to
cope with any stressful situations. For this reason, they needed to be
in a period of relative stability to be able to take part in the museum
activity. The group started in October 2011 and, with withdrawals
and new members, it continues to this day (2019). It was formed
of nine participants: men and women aged 30–55 years, most of
them with paranoid schizophrenia, and some with social phobia
and depression. They lived in family environments and all of them
had jobs, as they worked in Lantegi Batuak, one of the participant
institutions that offers job opportunities in their workshops for
people with intellectual and physical disabilities, and those with
mental health difficulties.

From contemplation to the creative response 

The museum, with its artistic heritage, offers an unparalleled setting
to introduce work of this type. Its atmosphere of tranquillity invites
groups to move at a calm pace that predisposes a contemplative
attitude and a direct and personal encounter with the artwork. This
experience allows the participants to access a rich resonance between
their own experiences and those communicated by, and contained
within, the displayed artworks. As Gilroy (2007) describes, this
process occurs when we face and contemplate an artwork, when we
214 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

focus in on particular areas or aspects of the work, making conscious

and unconscious choices about our interests. This depends on what
we are looking for in our effort to find meaning. In addition, by
being a large sensory space, the location also becomes an important
alternative for enjoyment and exploration.
This programme within the museum setting is based on the post-
modern vision of art, where ‘the boundaries between product and
process, individual and group creation and artist and viewer dissolve’
(Alter-Muri and Klein 2007, p.82). In this sense, the viewers who
contemplate the artwork are also creators of it and the creation of
shared meanings is what confers the communicative value of art. 
The idea of the programme is that the active engagement of
the participant not only changes their perception of the museum
space but also challenges the overall perception of the museum as
an exclusive and elitist space. As López Martínez (2011) argues, the
formal sense of curating the art of the institution, accessible mainly
to specialists and researchers, has now developed further without
losing the principles of conservation and research, to offer a much
wider service to the general public and to open up access and social
participation. Through a new approach, we can make these environ­
ments more accessible, helping to change the perception and the role
of museums and art itself so that these groups, who may feel out of
place and overwhelmed, lose their inhibitions and find a space with
relevance to their own lives. 

Experience with the group 

The following vignettes of workshops illustrate the relation between
the participants’ personal associations and the meanings raised
through viewing the artworks in the gallery and their discussion,
with the thoughts and emotions evoked and expressed by the parti­
cipants in the art-making in the workshops.
In this instance, two artworks were chosen from the museum’s
permanent collection and the third was a visit to a temporary exhi­
bition. The first one, ‘The Rape of Europa’ (c. 1590) by Marten de
Vos (BFAM n.d. a), is a painting from the High Renaissance, while
the second one, ‘Albia’ (2002) by Mari Puri Herrero (BFAM n.d. b),
Art Therapy at the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum 215

is a contemporary figurative work. The third example is ‘Messages

off the Wall’ (BFAM n.d. c), an exhibition about posters from 1886–
1975, belonging to the BFAM collection. 
‘The Rape of Europa’ represents the theme narrated by Ovid in
his ‘Metamorphoses’, in which the god Zeus, in love with Europa,
daughter of the King of Phoenicia, transforms himself into a bull in
order to kidnap her and take her to Crete, while Hermes, surrounded
by angels, watches from the sky. 
The group perceived the distance between them and this centuries-
old image that invited them to discover more about the image and
the narrative it depicted. The participants explored the symbolic
contents of the story and, from a contemporary perspective, opinions
emerged about rape as an aggressive act; seduction and deceit; the
feminine and masculine conditions in history; and the present struggle
for equal rights. Although these themes could have been potentially
distressing for the group, as an art therapist I was able contain any
such unsettling emotions by keeping the focus on the symbolic and
representative nature of both the artwork and the feelings that it
evoked. In this way, the experience helped to foster the participants’
own capacity to symbolise and to tolerate difficult emotions, a
process argued by Shaer et al. (2008).
In the second part of the activity, we moved to the workshop.
As the participants already knew the space, materials and its layout,
they entered confidently. In the workshop, I as the art therapist
aimed to encourage the participants’ creative process, helping them
to find their own unique expression and their experience with their
own internal resources, so that the group grew to trust in its own
artistic communication skills. I provided non-judgemental support
to each participant’s artistic process, giving equal value to everything
that emerged. 
When creative time finished, one participant shared her work
with the group (Figure 9.1). She commented that the experience
in the gallery had connected her with feelings of people’s general
lack of sensitivity and understanding which humanity continued to
suffer from. She described that she had drawn doors that open and
close representing the difficulties of the current working world and
in the middle, the Euro, symbolizing the European economic crisis.
216 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

She continued explaining that the feminine and masculine symbols,

as well as the bow and arrow of Cupid, represented conflicting
relationships that begin and end. She wanted to express the impotence
and the pain of these experiences through her drawing of the three
crosses on Mount Calvary of the crucifixion of Jesus.

Figure 9.1 Participant artwork after viewing ‘The Rape of Europa’

The group mentioned that ‘the proximity between the crosses suggests
bars, and the hand drawn on top of them looks like the gesture of
someone hitchhiking’. After a moment of anguished silence, she said
that she had not been aware of it while drawing but, when observing
it, she suddenly connected with the accident and death of a student
classmate that she had witnessed while hitchhiking. She told us
emotionally that at that moment she had been in a crisis due to her
illness and this event had shocked her a lot. In previous workshops,
she had told the group that her illness appeared with intensity at
21 years of age, while studying at university.
At the end of her moving explanation, the group responded by
helping her to contain her emotion, telling her that they understood
Art Therapy at the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum 217

her experience, and they recounted similar experiences that they

had had themselves. For example, one member related how she had
suffered cancer at a young age and had an operation which had led
to a crisis. By being able to speak out and share such challenging
topics, they were able to help each other manage difficult feelings.
Both in the creative work and in the process of talking about it, the
participants gained the ability to understand more deeply what was
being expressed, and the feedback from the group could then be
integrated by the creator of the image. 
The following two examples demonstrate how the group explored
viewing in the gallery in relation to their own life experiences. In the
visit to the temporary exhibition on old posters ‘Messages from the
Wall’ (1886–1975), one participant produced a creative work based
on the aesthetics of the poster in tribute to her recently deceased
mother. She commented that viewing the posters had aroused
memories of her mother, with mixed feeling of both sadness and
admiration. In her image, she painted her mother acting in a theatre
(Figure 9.2). She told us that her mother had been a singer of some
fame when she settled in Madrid at a young age. She stated proudly
that, despite having the same mental condition as herself, her mother
had achieved her goals. She demonstrated how important it was to
share this with the group, since her family always avoided the issue
in front of her for fear of a relapse in her illness and she felt that
the members of the group would understand this. Revisiting these
memories relieved her of her overwhelming feeling of emptiness.
218 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Figure 9.2 Participant artwork after visiting the

‘Messages from the Wall’ exhibition

On the occasion of the workshop about ‘Albia’, we looked at the

painting in which groups of people walk through the trees in the
gardens of a square in Bilbao. This figurative painting has a dream­
like and symbolic quality associated with magical realism.  One
participant commented that observing the work of art in the gallery
she felt at ease, and that the painting aroused pleasurable feelings. In
her own creative work, the group participants are represented, and
leafy, luxuriant vegetation seems to wrap the figures with care and
protection (Figure 9.3). The art therapist appears in another colour
on the right, accompanying the group. Reflecting on the connections
that emerged in her creative work, she expressed how she had felt
very welcomed by the group: ‘This group has helped me to trust,
I draw without thinking about the result, it is a liberating feeling.’
Her creative work represented in some way the many achievements
in the development and cohesion of the group.
Art Therapy at the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum 219

Figure 9.3 Participant artwork after viewing ‘Albia’

From these examples, we can see how the experience, from the
gallery to the workshop, helped to draw out feelings associated with
relationships, mental illness or life experiences which were shared by
the group. These images, linked to the contemplative experience in the
gallery, led the way for a process of introspection and reflection. As
in the potential space described by Winnicott (1971), the experience
of the inner world is created through the internalisation of external
experience; here, the artwork of the artist, the group, and the art
220 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

therapist all encouraged insight and self-awareness and processes of

transformation and constructive integration. 
For the group members, going to the museum has become an
important part of their lives. It is a place where they can share
life experiences and escape from isolation. In their own words, as
they gave feedback on the activities, ‘We talk about our concerns
and problems, about life, we get to know each other through the
reflections about the creative works of the group’; ‘They make us
see things that we do not normally see’; ‘Help to relieve the mind
and to reflect on the moments you live’; ‘I feel that this helps me to
make personal changes’. In addition, the experience has activated
their cultural interests and has improved their social lives.

Conclusions 
The incorporation of art therapy in the design and development
of the described programme has resulted in greater knowledge of
the profession in the museum field. This has been established not
only through the experience itself, but also through the continuous
evaluations carried out with the groups and the participating
institutions, as well as with the DECA and the art therapist. All
of the institutions involved have assessed positively the results
of this programme that happen outside the usual psychiatric and
rehabilitation fields. They highlighted that the programme adds
therapeutic benefits to the work carried out by these centres.
The following quotations are some of the positive feedback from
staff at the centres involved in the project: ‘It’s an opportunity to
observe and to get to know our users better from a different and deeper
perspective: their emotions, their life histories and their childhood’;
‘The participants are able to express and channel emotions in a way
that wouldn’t have been possible in their daily lives’; ‘The project
totally fulfils the objective of making the museum more inclusive;
they are not seen as people with a mental illness but as a group of
people interested in art.’ The organisations involved also value the
fact that the members of the groups have acquired expressive and
communication skills from their experiences with the non-verbal
artistic process. They recognise the determining role of the museum
and of the art therapist in their integrative and supportive work, so
Art Therapy at the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum 221

that the members of these groups feel themselves to be an active part

of the world to which they belong. Despite the length of time the
programme has been running, it continues to surprise the staff at
the DECA, as well as those involved from the participating centres,
due to the power and intensity of engagement in the viewing process
and in the creative art generated afterwards.
As a result of the positive assessment obtained for the pilot
project, the programme has continued to thrive, resulting in its ex­
pansion to other groups. We now work with: offenders who are on
probation; young people with learning difficulties or personal and
family conflicts; unprotected minors who live in foster homes; people
involved in conflictive adoptions; women who have suffered abuse;
people with intellectual disabilities; and children and adolescents
with special educational needs associated with mental health. The
participating institutions are state organisations, such as the Youth
and Family section of Social Services; the special needs section of the
Department for Education; women’s and family refuge centres and
penal institutions, as well as diverse organisations and associations
who work with socially excluded collectives.
Following the original three-month pilot project, the programme has
been running for nine years. Throughout this period, the commitment
of many professionals has been required, such as the team at BFAM, the
art therapist, directors and support staff of the centres, psychologists,
family therapists, social workers, educational therapists, special needs
teachers and carers, as well as a multidisciplinary network made up of
staff from the BFAM and the participating centres. All have worked
together to collaborate and develop this resource for the benefit and
the inclusion of the above groups. 
To generate opportunities to enable groups of people to share their
realities and their emotions, to hear themselves and be listened to by
others, to value themselves and to be valued by others, means helping
them to feel part of the society in which they live. The construction of
this experience, based on feelings of trust and belonging, is our work
as art therapists. By involving ourselves with museums and creating
programmes such as Let’s Include the Museum, we help to extend the
use of art with therapeutic purposes and also help to provide broader
perspectives of personal growth, while at the same time providing a
cultural experience and an opportunity for social inclusion.
222 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

References 
Alter-Muri, S. and Klein, L. (2007) ‘Dissolving the boundaries: Postmodern
art and art therapy.’ Art Therapy: Journal of the American Art Therapy
Association 24, 2, 82–86.
BFAM (n.d. a) ‘The Rape of Europa.’ Accessed on 16/2/19 at www.museobilbao.
com/obras-maestras/martin-de-vos.
BFAM (n.d. b) ‘Messages off the Wall.’ Accessed on 16/2/19 at www.museobilbao.
com/exposiciones/mensajes-desde-la-pared-238. 
BFAM (n.d. c) ‘Albia.’ Accessed on 16/2/19 at www.museobilbao.com/catalogo-
online/albia-02158.
Case, C. and Dalley, T. (2006) The Handbook of Art Therapy. London and New
York, NY: Routledge. (Original work published 1992). 
Casement, P. (2013) On Learning from the Patient. London and New York, NY:
Routledge. (Original work published 1985). 
Dalley, T. (1987) El arte como terapia. Barcelona: Editorial Herder S.A. (Original
work: Art as Therapy, 1984, London and New York, NY: Tavistock
Publications). 
Gilroy, A. (2007) ‘Taking a long look at art: Reflections on the context of
production and consumption of art in art therapy.’ ATOL: Art Therapy
Online 5, 2, 1–36. Accessed on 20/10/15 at http://eprints.gold.ac.uk/113. 
Kislev, E. (2015) ‘The use of participant-observers in group therapy: A critical
exploration in light of Foucauldian Theory.’ Group 39, 1 (Spring 2015),
9–24.
Liebmann, M. (2000) Art Therapy in Practice. London and Philadelphia, PA:
Jessica Kingsley Publishers. (Original work published 1990). 
López Martínez, M.D. (2011) ‘Arteterapia y Museos. Puntos de encuentro.’ Arte
y políticas de identidad 4 (June), 127–136. Accessed on 19/4/12 at http://
revistas.um.es/api:1989-8452. 
Maclagan, D. (2005) ‘Re-imagining art therapy.’ International Journal of Art
Therapy 10, 1, 23–30. 
Mahony, J. (2001) ‘Three commentaries: Looking experiences at three
exhibitions.’ International Journal of Art Therapy 6, 2, 51–62. 
Ramos i Portas, C. (2003) ‘The experiential art therapy group in the training
of art therapists.’ Paper presented at 1st Art Therapy World Congress, 30
March–2 April 2003, Budapest Convention Centre, Budapest. 
Shaer, D., Beaven, K., Springham, N., Pillinger, S. et al. (2008) ‘The role of art
therapy in a pilot for art-based information prescriptions at Tate Britain.’
International Journal of Art Therapy 13, 1, 25–33.
Waller, D. (1996) Group Interactive Art Therapy: Its Use in Training and
Treatment. London, USA, Canada: Tavistock/Routledge Publications.
(Original work published 1993). 
Winnicott, D.W. (1971) Playing and Reality. London: Tavistock Publications. 
 CHAPTER 10 

BALTIC Art Therapy Project

A Collaboration Between NHS Art
Therapists and BALTIC Centre for
Contemporary Art Gateshead

Michael Fischer and Whittaker Scott

Introduction
This chapter describes an eight-week pilot project developed by the
art therapists in Northumberland, Tyne and Wear NHS Foundation
Trust (NTW) Children and Young People’s Service (CYPS) in con­
junction with the BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art and a
practising artist. Northumberland, Tyne and Wear Children and
Young People’s Service is part of the National Health Service (NHS)
in England and offers a mental health service for children and young
people up to the age of 18 years old.
In this project, service users aged between 13 and 18 took part
in a short-term art therapy group at the BALTIC Centre for Con­
temporary Art in Gateshead, which culminated in a public exhibition.
In the conception, planning and running of this project, a key
question for us was: What is it about the art gallery experience which
can add to an art therapy group?
Our chapter focuses on some of the practicalities of setting up
and running this project that we hope will be useful to others plan­
ning, or engaged in, this type of venture.

223
224 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

We begin by outlining the background to the project, looking

at relevant literature and describing the steps taken in setting the
project up, from approaching the gallery to recruiting for the group.
We then explore different aspects of the planning and delivery of the
project, such as the experience of the art therapists working with an
independent artist, some of the differences when providing an art
therapy group in this setting, the group’s experience of the gallery
and public exhibition, and the opportunity for young people to
exhibit their artwork in an internationally renowned venue.
Finally, we look at what we have learned from the project and at
planning for future collaborations with BALTIC.

Background
The motivation for this project came about due to having a sub-
optimal art therapy space in the Northumberland, Tyne and Wear
CYPS provision, premises available that were not purpose specific,
and on one site there being no creative therapy room at all. It also
came from a conviction held by the art therapists that contemporary
art galleries had something to offer the therapeutic process. This
belief came from our own experience as artists and our involvement
in community arts projects and exhibitions prior to becoming art
therapists. We felt that the gallery environment and access to con­
temporary art that embraces different forms of expression could be
inspiring for young people.
BALTIC is a major international centre for contemporary art in
Gateshead, England. With no permanent collection, BALTIC has
gained an international reputation for its distinctive and ambitious
programme of exhibitions and events.
BALTIC’s Learning and Civic Engagement Team works with a
variety of different audiences throughout the region and nationally,
and is committed to providing inclusive opportunities that enable
individuals and communities to explore and exchange different
perspectives and new ideas (BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art
2018).
BALTIC Art Therapy Project 225

Figure 10.1 BALTIC

Our initial ideas were that the experience of group art therapy in a
gallery could help to engage hard-to-reach adolescents who might
find NHS premises stigmatising. We also thought that it could
help participants who might have difficulties with confidence, low
self-esteem and developing relationships, as it could provide an
opportunity to work with others in an exciting gallery environment
with access to various art media and potential to be involved in an
exhibition at the end of the project. We felt that through exhibiting
their own artwork, the project could give young people a voice and
promote positive mental health awareness in the community.
The participants were not necessarily familiar with the centre of
the city, as the catchment area for those taking part in the group
included a large outlying suburban area, smaller towns, and rural
areas. We were conscious that both the city environment and travel
might be off-putting for some participants.
226 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Literature
Group art therapy with young people
Offering group art therapy to adolescents experiencing mental
health difficulties can be a helpful approach as it involves both self-
expression and interpersonal learning through sharing, modelling
and peer interaction (Linesch 1988; Waller 1993).
Adolescence is a time of rapid physical and psychological change.
Young people are searching for new and meaningful relationships
with their peers and other significant figures and there can be a tension
between dependence on and avoidance towards adults (Anderson
and Darlington 1998). The group setting can be a particularly
relevant one but can also make running this type of group more
challenging, where young people can test boundaries and there is
the potential for the group to become counter-therapeutic. Linesch
(1988) describes how careful planning and selection for adolescent
group work is essential and how art can play an important part.
‘Harnessing the adolescent’s creativity and expressive potential, as
is done in the art therapy modality, can direct and sustain group
interaction’ (Linesch 1988, p.134). In her work with adolescent male
youths who have had backgrounds of adversity and trauma, Slayton
(2012) discusses how making art and witnessing what is made in
art therapy group work can help to engage young people, helping
them to have meaningful and positive social experiences. Cole et al.
(2018) describe how group art approaches involving self-expression
and making connections with others can help to engage young adults
in mental health services, and Riley (1999) describes how art therapy
groups can seem less threatening than verbal group work, as young
people can feel some control over what they choose to share in their
artwork with their contemporaries. There are examples of group
art therapy helping young people with difficulties – including eating
disorders and mental health issues relating to epilepsy – to use art
to express difficult-to-verbalise feelings to communicate with others
(Pepper Goldsmith and Ben-Simon 2012; Congreave et al. 2017).
The visual nature of art can be useful in developing self-image,
which can then be explored with others. Higenbottam (2004) de­
scribes how art therapy groups help female adolescents use art to
BALTIC Art Therapy Project 227

express and develop a more positive body image and to improve

self-esteem. Miller (2012) recommends offering a diverse range
of art media and creative tasks that are sensitive to the needs and
interests of the young people involved, to facilitate engagement. The
art medium is also highlighted in outcomes in a group art therapy
study with young people from low economic backgrounds in South
Korea, where Jang and Choi (2012) suggest that the qualities of clay-
making, through to the experience of seeing their artworks fired and
completed, had a positive impact on young people’s ego-resilience.
A recent review indicates that young people with mental health
difficulties also show cognitive difficulties, especially those who have
been homeless or in care, with some suggestion that these young
people may be particularly open to interventions involving creativity
(Fry, Langley and Shelton 2017).

Art therapy in museums and

galleries with young people
There are examples of art therapy and art-based programmes with
young people predominantly taking place in galleries and museums
that support insight and awareness, improved self-esteem and social
interaction. Silverman (1989) writes about structural family, art
and play therapies for young people in the museum and how the
setting can add to the therapy experience: ‘Skilled in art history and
techniques, art museum educators and curators can enhance an art
therapy activity. Artwork in the collections can be used to stimulate
discussion and creation’ (Silverman 1989, p.141).
With reference to an art therapy project with middle school
teenagers at the Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles, Linesch (2004)
describes how art therapy activities can also enrich the connection
young people make with the collection and their understanding of
the exhibits, and Kaufman et al. (2014) report a significant impact
on self-concept in their research study of 176 children in an educa­
tional/youth development art programme at the Dali Museum in
St Petersburg, Florida.
Treadon, Rosal and Thompson Wylder (2006) describe an  art
therapy pilot project with young people experiencing mental health
228 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

and behavioural difficulties, involving seven 12–14-year-olds from

an educational setting who visited a large state university art mu­
seum in the USA as part of a seven-week intervention. The focus
was for young people to explore their feelings and relationships
with family, and participants explored links between art exhibits,
their own artworks and their personal lives. It was suggested that
the experience had a positive impact on participants’ engagement
with their own artwork and with staff at school following the
project. Schleien, Mustonen and Rynders (1995) describe structured
group art activities with children both with and without autism at
a children’s museum, where results showed that social interaction of
children without autism towards children with autism was boosted
significantly during the intervention. Stiles and Mermer-Welly (1998)
worked with young people from an early teen pregnancy programme
where 13–15-year-olds were offered family therapy, individual and
group therapy and museum visits. They found that through looking
at museum artworks, the young people were able to reflect on them­
selves and feel more connected with the community, and that the
experience had a positive impact on young people’s self-esteem and
other difficulties they were experiencing.
Malone (2017) reported empathic responses from visitors to
a gallery exhibition co-created with young survivors of child sex
exploitation in Dorset, England. This showed how personally sen­
sitive material in the art is not necessarily a barrier to involving
young people in a public exhibition. The young people selected had
achieved some stability in terms of their difficulties and were seen in
a small supportive group. Interestingly, Salom (2015) describes how a
group of 15 internally displaced indigenous women aged between
12 and 40 took part in an art therapy programme at the Museo del
Oro in Bogotá, Colombia, where a theme emerged of the museum
acting as a safe and supportive environment and where personal and
cultural experiences could be explored. Coles and Harrison (2018)
describe evaluating a museum-based group with young adults aged
18–25 with severe mental health difficulties using mixed qualitative
and quantitative methods; they report that participants found that
the museum environment and objects were a helpful focus for ideas
and social interaction.
BALTIC Art Therapy Project 229

The group
Initial networking
The initial idea for the project was conceived in 2012. The first contact
was made by Whittaker Scott, Head of Art Therapies (CYPS North
of Tyne Community) with a staff member at BALTIC’s Learning and
Civic Engagement Team. With a commitment to extend and deepen
the engagement with contemporary art by diverse audiences and a
track record in successful projects specifically for young people, this
practice fitted with BALTIC’s strategic objectives (BALTIC Centre
for Contemporary Art 2018). Having worked with potentially
vulnerable groups was particularly helpful and the gallery had an
understanding of consent and confidentiality in this context. BALTIC
suggested working with a member of its Freelance Artist Team and at
these meetings the issue of financial cost was raised, for example for
room use and participation of the BALTIC artist. This was significant
as it meant funding from NHS CYPS and was one reason the project
took time to come to fruition.
We thought the project might have a potential research aspect and
contacted the NHS Trust Research and Development Department
which oversees research projects and has experience and expertise
significantly greater than ours was. In these discussions, proposing
the project as research was mooted, and that the project fell between
formal research and innovative practice evaluation. It was agreed to
apply through the Integrated Research Application System (IRAS)
process to obtain ethics approval to conduct the project as research.
The committee considered the project’s application, deciding it might
not constitute research. Nevertheless, it was a useful learning ex­
perience for us and the project proceeded as a piece of innovative
practice evaluation. BALTIC was also positioning the project as
innovative practice, which was more in line with its strategic aims,
as outlined above.

Discussions with NHS management and colleagues

Our NHS manager was aware of the BALTIC project through informal
discussions and a case for it was presented to the management group;
although the response was favourable, there were no funds at that
230 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

time and the project was shelved. In 2015, funding was obtained and
we were able to proceed, the manager visiting the exhibition before
the group started, to review the content and check it was appropriate
from a managerial viewpoint. This was important, because both the
art therapists running the group and the BALTIC artist were trained
artists familiar with contemporary art. Not everybody shares this
position and set of assumptions – what might be seen as legitimately
challenging in the art world might be seen as inappropriate for young
people by those with a different perspective. Thankfully, she deemed
it reasonable.
Through discussion with a consultant clinical psychologist it was
suggested that a higher assistant psychologist from the NHS CYPS
team would help facilitate the project. It was felt that the support
this would bring (especially an understanding of theory and outcome
measures) would be helpful. James Blacklock took on this role. Part
of this was to offer support at the gallery in meeting and greeting
participants and by being available in a nearby room for participants
who might feel they needed to leave the group during a session –
he could offer support and, if necessary, liaise with other CYPS
team members. He also had the role of administering the outcome
measures (see section below on ‘Outcomes’)
We liaised with various colleagues within our Trust to produce
the information and consent forms for the participants and their
parents/carers, giving consideration to our Trust’s values and legal
frameworks. Confidential storage of artwork made in the group was
arranged at the NHS site in a locked cupboard.

Recruitment
Planning an art therapy group outside the NHS setting was a new
experience with some challenges. Recruitment for the group took
place over a few months as, when NHS funding became available, we
needed to use it within a certain time frame while ensuring the group
coincided with a suitable exhibition.
We identified potential candidates and they and their parents/
carers were seen for initial individual assessment appointments on
NHS Trust premises. Because the group would be taking place in a
BALTIC Art Therapy Project 231

gallery, we needed to discuss with the service users and their parents/
carers what risks might exist getting to and from the venue and being
in a public gallery at this assessment stage, in order to manage and
minimise these.
We recruited two male and six female participants. Presenting
difficulties for the young people included disrupted childhood expe­
riences, anger problems, low mood and anxiety.

Attendance
Attendance varied from one to all eight participants attending, with a
‘core group’ of three young people attending regularly. Sessions were
one-and-a-half hours in length from 15:30–17:00 for eight weeks.
The group was facilitated by art therapists Whittaker Scott and
Michael Fischer and BALTIC artist Lesley-Anne Rose, with additional
support from higher assistant psychologist James Blacklock.

Involving parents and carers

As with all CYPS interventions and supports, we aim to involve
parents/carers where appropriate. A pre-group meeting was offered
at BALTIC to meet the parents/carers of service users together with
the  art therapists and artist in attendance. The meeting aimed to
build an alliance with parents/carers to support attendance at the
group, and to consider parents’/carers’ views of the suitability of
exhibits and facilities their children would be seeing (e.g. they may
have viewed some exhibits as potentially disturbing to their child).
It offered the opportunity to involve them in refinement of risk
assessments, our understanding of particular needs their children
had, and any unforeseen transport issues.

An art therapy group with an artist

In the planning stages, Whittaker Scott met with the BALTIC artist
Lesley-Anne Rose. Lesley-Anne had past experience of art projects with
young people who had mental health issues. The principles of psycho­
dynamic work, working with transference, counter-transference and
relationships with therapists within the group were discussed. This
232 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

raised the issue of how much, alongside a more directive approach,

to address possible group processes such as awkwardness, silence
and uncertainty. The artist saw these things as potential barriers to be
overcome in order to proceed with a productive group, whereas the
art therapist perspective saw difficult experience as part of a thera­
peutic process that can be worked with to help participants gain
insights into themselves and relationships with others, benefiting
the person in other situations in life. There is a history in some
art therapy traditions of favouring spontaneous, non-directive art-
making (McNeilly 1983), which can access unconscious material in
a way directive work might not.
We settled on a combination of educational/directive and psy­
chodynamic/reflective aspects. The artist would introduce techniques,
and limited optional themes would be suggested, and there would
also be room for difficult emotions and group processes to be ack­
nowledged in the second part of the group sessions. Greenwood
and Layton (1987) provide an example of combining theme-based
and psychodynamic approaches in group art therapy with adult
outpatients who have a history of psychosis.
Themes and directive activities were chosen by the artist and
discussed with the art therapists. After setting some ground rules
relating to mutual respect for group members, we reminded par­
ticipants of the group structure: introductions/brief discussion at the
start; looking at the exhibition/being introduced to materials; time
for making artwork; a break; looking at artwork, and discussion. In
initial sessions, optional themes and technical demonstrations from
the artist appeared to reduce the young people’s anxiety, providing
structure and a starting point for ideas and discussion. These activities
were followed by a shorter time towards the end of the sessions for
looking at artwork and for discussion facilitated by the art therapists.
We were keen to develop this space for reflection and to find a better
balance between educational and reflective approaches. This was
helped by regular post-group reflections with the artist, further
planning, and supervision. In subsequent sessions, while maintaining
the basic group structure of both making artwork and having time
for showing and discussing it, we developed more flexibility, with
some discussion and reflections during the art-making part of the
BALTIC Art Therapy Project 233

group, extending the art-making time to enable participants to

develop and complete work, alongside having some time to look at
the exhibition together.
At times, the artist and art therapists also made artwork and we
viewed this as therapists modelling the act of trying out materials
and ideas to help the group’s confidence. There is precedence for art
therapists making art during sessions in the literature, specifically
Havsteen-Franklin (2014) and Marshall-Tierney (2014). It was impor­
tant to find and maintain a good functional relationship between
the  therapists and artist who have different roles and approaches,
so that the group would work optimally. This was to give group
members an experience of adult figures with different approaches
and working together, like a functioning family.

The environment and facilities

While we thought BALTIC would be attractive to young people – a
renowned gallery with a wide range of facilities – with the additional
option of being part of an exhibition, we were aware that the
expe­rience might also be intimidating. Some young people could
feel alienated by a gallery/museum environment due to personal,
social  and cultural attitudes based on each individual’s experiences,
views and attitudes of their family and social groups, and also the scale
of this type of building. However, some participants were familiar with
the gallery space either through family or from school visits in the past.
On arrival at BALTIC, the young people were asked to gather
on the ground floor. The art therapists and the higher assistant
psychologist were waiting to greet them. In retrospect, this situation
may have increased self-conscious and anxious feelings, as it was
a large space, with members of the public entering and leaving the
building. Those attending appeared to get used to this, or chose to
come straight up to the studio space. We later wondered whether this
meeting arrangement might have been a factor for those who stopped
attending, and that suggesting they went straight to the studio space
might have been be a better idea.
The studio space was a relatively large space not open to the
general public, containing two large tables, cupboards, sinks and
234 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

equipment and a large wall area opposite to make larger work.

Level 2 was accessed by glass-fronted elevators from the main hall
below, and toilets were nearby. We were curious about what a wider
range of art facilities and materials at BALTIC would bring to the art
therapy group’s experience. Alongside the more traditional art media
associated with NHS site-based art therapy groups, such as pencils,
pens, paints, collage and modelling material, the artist Lesley-
Anne Rose introduced media such as print-making and animation.
There was wariness about trying materials and equipment such as
the camera to take part in an animation demonstration but by the
end, when group participants had gained confidence, the access to
technical materials and the space provided enabled different types
of art production – for example, large-scale screen printing – which
would have been difficult in art therapy in NHS-based therapy or
clinical rooms.

The exhibition and its possible

effects on the group
This project linked to ‘DEPOT’, a major new commission by Dutch
artist and filmmaker Fiona Tan. ‘DEPOT’ made reference to the North
East’s whaling history, and Tan created an immersive installation
especially for the gallery. Drawing on Newcastle’s forgotten history
as a principal whaling port in England from 1752–1849, ‘DEPOT’
re-imagined a fairground attraction, ‘Jonah, the Giant Whale’, a
76‑foot long blue whale caught off the coast of Trondheim, Norway.
Preserved in formaldehyde, the whale toured Europe from the 1950s
to the mid-1970s, exhibited inside the ‘longest lorry in the world’,
before being abandoned in Belgium. Tan rebuilt the vehicle, which
spanned almost the entire width of the gallery, and which visitors
could climb aboard. Instead of whale remains, the interior con­
tained a cabinet of curiosities, including illustrations, archival photo­
graphs, a narwhal tusk and glass models of sea anemones by German
glassmakers Leopold and Rudolf Blaschka (BALTIC Centre for
Contemporary Art 2015).
Viewing this exhibition allowed the group to go physically out
of the group room, the place for making and talking, into larger
BALTIC Art Therapy Project 235

spaces for looking, which was a different experience to more typical

art therapy groups where people remain in the therapy room during
the session. We spent some time walking around the exhibition in the
first two sessions. We noticed that participants at first seemed shy and
withdrawn when back in the studio space, but that the experience of
touring this exhibition appeared to help them to grow in confidence
– perhaps because the focus was on looking at and talking about
the artwork and less on each other. Isserow (2008), Scaife and
Brunner (1975) and Huet (2011) describe how the joint attention of
a therapist and client on an artwork echoes pre-verbal developmental
steps of shared attention, recognition that the other’s attention can be
directed to something, and the ability to see the other’s point of view.
Looking at the exhibition together simultaneously reduced the direct
focus on each other and created awareness of different knowledge,
ideas and perspectives of the other, particularly at the beginning of
the group’s development.
In a pilot project of art therapy-based organisational consultancy
within public healthcare, Huet describes how joint attention allows
imaginative space to develop where participants explore possible
meanings and stories relating to the artwork they are looking at
(Huet 2011). We wondered if walking out of the art room into
large spaces to look at unusual artworks would be intimidating or
stressful for participants. How would group experience be affected
by moving between public space and the more private art room?
A possible disadvantage was disruption to group process. However,
viewing the art in the gallery context was a key part of what might
inspire the young people and it appeared to create no observable
problems for group members: participants spoke to the therapists
in the exhibition space and in the private studio space. The more
emotionally challenging discussion topics happened in the studio
space, facilitated by interventions from the therapists, with the
participants able to judge for themselves (to some extent at least)
what was appropriate to communicate, and in which context.
BALTIC positions gallery assistants, or Crew, in its exhibition
spaces, who act as the frontline learning team, greeting and welcoming
visitors, offering information about exhibitions, the building and
local history, leading public tours and keeping both the artwork
236 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

and members of the public safe (BALTIC Centre for Contemporary

Art 2018). Crew were in a position to add to the group participants’
experiences by answering questions about the featured artist and
artwork, which group members took advantage of. Crew were not
present in the studio space.
An NHS-based art therapy group would involve participants
making artwork based on ideas and feelings from their imagination,
rather than what they are looking at. In this project, features and
themes from the exhibition appeared to develop in group artwork
which were then explored in relation to group experience; for
example, the BALTIC artist introduced the theme of whale and
fish eyes, based on the exhibition, through photocopy and collage
imagery as one optional directive in the first session. The artwork
made in response built on this initial theme, using this material to
express what we felt were strong feelings of people watching and
being watched. This might be something expected in a group for
young people where feelings of self-consciousness can be heightened,
especially at the start of a group, but perhaps the feeling of watching
and being watched was intensified by the public gallery experience
where art is on display and where the group might also feel scrutinised.
The eye motif taken from ‘DEPOT’ facilitated this expression in the
group. The sea themes in ‘DEPOT’ also appeared influential in group
artwork and whale, fish and sea-related imagery became a platform
in the young people’s artwork to communicate possibly frightening,
frightened or painful feelings. The therapists commented on this in
relation to how people might be feeling in the group.
Another idea that the art therapists noted from ‘DEPOT’ by
Fiona Tan was the contrast in scale – there were some very large
and some very small/delicate exhibits. We felt this may have been
reflected in some of the participants’ art, which ranged in scale from
small, delicate sculptures to large-scale drawings and screen prints.

Outcomes
A combination of qualitative and quantitative measures was used.
These were administered by the higher assistant psychologist. The
quan­titative measures proved problematic, largely due to poor return
BALTIC Art Therapy Project 237

rates. Outcome measures included Young Person’s CORE (Twigg et al.

2009) and Beck Youth Inventories (second edition) (Beck et al. 2001).
The higher assistant psychologist contacted some participants after
the group by letter and had conversations with some group members
and their parents/carers to gather more qualitative information by
phone to help us understand more of the participants’ experience
by offering the opportunity to speak with someone not directly in­
volved in delivering the group.
Analysis was informal and looked for themes in the artwork,
notes and processes. Of those who engaged with the telephone inter­
view, the overall response was that the group was a positive oppor­
tunity, the feedback including positive comments about the location,
and that it was interesting and enjoyable. Comments were made about
feeling encouraged to try something different, art helping with self-
expression, and having the opportunity to work with others. Some
participants said they would consider returning to exhibitions at
BALTIC at a later date, perhaps due to having positive associations as
a result of their participation in the group there. A regular theme was
the difficulty many had with the timing of sessions, with suggestions
of how this could be changed – not having to travel through the city
at a busy time, and not during work and school hours. Practicalities
of getting to the city centre site were raised as problematic for some.
Some participants also described feeling uncomfortable to begin
with, but that this lessened as people got to know each other.
We thought about the possibility of having some more structured,
guided art activities to facilitate initial engagement of participants.
We also wondered about reviewing the timing of the project to a less
busy time and increasing the session length from one-and-a-half to
two hours. It was worth reviewing which outcome measures were
best for this type of project: the Revised Children’s Anxiety and
Depression Scale (Chorpita et al. 2000) addressing low mood and
anxiety, or the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Inventory (Rosenberg 1965)
measuring self-esteem may be easier to administer than the Beck
Youth Inventories, focusing on areas where the group proves helpful.
It might be useful to consider if time at the start of the group could
be used to complete these.
238 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

The group exhibition

The idea of the group having an exhibition was explained during the
assessment before the group began, and also included in the consent
form. It was explained that the exhibition would not contain names
or identifying information.
The BALTIC Art Therapy Project Exhibition opening event took
place six weeks after the last group session. The exhibition ran for two
months and consisted of a film of still and moving images of artworks
that were made in the group, and produced by the artist Lesley-Anne
Rose. This was displayed on a wall-mounted TV monitor at BALTIC,
with text describing the project. The opening event was attended by
two participants and their parents, BALTIC staff, a member of CYPS
management, the group artist Lesley-Anne Rose, and art therapists
Whittaker Scott and Michael Fischer. Whittaker introduced the film
on behalf of the group, putting it into context, and various agencies
were thanked for their support. Group participants were asked if
they wanted to be part of the speech and introductions, or to remain
anonymous. The two young people who attended were happy to be
identified as participants of the group but chose not to be part of the
speech. They appeared pleased with the show. Their parents praised
them and seemed impressed with the exhibit. It is possible that other
group members visited the exhibition at other times, but we do not
have specific information on this.

A note on artwork made in the group

Discussion with our NTW Trust Information Governance Department
and the publishers led us to decide that the consent we had obtained
to reproduce participants’ artwork was not robust enough for us to
use in this publication and it was not appropriate to seek further
updated consent.

Conclusions
It is important to note that this pilot project and our ideas and
conclusions drawn from it relate specifically to this group of young
people, what they made and said, and the feedback obtained from
BALTIC Art Therapy Project 239

them. The project was limited by a lack of data from outcome

measures, but has represented a first step in our understanding of
providing art therapy alongside an artist in a gallery setting, and has
suggested what we could do differently next time.
The wider range of facilities available and large space to work
in at BALTIC compared with NHS site-based art therapy created
opportunity for different types of art production, such as large-scale
screen printing. However, the wide choice of technical options such
as animation and screen printing seemed to make participants wary
to begin with. Screen printing was taken up later in the group. The
presence of the artist in the art therapy group provided an educational
component where the exhibition was described and facilities and
materials were demonstrated, and this appeared to help engage young
people in what was a relatively short-term project – only eight weeks.
There was a learning curve for the facilitators, both art therapists
and artist, in developing a flexible balance between educational and
reflective aspects in this project.
From the experience of the initial sessions and feedback from
participants, more structure, demonstrations of materials and
equipment, and directive tasks at the start would be helpful. The
exhibition and themes chosen by the artist based on the exhibition
might have influenced the artwork made, and some themes in the
exhibition, such as sea creatures and an eye motif, appeared to
develop in group artwork. These were then explored in relation to
the young people’s experience in the group. Looking at the exhibition
appeared to reduce group anxiety, and helped with a sense of being
involved in something together, as well as fostering awareness of
different ideas and views that developed in the group sessions. The
experience of moving between the art room and the exhibition did
not appear to intimidate participants, who largely appeared able to
judge what to say where (i.e. not discussing more personal difficulties
in the public space). Our view, along with positive feedback from
some of the participants, was that the experience of being part of the
exhibition at the end of the group project gave a boost to self-esteem
and confidence. Young people’s ideas and artistic self-expression
were viewed by a large number of gallery visitors, which was an
exciting prospect for the participants who attended the exhibition,
240 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

the end result helping to promote mental health awareness to the

wider public.
Areas to consider for future projects include how to reduce the
drop-out rate. Attendance might have been helped by further liaison
with parents/carers and schools in supporting and encouraging
attendance. Some families lived outside the city, and so the distance
and traffic congestion towards the end of the working day impacted
on attendance, with feedback suggesting the location was difficult to
get to. Options such as changing the day and time were looked at, as
attendance can be affected by school exams and holidays. Arranging
transport could also be considered in future. There were different
views about the length of the group sessions: for some the one-and-
a-half-hour sessions were too long at the beginning of the group,
but by the end of the project the time went too quickly, which might
have reflected the anxiety participants experienced at the start of
the group compared with their more engaged experience later, so
we were unsure if changing the length of session based on this alone
would be advisable. Arranging for participants to come directly to
the studio could reduce the anxiety of waiting on the gallery’s ground
floor. There might be a way of getting a better completion rate of
outcome measures if these were completed immediately after the
final session, and some of the outcome measures, while very useful
in other contexts, may have been too long for this project. We might
get more usable data if we had fewer and simpler outcome measures
such as the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (Rosenberg 1965).
One aspect of the group work was to try to identify further support
young people might access in CYPS, the community, or both, after
the end of the group. A future version of the BALTIC project could
offer the opportunity to make links with other activities and projects
for young people at BALTIC after the project finished, for instance
by offering the option of joining one of the art activity groups run by
BALTIC. Overall, while encountering some challenges, this type of
collaborative project can be done with potential benefits for both the
participants and the organisations involved.
Most importantly, we are grateful to the service users, their
parents and carers who took part. What we have learned from the
experience and from their feedback has been invaluable in helping
plan further collaborations with BALTIC.
BALTIC Art Therapy Project 241

Acknowledgements
With thanks to Lesley-Anne Rose, Sarah Bradbury and the staff
at BALTIC; our management at Northumberland, Tyne and Wear
NHS Trust; James Blacklock, higher assistant psychologist; Simon
Critchley and Mandy McCoull from NTW CYPS, who helped with
planning; NTW Library and Knowledge Services and Research and
Development; Val Huet and the staff at the British Association of Art
Therapists. Photograph of BALTIC © Graeme Peacock.

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 PART 3

Wider Perspectives
 CHAPTER 11

Further Conversations
with Rembrandt in Space,
Place and Time
How Rembrandt’s Self-
Portraits and the Gallery Setting Inform
the Art Psychotherapy Review

Helen Jury

Introduction 
The National Gallery in London represents a major international
collection of renowned artworks through the centuries: ‘All major
traditions of Western European painting are represented, from
the artists of late medieval and Renaissance Italy to the French
Impressionists’ (National Gallery n.d.). For art psychotherapists, it
is an invaluable reserve for considering artist-based skills, together
with the development of the artist identity (Health and Care
Professions Council 2013 (Standards of Proficiency 13.17–13.23),
2016 (Standards of Conduct, Performance and Ethics 3.3)). As a
significant collection, it is an important resource for creative thinking
in our professional work with client  populations, and to  expand
ideas around innovative clinical practice.
In this chapter, I look at the connection that can be made when
viewing artwork in a gallery space and particular artworks on display,

244
Further Conversations with Rembrandt in Space, Place and Time 245

and how the possibilities and difficulties around this can inform our

understanding of art psychotherapy practice. I consider the two self-
portraits by Rembrandt displayed in the National Gallery and how
these inform the therapeutic encounter in art psychotherapy in the
context of space, place and time – both together and individually – as
well as consideration of the art psychotherapy review.
Through visiting the two Rembrandt self-portraits over a long
period of time, I developed an internal discourse and journal in
response to Rembrandt as painter, and his paintings as an art form
and technical construct. The two self-portraits became central to
understanding an interpretation of inner self. Something caught
my eye, held my attention and compelled me to keep returning to
view them, to understand them better, and to converse with them.
As Berger comments of Rembrandt’s work, ‘If the pictures convince,
they do so because details, parts, emerge and come out to meet
the eye’ (Berger 2015, p.143). Central to my understanding is the
challenge of holding in mind and keeping each portrait in vision
internally, ‘giving rise to thoughts concerning the temporal, mental
and emotional space we experience and occupy when we hold in
mind the sense of artwork created; whether our own, that of another
artist, or that of the client’ (Jury 2012).
Together with these thoughts – and essential to consider – was
the challenge of the impossibility of viewing the two Rembrandt
portraits together, as they were in different rooms within the National
Gallery. This challenge is compared to the significance of referencing
the diverse artworks of any and all types that are created during art
psychotherapy by a client; art made in separate sessions as part of the
exploratory, clinical representation and record of the client’s sense
of self. This, the art psychotherapist holds in mind both together
and singly, as part of the total collective of the therapeutic artwork.
The capacity to recall the visual significance of a piece of artwork
alongside the non-verbal material generated through its making is
unique to art psychotherapy in that the original, concrete object
remains to prompt this process. All intervention with materials is
considered confidential clinical material for the client to return to
and to access at any point in the therapy, which aids this.
246 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

These factors inform the chapter, connecting with the distinct

ages and stages of life when Rembrandt  painted each portrait: 34
and 63. This is considered in relation to time, place and space and
the relevance to the potential span of art psychotherapy sessions,
alongside implications of any changes that might take place for the
client circumstantially, environmentally, and as a result of thera­
peutic engagement, which in turn become part of the complete art
psychotherapy experience.

The Rembrandt self-portraits

Rembrandt painted over 80 self-portraits. He was unafraid of self-
reflection and self-examination, fascinated by depicting an inner
self and inner state. Wieseman (2014) suggests of Rembrandt’s later
work that a demonstration of passion and extrovert nature in his
early years gave way later to ‘an intensive investigation of the inner
life of his subjects’ (p.42) and as a consequence his self-portraits:

became more inwardly directed and subtly, profoundly ex­

pressive…he turned his experienced and intensely inquisitive eye,
mind and hand to the consideration of his own ageing flesh, the
emotional onslaughts of his tumultuous personal life…venturing
bold experiments in presentation. (p.42)

Study the two Rembrandt portraits in the National Gallery for any
length of time and it becomes apparent that although by the same
artist, they are distinct in period, style, image and mood. Berger
compares the divergent aspects of ‘Rembrandt and Saskia in the
Parable of the Prodigal Son’ c.1635, and ‘Rembrandt, Self-portrait at
the age of 63’, stating that ‘all has gone except a sense of the question
of existence, of existence as a question. And the painter in him who is
both more and less than the old man, has found the means to express
just that’ (Berger 2015, p.142). The two self-portraits in the National
Gallery are similarly intertwined: created by the same artist, the same
man painting his own image in different eras. Twenty-nine years
separate these self-representations, with intervening life experience
and events. The person represented is the same, yet the mood and
character depicted are different – they are ‘states of mind apart’
(Jury  2012). When working with clients in art psychotherapy, we
Further Conversations with Rembrandt in Space, Place and Time 247

notice this sense of increased self-reflection depicted in the artwork,

as the therapeutic process becomes assimilated and psychological
material is possible to explore in greater depth.
To see all of Rembrandt’s self-portraits together would be a
captivating prospect: 80-plus depictions of self together in one
room, one gallery. A collective expression would be evident, as in a
retrospective of any artist’s work. But perhaps precisely because we
cannot always see artworks together, we learn to consider the mood
and mental and emotional state of the artist that leads to investment
of self at any specific point in time and space in an artwork – in
Rembrandt’s case, in each self-portrait.
What visual conversation would be possible if we could see
these two National Gallery self-portraits side by side? We can
anticipate what we might learn from the visual contraction of the
intervening years in which they were created; the consideration of
the two self-portraits and all depicted life experience together, in one
particular point in time. Arguably, this is what we perceive in the
art psychotherapy review where personal expression in artwork
made over a period of time comes together; a totality of experiences
juxtaposed in one place, in one time frame. In my journal I wrote:

I can either mirror, or alter the dimension I am exploring, by

choosing to consider the portraits separately, or I can bring them
together [through photography]. Bringing them together for
joint viewing would alter one state of mind: that of the absence
of physical comparison. If the two paintings are together, it
temporarily reverses the tension that ‘holding in mind’ the two
together might offer. The artwork, in the process of being made,
creates its own impetus: the reference being the time and space
in which it was created. The ‘holding space’ becomes the time
between sessions and/or a potential review, a revisiting of the
artwork. (Jury 2012, annotated)

The role of the portrait

The two paintings are of interest due to the context in which
Rembrandt was painting, and how his approach to them and view of
his own self was influenced. Berger remarks on Rembrandt’s moral
248 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

stance and comments that he showed an interest in the ethical frame,

‘he was the first artist to take the tragic isolation of the individual as
his recurring theme, just as he was the first great artist to experience
a comparable alienation from his own society’ (Berger 2015, p.139).
Rembrandt appeals because we understand that the communication
of empathy through his art depicts the state and living conditions of
others, as well as his understanding of what it meant to be ostracised
by society through personal life events. He can be said to reflect back
to us what we are aware of in our own lives.
Portraits mirror the self and other, allowing the viewer to
re/consider and question senses of identity and self. Carr and
Hancock (2017) describe Wright’s ideas on mirroring and attunement
in portraiture and self-identities, stating that the painting’s surface
is ‘derivative, or “analogue” of the mother’s expressive face in
infancy’, acting as ‘a responsive and mirroring extension of the self’
or ‘surrogate adaptive mother’ (p.8). Mirroring and attunement as
developed by Stern (1985) are important processes in the healthy
maturation of the infant in communication and socialisation
through learned responses that are first experienced between baby
and caregiver. This becomes refined and developed through extended
communication with the outside world, in to adulthood. The idea
is demonstrated in Berger’s exploration of sense of self as reflected
back through self-portraiture:

A painter can draw his left hand as if it belonged to somebody

else. Using two mirrors he can draw his own profile as if observing
a stranger. But when he looks straight into a mirror, he is caught
in a trap: his reaction to the face he is seeing changes that face.
Or, to put it in another way, that face can offer itself something it
likes or loves. (Berger 2015, p.151)

Carr (2014) talks of co-creation of a client’s portrait in art psy­

chotherapy where ‘the revisioning process and the manifestation
of aspects of self-identity within externalised objects’ allow for
difficult feelings to be uncovered and explored ‘so that they can be
held, contained, moved, worked on and reflected upon’ (p.18). The
portrait is therefore a powerful medium of exploration of inner self
and self-in-relation-to-other, at any point in time.
Further Conversations with Rembrandt in Space, Place and Time 249

The review in art psychotherapy process

Each piece of artwork produced by the client in art psychotherapy
is unique. Whether a copy of another artwork, diagrammatic
image, or form to express mood or feeling, it communicates an
internalised sense of self felt and conceived at a particular point in
time,  in a particular session,  framed in the context of the overall
therapeutic process. Art psychotherapists are trained to work with
this expression and to prize the role of artwork in recovery. Arnheim
suggests that ‘art therapists must use all resources and information
in an investigative manner such that the image is understood as more
than just an amalgamation of parts’ (cited in Curtis 2011, p.2). As
such, the body of reviewed artwork possesses a distinct status and
function, demonstrating a unique picture of the therapeutic work in
hand. As Prokofiev (2013) states of the client’s participation in the
review, ‘it allows the checking and cross referencing of memory and
meaning’ (p.4).
The review offers client and art psychotherapist an opportunity
to work across a combined time and experience span that is created
between the original making of the artwork and its re-evaluation in
the review. It allows for significant reconsideration, plus possibility
for new meaning-making. Curtis (2011) suggests that ‘when clients
make and view their art, it is an active and dynamic process that
engages the whole person’ (p.1) through ‘visual perception as
an active process involving the whole person who dynamically
constructs meaning’. Here, the therapist focuses on the artwork,
‘attending to and repeatedly returning to the art’s sensory and formal
qualities to look for meaning’ (ibid., pp.9–10). Drawing on Leclerc
and Acosta, Curtis suggests that the experience goes beyond both
the seen or interpreted and cannot be defined, but it implicates ‘the
observer’s whole, personal self’ (ibid., p.10). The art psychotherapist
is integral and contributory to sense-making in the review, a viewpoint
endorsed by Prokofiev (2013), who states that it ‘helps to isolate and
foreground the narrative of the art making’, describing Schaverien’s
analysis of the chronology of the reviewed work as an opportunity
to ‘explore meaning in a new context and observe where change
occurs with the intention of comparing it to psychological change or
improvements’ (p.2).
250 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

The art psychotherapist holds distinct strands of client experience,

response and history. Ellis (2008) recognises that this encompassing
role allows for ‘the socio-historical aspects of temporality’ that
‘can contribute to a richer and more complex understanding of an
individual’s experience’ (p.156).  The capacity of the art psycho­
therapist to co-construct a meaning around artworks with the client
is a skill crucial for the integration of therapeutic benefit and allows
the client’s presentation and engagement up to this point to be held in
mind. Coles (2014) reflects this view in her description of ‘therapeutic
presence as a spatial “ground” for what happens within therapy’
which facilitates ‘creating a rich, textural “felt” presence which is
finely adjusted in response to the client’ (p.80). How this is done
is important; as Huss suggests, ‘art therapists often naturally and
unthinkingly do integrate different ways of seeing client art’ but ‘how
this integration occurs, and what exactly is integrated, has yet to be
articulated’ (Huss cited in Curtis 2011, p.10). This is also explored
through the counter-transference response described by Acosta as
‘the knowledge one knows without knowing one knows it’ (cited in
Curtis 2011, p.10).

Clinical context
Reflecting on the circumstantial impossibility of viewing the two
Rembrandt self-portraits together at the same time in the National
Gallery helps us understand more about the sum of individual,
including apparently unrelated, artworks created on different occa­
sions in art psychotherapy. How artworks are seen together in the
review provides  opportunity for distinct and new understanding.
Each separate artwork ‘talks’ to the others when spread out or
‘galleried’ around the room and the overall therapeutic journey is
laid out for viewing through this visual lens of artwork. A sense of
passage of time and experience in therapy can be contemplated and
witnessed here, in the review.
Artwork might be created in one session, or it can be returned to
and even developed over a period of time. It might be reconsidered,
and the original spur for creating it revisited. It can depict a difficult
period for the client, or be a visual representation of unarticulated
Further Conversations with Rembrandt in Space, Place and Time 251

thoughts and feelings. Artwork is sometimes discounted by the client

as unimportant or irrelevant, or it is forgotten, and sometimes the
content and its significance within therapy overall is a surprise in
the review. Reassessment of the subject matter might be difficult, or
there might be reconciliation and resolution of experiences, thoughts
and feelings. However, there is also opportunity for integration
with fresh thoughts and ideas about the original difficulty being
revealed. Although artwork often retains challenging or evocative
feelings, the review can offer a unique opportunity for exploration
with the experiences of sessions leading up to that point helping
to clarify greater understanding. Significant pieces of artwork are
now accompanied, couched, embedded, and sometimes explained,
through being grouped together when reviewed. The review can be
consolidating and informative in function, and holds a particular
place in the art psychotherapy process.
The implication of viewing all the artwork  together, with its
associated art-making and process in space, place and time, is present
alongside the recollection of each piece made within that session. The
viewer plays an important role too, as artist-art psychotherapist.
Townsend (2013) suggests optimisation of psychological space
generated by the artist is important in order to create artwork, and
proposes that the viewer also needs ideal conditions to truly benefit
from the artwork presented in order to be able ‘to enter into a
relationship with it’ and thereby ‘perhaps imbue the work with his
or her own inner experience’ (p.183). Acknowledging that not all
artwork is viewed within a gallery setting, she continues ‘wherever it is
seen, if it is successful, the surroundings contribute to the experience,
enabling the viewer to enter his or her own internal space’ (ibid.,
p.183). Baker (2009) supports this, citing Dufrenne who suggests
that ‘artwork and spectator not be considered as isolated entities, but
as mutually invested in one another, so that to understand the work
of art, it is necessary to study the aesthetic experience constituted by
the intimate relationship between its subject and object’ (p.18).
The right conditions in the review allow the client-viewer
to assimilate the experience and nurture a capacity to creatively
process what is witnessed. The context becomes ‘a place set apart
from everyday life’, where the boundaries of art psychotherapy
252 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

space take on significance in facilitating the review, and this ‘in turn
informs subsequent art-making, as well as [further] therapeutic
interaction’ (Jury 2012). Art psychotherapy involves close emotional
and personal examination, allowing for new appraisal of the self
together with an opportunity for psychological insight into processes
that were not necessarily apparent or possible to consider prior to
the review, thereby effecting advancement of self-discovery. In the
review, previous clinical processes and artwork are brought together
en masse. For clients, this experience can be both overawing and
revelatory, according to ‘Simone’, a woman in her 40s in long-term
art psychotherapy, who described the experience of the interim
review as being as if the inner self was exposed, allowing recollection
of issues explored, and where the safe environment of the therapeutic
space became vitally important. The time for the interim review
session drawing to a close, she found this stage difficult, and she was
surprised at how emotional she felt. She paused, appearing uninclined
to physically move and finish the sessions, affected by the experience
and unexpectedly caught unawares.

Time, space and process

Time as process in art psychotherapy has different frames in relation
to artwork and therapeutic intervention. First, there is the time in
which the artwork is made – the external frame and circumstances of
a client’s life at a particular time that inspire particular artwork and
use of materials. There is the time at which it is made – the conscious
or unconscious point at which it occurs for the client in therapy, with
all the reference it will contain of the client’s revealed experience.
Then there is future time, unexplored and unrevealed, that will be
significant for the client. These time structures relating to artwork
and process are intrinsically held in mind by therapist and client,
including how this will feed back in to clinical work.
The how of artwork made by the client and retained in the mind
of client and therapist, alongside what space and relevance it holds,
is important in therapy. Why does one piece of artwork remain
in mind rather than another? What determines the importance of
one piece of artwork over another, for either client or therapist?
Further Conversations with Rembrandt in Space, Place and Time 253

What is it that makes us notice a particular artwork in relation to

clinical material expressed, rather than another? Similarly, what is
it that draws us to view one artist’s work in a gallery, rather than
that of another artist? These are questions that are embedded in the
practice of art psychotherapy and worked with through verbalised
thoughts and feelings in conjunction with the client. There is also the
more complex understanding of the mental space that the artwork
occupies when seen anew at the review. At this point it is literally
reviewed and has the potential to take on a different significance for
the client, according to their perception of what particular meaning
the whole body of artwork holds in this new context. This can
involve the feelings it originally evoked on making, what inspired
its creation, and what new thoughts or feelings are activated and
initiated on reviewing it. It might be ignored, the previously potent
feelings contained within it disallowed and disavowed, or these latter
might reappear in future sessions.
When reviewing her artwork after a year of being in therapy,
Simone found an exploration of the artwork all in one place at one
time overpowering, with its experience of the levelling of temporal
boundaries. The concentration of artwork collapsed time, place
and feelings, condensed in one here-and-now moment, and this felt
almost overwhelming to her. She sat quietly before considering what
the exploration of the body of artwork meant to her. It appeared that
each of the artworks became significant in three ways:

• What it had meant at the time of making, and frames of

reference at that particular point in time.
• What it meant now in relation to a sense of progression/
moving on/understanding where she had been, and the latent
power and emotional content it still held.
• Its place among the rest of the artwork, in consideration of the
body of work as a whole; what it reflected of the journey that
she had been on or still felt herself to be on.

Simone found that the artwork as individual pieces, and as a collec­

tion, condensed time and space so that the images were not only
a collection, but a mass, each separately and together representing
states of mind, thoughts and emotions that were uncovered and then
254 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

partially or wholly forgotten, or that were re-addressed and became

subdued and less troubling. She was surprised, and initially overcome
by her internal response and the reminder of feelings made tangible
through the artwork. This subsequently allowed her to construct her
previous experience in the context of the fresh view and structure of
the review: at the same time both time-less and time-laden.
Reflecting on how artwork produced in art psychotherapy is kept
in mind through space, time, and in relation to the emotional frame
in which it was made (and how it might be recalled in particular
sessions by the art psychotherapist who holds it in mind for the
client in therapy), is integral to the overall frame of the therapy work
taking place. How a piece of artwork is retained through time in the
mind of the art psychotherapist, session by session, both when it was
created and how, and what it represents of the feelings, thoughts
and experiences as communicated by the client in the session – all
these elements become fundamental to the construct and efficacy of
art psychotherapy practice. While the entirety of the work is kept
in mind by the art psychotherapist clinically, the visual, emotional
and therapeutic impact of the collective view of the client’s artwork
witnessed in the review is experienced and worked with by both the
art psychotherapist and the client together, at the same point in time.
This subsequently informs future therapy.
It is important to consider what bringing together the entirety of
the client’s artwork in one space signifies, as well as the frequency
of reviews and the implications of this. When reviewing her artwork,
‘Ursula’, a young woman in ongoing art psychotherapy, found in her
initial review that it was unexpectedly powerful for various reasons:

• The concrete nature and actuality of the artwork displayed.

• The juxtaposed sense of timing inherent in all the pieces laid
out together for viewing.
• The fact that material explored through the artwork in one
particular session might not be explored verbally until some
sessions later, or never referred to again.

For Ursula, in the review, memories and a recall of events merged

and formed new realisations, propelling the therapeutic process
into another psychological space on which to reflect. Time and
Further Conversations with Rembrandt in Space, Place and Time 255

unconscious material slipped and slid over one another causing areas
of explored material to join up, sometimes to make greater and more
impactful sense, and sometimes to allow new revelation of meaning.
Experiences and memories took on different resonances, surging up
in unexpected juxtaposition and connectedness to one another and
consequently becoming even more powerful in affect.

The internal dialogic space

[T]he spectator intercepts (overhears) dialogues between parts
gone adrift, and these dialogues are so faithful to a corporeal
experience that they speak to something everybody carries within
them. Before his art, the spectator’s body remembers its own
inner experience. (Berger 2015, p.145)

When writing my journal, I asked, ‘How can we hold the two frames
of reference and the experience of viewing each artwork in the same
space?’ (Jury 2012). I travelled back and forth between the two
Rembrandt self-portraits to hold in mind one, while trying to catch
a living connection with the other. Each time, the influence of a
refreshed review of the other interrupted my flow of thought and
visual memory. This brings into question what happens when we hold
in mind the client’s artwork – exactly how do we hold each separate
piece and its significance in mind? How does each individual piece of
viewed artwork influence consideration of every subsequent piece
of artwork made by the client? Furthermore, how does the client,
involved as they are in the production of artwork on a regular basis
in sessions, hold in mind each piece of artwork created over time,
plus process the personal significance of each and the influence it
might have on future artwork and therapy? Curtis (2011) describes
how ‘people construct meaning given different levels of experience
with imagery’, applying ‘feelings’ and ‘intuition’ among other skills
to understand ‘meaning as open to reinterpretation’, that they ‘con­
tinually return to the image to contemplate new meaning, syn­thesize
ideas, and justify their hypotheses through visual evidence’ (p.10).
This is the objective, spectator-art-psychotherapist view, but there
is also the subjective, personal element that inspires thinking and
256 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

feeling, when the piece of artwork being studied by the client is

artwork of the client’s own creation.
Each of us maintains internal conversations and dialogues not
only on a non-verbal level through the artwork we create, but
through ongoing narrative via thoughts concerning the influence
of life events, relationships, imagined fantasies. These dialogues
relate to our worldview and our negotiation of the actual world
around us. The therapeutic relationship depends on an awareness
and preparedness by both therapist and client to reach across and
within different understandings of internal conversations and world
observations, to form a common dialogue with the client’s internal
worlds and constructs. This, in association with the processing
and production of any artwork in art psychotherapy, allows for
development of further thought and articulation of the client’s sense
of reality of self, and ultimately a sense-making of experience and
events in the client’s life.
As art psychotherapists, using visual and verbal journalling helps us
maintain a fluid articulation of thought and feeling around engage­
ment with art processes through contact with art materials and
creation of our own artwork and in viewing and contemplating
the artwork of others,  both artists  and clients.  It allows us space
to challenge ourselves in meaning-making about external events and
circumstances and to interrogate previously accepted views of the
world. It helps consideration of alternative viewpoints and ways
of articulating and expressing ideas. With the client who tears the
corrugation from the surface of the cardboard and uses it to print
texturally, or who bleeds ink and oil together on paper to make an
emulsive swirl, both these processes might challenge our previously
accepted ways of thinking about art practices and the function of
materials as the ‘artist-art psychotherapist’. We might not notice these
processes nor see them as significant if we have not broadened our own
understanding of techniques that other artists employ in expression
making, or viewed their work in galleries and museums. Viewing
the work, techniques and practice of others expands our knowledge,
skills and understanding of the potential of art practice, enlightening
and informing us of clients’ internal processes and unconscious
thoughts. Museum and art gallery exhibits that challenge our ways
Further Conversations with Rembrandt in Space, Place and Time 257

of seeing and conceptualising art, and the use of materials as art,

are important to enable us to appreciate versatility of mediums and
form, and their usage. Destruction of work by a client,  with the
potential absence-but-presence of the artwork that is felt and at times
acknowledged in the review (where although it cannot be seen, the
absence is notable), can be an important reminder of the relevance
of absent psychological material in therapy. This further informs us
about the psychological space clients occupy and their functioning,
explored in the next section via the Rembrandt portraits.

Absence: out of sight, out of mind?

During my conversations with Rembrandt, one of the self-portraits
from the National Gallery went out on loan and was no longer
possible to view. A brief note replaced the portrait, stating it had gone
on tour and would return at some future date. I was indignant and
felt acutely the sense of absence in relation to the corresponding self-
portrait in the next room. Suddenly, there was the need to ‘keep in
mind’ the missing portrait until it returned at some unknown date,
along with the significance of absence, as well as any difficulty on my
part in trying to recall the portrait meanwhile. I was struck that in
a similar way, the client artwork remains out of sight but accessible
to the client each session. The fact that the artwork is hypothetically
available for viewing in any art psychotherapy session in a drawer,
box, folder or similar, provides a parallel link in therapy, sustaining
hope and constancy through a latent contract of future viewing. The
stored artwork maintains a constant and concrete connection and
positive reminder, an unformed sense of self, continually exploring
and constructing, in therapy. It is a reminder of what has been
explored in the safe environment of the therapeutic space, kept
constant by the therapist and evidenced in the accessible artwork
psychically present each session. How then, would the client feel if
artwork went missing, was not available to view at any particular
point, in the same way as the Rembrandt had gone walkabout?
This could engender a sense of attack and insecurity regarding
the therapeutic engagement. In this case, I was rationally aware
that the National Gallery would eventually return the Rembrandt
258 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

self-portrait to its location. But the attachment I had formed to it

presumed an unquestioning expectation of its continued presence for
me, whenever I might choose to view it.
Through the process of reviewing artwork in art psychotherapy
there is unconscious awareness of the artwork as part of a larger
sense of the client’s trajectory in therapy: the linear process and
narrative of whole life experience. In the journal, I noted:

What do I bring to each Rembrandt self-portrait, and what do I

take away? I am reminded of my own mortality. I am between
the ages at which the paintings were made and can therefore be
wise to a youthful Rembrandt, while mindful that I reject a certain
knowledge of mortality I see in Rembrandt’s later portrait, a ‘he-
knows-something-I-don’t-and-I-don’t-want-to-know’ that informs
me he is aware of not only demise and death per se, but quite
possibly his own. He died a year after it was painted. (Jury 2012)

Death as implicit in living is evident just as the ending is apparent

at the beginning of therapy, and our conscious awareness of death
and how we interact with the concept unconsciously dictates how
we understand our relationship with time. Ellis (2008) emphasises
the importance of this aspect of temporality through ‘the importance
of the fact of our death which is already inescapably present for us
on the horizon of our lives’ (p.177), and the significance of this in
work with clients alongside consideration of endings in therapy. She
goes on to explore age in relation to self-exploration, citing Reggiori
who maintains that ‘while aging unavoidably and invariably brings
about a deterioration in some capacities, it may also enable increased
playfulness and creativity’ (ibid., p.178). I felt this to be apparent in
the Rembrandt portraits, mixed with reckoning and assimilated life
experience, the older Rembrandt holding in mind the younger self
depicted in the next room in the National Gallery.
Similarly, the artwork of the client represents the life story of the
span of therapy, and has a beginning which we can see, and which is
witnessed, and an end that can still only be supposed during interim
reviews. The ending of the therapy work becomes implicitly present
in the interim review and is a type of witnessing of death: a landmark
pointer in the life of the therapy. Some clients manifest this when
Further Conversations with Rembrandt in Space, Place and Time 259

reviewing the artwork, becoming overwhelmed by what has gone

before, and by implication, understanding the potential of what
might be to come. While it is possible to recall how the artwork has
come about through the sessions up to that point, there is no way
of the client being able to anticipate what the final accumulation of
artwork will represent in terms of psychological material, nor the
events and life experience that will have happened by the next, or
even final, review of the work.
The two Rembrandt self-portraits can be used to understand
something further here. The later Rembrandt portrait in the National
Gallery captures a sense of an afterlife of the picture that can only
be surmised at this point. At this stage, Rembrandt did not have
experience of the whole, or entirety, of his life, as it had not been
completed. Perhaps we can assume he understood that the portraits
he had painted would continue to have an individual presence
through future existence when he, as the artist, did not. I feel he
played with this idea in his portraiture: a concrete understanding
of here-and-now representation within the unknown, potentiated
future. Berger corroborates this idea when discussing Rembrandt’s
later works, saying that ‘the late Rembrandt self-portraits contain or
embody a paradox: they are clearly about old age, yet they address
the future. They assume something coming towards them apart from
Death’ (Berger 2015, p.149).
Similarly, the artwork the client produces in sessions becomes a
memento mori. By the tangible nature of its existence, it is a reminder
of mortality – it exists, but could just as easily not. The artwork
will continue in its ‘here-and-now’ state into the future, occupying
present space in future and past contexts simultaneously, as long as it
is kept and viewed anew. In the review, we are reminded of the hidden
future capacity of psychological material, as yet unwitnessed and
unexpressed in artwork form. Although not yet experienced, its future
possibility is glimpsed in the context of the final review, spanning as
it does all time frames including, implicitly, ‘what is to come’. The
client can have no knowledge of what is to come in terms of life and
therapeutic experience, but there is portent in the review – the sense
of linear time through creation of artwork also creates possibility of
a future. When Simone reviewed her artwork, she  also recognised
260 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

possibility for fragmentation that she feared might come about if she

explored too much through the art materials. She valued creativity
very highly, but feared the sense of her creative self being overcome
by the significance of what she created in the context  of the art
psychotherapy time span available. We were able to explore how she
might cope in the context of the containing environment. This was
an important discovery in her therapy of newfound capacity.
While there might be a glimpse of future self towards the end
of therapy when the final review of artwork has happened, and
the artwork has been collected up and removed from the therapy
room, another knowledge of the psychological process also becomes
possible: the cumulative effect of the whole. Here, art-making
process, verbal exploration, and reviewing of the physical artwork
begin to work together. The particular elements of the therapeutic
experience sift down to validate the beneficial attributes. These are
eventually internalised by the client and inform a sense of self in
relation to psychological material and within an overview of their
experience. In conversation about Berger’s analysis of Rembrandt’s
works, Riach states:

What Berger draws our attention to in the later Rembrandt

self-portrait is a quality of human sympathy untainted by
self-pity. It’s one of the most difficult, but necessary things…a
remembering accompanies the disintegration… And when we
look at Rembrandt…what gives us authority and encouragement
comes through, something essential, part of that recognition of
what tragedy is. In Berger’s phrase, that quality of inspiration is
what all art delivers: the intimation of our own potential. (Riach
and Moffat 2017)

The supervisory nature of reflective space

Regularly viewing the works of artists in galleries, museums, exhi­
bitions and performances is an investment in both artist and art
psychotherapist self, as explored previously. Coles refers to the need
for the therapist to ‘be in a state of heightened artistic sensitivity’
(2014, p.80) to understand the different levels and degrees of
expression of the client. Through reflection and exploration of works
Further Conversations with Rembrandt in Space, Place and Time 261

of artists and their handling of materials and ideas, we understand

more not only the potential of materials, their scope and divergent
uses, but also styles and symbolism. We come to understand a greater
pictorial representation of a worldview, helping us acknowledge
clients’ states of mind. Reflection and contemplation of  art psy­
chotherapy  practice through supervision are essential properties
of clinical work, to benefit and maintain professional insight and
sensitivity. Professional art psychotherapy supervision allows the
supervisee to recall the artwork of the client through discussion to
give space and opportunity for enriched reflective understanding,
sometimes through reverie. During supervision, the supervisee can
non-judgementally inhabit a contemplative and critical space where
artwork and artwork process are jointly considered in relation to the
client’s presentation and presiding history. Here, the supervisee can
work with specific artwork or refer to all artwork and psychological
material, along with the time span they encompass, truncating time
and gaining an overview. Unless otherwise consciously arranged,
there is no other opportunity to overview, review, or work back and
forth through all the artwork between sessions,  apart from  here,
within supervision. However, this takes place for art psychotherapist
and supervisor alone within the supervision space, holding a distinct
function overall in the therapeutic context – the client is not physically
present to respond or partake, but is recalled, conjured up, by the art
psychotherapist.
The powerful and collective totality of viewing individual pieces of
artwork in relation to one another, and/or as a whole body of work, is
therefore not available to either client or therapist until a review. In
the review, the experience is clinically reflective and is within the
context of the art psychotherapy process, whereas in supervision,
reviewing artwork is a professional consultation, an opportunity
for the professional exploration of ideas by the therapist with an
experienced colleague.

Conclusion
The art psychotherapy review is an opportunity for new  connec­
tions and interconnections  between thoughts, feelings, ideas and
262 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

incidents previously hidden or unrealised to be  uncovered. Had

the artwork not been seen collectively as a whole, in its entirety
and each artwork in relation to the other, these meanings might
have remained hidden. New implications become apparent  and
re-examined as unconscious material is connected between work
that was sometimes produced weeks or months apart, alongside
the recalled process of making the art piece. The experience of the
review can seem the equivalent of an exhibition’s worth of artwork
(corresponding to all the 80-plus Rembrandt self-portraits together,
perhaps?) viewed in the boundaried construct and space of one art
psychotherapy session. It can be the self, laid bare. It becomes the
in the moment summation of thought and feelings; internalised and
externalised experience brought together with all the here and now, in
the present,  transferential  feelings and emotional responses  that
might occur within this experience. Time shortens and contracts,
sometimes even appearing to stop when the  entire scope of art
psychotherapy sessions  is laid out and made  apparent through the
artwork. Time telescopes  and  individual  sessions lose longitudinal
character with the artwork displayed in one space, at one time, and
on one occasion – that of the review. The effect that it can have for
the client, as they see their symbolic history displayed before them –
feelings and thoughts, emotions and experience, all revealed – cannot
be undone, and can lead to a sense of profound affect. As Ellis (2008)
says, ‘every moment produces a new moment for a different context
of experience’ (p.154).
And then I revisit the National Gallery to find that there has
been a reorganisation. The gallery space has been repainted and
the Rembrandts now appear together in one room. Among these,
Rembrandt aged 63 appears to sympathetically consider his younger
counterpart aged 34 across the gallery space; the younger version
making sense, or not, of his future counterpart. I still cannot hold
them both in view at the same time, even if I stand in the middle
of the gallery and use peripheral vision, and so, tantalisingly, they
cannot co-exist in the same span and moment. But the awareness
of them being there together in that same space, provides a different
viewpoint and a new consideration that is similar to a periodic review
of clients’ artwork, where the work is seen together and a new vision
Further Conversations with Rembrandt in Space, Place and Time 263

is created, but then returns to the folder/box/cupboard/storage.

What remains is the knowledge of the work having been together
collectively; the memory and the effect of each piece on the other
and the subsequent, unseen mental process continuing work. The
other Rembrandt works surrounding the self-portraits in the gallery
and accompanying and informing them provide additional reference,
context, information and knowledge – this is a new level discovered.

Acknowledgements
Fully informed consent has been given for all clinical work cited
in this chapter for the purposes of research and publication. All
contributions have been anonymised and any identifying factors
removed. Sincere thanks and appreciation go to those who have
contributed and advanced the thinking around the topics explored.

References 
Baker, J. (2009) The Tactile Eye: Touch and the Cinematic Experience. London,
Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.
Berger, J. (2015) Portraits: John Berger on Artists. London and New York, NY:
Verso.
Carr, S. (2014) ‘Revisioning self-identity: The role of portraits, neuroscience and
the art of the therapist’s “3rd hand”.’ International Journal of Art Therapy
19, 2, 54–70.
Carr, S. and Hancock, S. (2017) ‘Healing the inner child through portrait
therapy: Illness, identity and childhood trauma.’ International Journal of
Art Therapy 22, 1, 8–21.
Coles, A. (2014) ‘“Being Time”: An exploration of personal experiences of time
and implications for art psychotherapy practice.’ International Journal of
Art Therapy 19, 2, 71–81.
Curtis, E.K. (2011) ‘Understanding client imagery in art therapy.’ Journal of
Clinical Art Therapy 1, 1, 9–15.
Ellis, M.L. (2008) Time in Practice: Analytical Perspectives on the Times of Our
Lives. London: Karnac Books. 
Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) (2013) Standards of Proficiency
for Arts Therapists. London: HCPC. Accessed on 31/10/18 at www.hcpc-
uk.org/standards/standards-of-proficiency/arts-therapists.
Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) (2016) Standards of Conduct,
Performance and Ethics. London: HCPC. Accessed on 28/6/18 at www.
hcpc-uk.org/aboutregistration/standards.
Jury, H. (2012 onwards) Conversations with Rembrandt. [Personal journal,
unpublished].
264 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Prokofiev, F. (2013) ‘Allowing the artwork to speak: The use of a visual display
as research method in a retrospective study of four years’ artwork in art
therapy with a four-year-old boy.’ ATOL: Art Therapy Online 4, 1, 1–5.
Riach, A. and Moffat, A. (2017) ‘In praise of John Berger Part Two: Scratching
beneath the surface of art’s canvas.’ The National Scot News (24/2/17).
Accessed on 24/2/17 at www.thenational.scot/news/15114086.in_praise_
of_john_berger_part_two__scratching_beneath_the_surface_of_art___s_
canvas.
Stern, D. (1985) The Interpersonal World of the Infant. New York, NY: Basic
Books.
The National Gallery website (n.d) Accessed on 5/1/18 at www.nationalgallery.
org.uk/paintings/collection-overview.
Townsend, P. (2013) ‘Making Space.’ In A. Kuhn (ed.) Little Madnesses:
Winnicott, Transitional Phenomena and Cultural Experience. London and
New York, NY: I.B. Tauris.
Wieseman, M.E. (2014) ‘Rembrandt: The Late Self-Portraits.’ In The National
Gallery Rembrandt: The Late Works. Exhibition catalogue. London: The
National Gallery.
 CHAPTER 12 

Temporary, Portable
and Virtual
Making Galleries on the
France–UK Border at Calais 

Miriam Usiskin, Bobby Lloyd and Naomi Press 

Introduction 
This chapter proposes an innovative, even radical, approach to using
arts-based psychosocial groups and curation as part of crisis support
for refugees living in transit on the France–UK border at Calais and
facing ongoing exposure to hostility and homelessness. It is delivered
by a core team of art therapists from Art Refuge UK, and the potential
spaces and art media used within this particular humanitarian setting
become sites for intercultural and social connections, imagination
and psychological survival. At times, they also become galleries –
temporary, portable and virtual. 
Refugees, volunteers, and workers from other organisations as
well as ourselves as artists and art therapists make art alongside one
another in diverse group settings which have included portacabins,
tent studios, community centres, a day centre, a safe house, and a
roadside distribution point. The work described here does not form
part of clinical treatment as those we work with are neither patients
nor clients. The settings are accessed by refugees on a drop-in basis,

265
266 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

and people are free to join our groups for as long or short a time as
they so wish.
Art installation, a box of postcards, a large map and the use of
social media are discussed due to their particular relevance to the
theme of this book. The photographs included were taken on our
mobile phones by or alongside those we work with. We have chosen
to curate this chapter thematically rather than in a linear way so as to
reflect the complexity and richness of the work.

Context 
Established in 2006, Art Refuge UK is a small, robust charity
that offers specialist and imaginative art and art therapy spaces to
people displaced due to war, persecution and poverty, including un­
accompanied minors. Our work largely takes place through groups,
and currently operates in London, Bristol and northern France. Art
Refuge UK works in close partnership with local government and
non-government organisations (NGOs) that provide infrastructure,
local knowledge and mutual support, to ensure interventions are
adapted and appropriate to each social, political and cultural context,
and to enable sustainable working.
In September 2015, a small team of art therapists began offering
psychological support on behalf of Art Refuge UK in the large make­
shift refugee camp known as ‘The Jungle’ in Calais, northern France.
To put numbers into context, around one million migrants and
refugees arrived in Europe in 2015, while numbers at the border in
Calais reached their height of around 10,000 people towards autumn
2016 (Stanton and Welander 2016). We worked with unaccompanied
minors and adults, mostly fleeing war and persecution from North
Africa and the Middle East, the majority risking their lives to get
across the English Channel to claim asylum in the UK where many
have family connections and/or a legal right to asylum. 
In the camp, we delivered our work across two days each week
in partnership with our French partners Médecins du Monde and
Médecins Sans Frontières within their psychosocial programmes.
Ours was one of the few services to offer a psychological space open
Temporary, Portable and Virtual 267

to all, regardless of ethnicity, culture, age or gender. Following the

camp population’s eviction and its razing to the ground in October
2016, we have worked in various settings alongside the French
associations Secours Catholique and Médecins du Monde, adapting
our work to suit the changing context and needs. 
Our team is made up of experienced UK Health and Care
Professions Council registered art therapists who are also practising
artists. Keeping the team small and focused allows us to remain
steady in face of the significant challenges we encounter while
working in this unique context. Team members work in rotation,
never alone, with one core member acting as the cultural carrier
from week to week, passing on knowledge, information and nuances
from the previous week’s work. Consistency of delivery is essential
to allow for trust and knowledge accumulation to build, both within
the work and with our partners. It also ensures effective, robust peer
support. The latter is a crucial part of good practice and the editing
and reforming of the social media posts we write at the end of each
visit provide not just an online gallery, but also the structure for
us to regularly check in with each other as to how, if, and by what
means, we have been affected within the work. This peer supervision
acts as a means of self-care for the team while working in the field,
which is further supported by each member of the team’s individual
supervision back in the UK. 
The extracts presented are adapted from Art Refuge UK’s
Facebook posts (2016–18) written each Friday by the team members
on their way home from their shift in Calais. The varied and informal
style captures something of the particular quality of experience from
that week’s work.

Temporary, portable and virtual 

Our work began in various settings across the large camp: tents, a
portacabin, a wooden shelter. From November 2016, it has taken
place through outreach in the Calais area, in temporary housing, a
safe house for unaccompanied teenagers, a day centre, and alongside
a medical van at the main roadside distribution point. Art materials
268 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

used in the various spaces range from focused, ordinary materials, to

found objects, plasticine, postcards, filmmaking and animation, as well
as cyanotypes, kite-making and large-scale mapping in the outdoor
environments. Through witnessing, cataloguing, photographing and
curating, and against the backdrop of widespread human rights
abuses in the Calais area (Bochenek 2017; Welander and Gerlach
2018), the work draws on the team’s knowledge and experience, the
individual refugees’ resilience and imaginative capacity, as well as
the idiosyncrasies of the different physical spaces on offer (Andemicael
2011). All the work is supported by linking closely with our NGO
partner organisations. 
Our work is underpinned by the concept of Portable Studio
(Kalmanowitz and Lloyd 2005, 2011, 2016), which offers an internal
frame. Portable Studio emerged out of the work of Kalmanowitz
and  Lloyd in the former Yugoslavia in the mid 1990s and they
described it as: 

based on the premise that the internal structure we carry as art

therapists can allow for work to physically take place in a wide
range of settings which, in the former Yugoslavia, extended
from the refugee camp dining room and bedroom, to the hills
surrounding the camp and, at one point, the local rubbish dump.
This internal structure comprises a number of key elements
which include an attitude both to the art and the individual
making it. Central is a belief in the individual possessing internal
resources rooted in experience, resilience and culture rather than
being a powerless victim for whom the therapist alone holds the
solutions. (Kalmanowitz and Lloyd 2005, p.108) 

The notion of appreciating that people we encounter in our work

carry with them their own inner resourcefulness is imperative in this
context and helpful in informing the frame of our work. It is what
the psychological aspect of this work hinges on and where we see
time and again the way that the art-making, viewing, curating and
exhibiting can both collaborate with and enhance personal resilience. 
The work is responsive and nuanced, and as a team we have
been through our own journey of doubt and hope and the need to re-
Temporary, Portable and Virtual 269

inhabit our workspaces both psychologically and physically on each

occasion. We make no assumptions and need to be congruent about
our own cultural heritages and mindful about how these may be both
received and seen.
In creating the galleries – both physical and virtual – we often
need to literally inhabit spaces that have no walls. Interactions can
be fleeting; the individuals we encounter often engage with little
expectation other than a curiosity as to what we are doing and who
we are. The ethos of the work is underpinned by core principles
of art therapy practice, while as a team we acknowledge our need
to adapt our models to respond to the psychological needs of the
refugee population and keep a strong ethical frame (Hogan 2009).
We are a specialist team of art therapists who view the work through
a particular lens that is shaped by our extensive knowledge and active
engagement in the here and now in this setting.
There is no avoidance of the complexities of this environment in
which there are multiple, complicated, daily socio-political shifts, as
we have explored in our article on ‘virtual shelters’ in this context
(Lloyd, Press and Usiskin 2018a). Police, vigilante and mafia violence,
and intimidation and destruction of property are all ongoing and all
too familiar. We have to be honest about the limitations of the work,
as well as the difficult grey areas (Kalmanowitz and Potash 2010)
that need continual reflection and re-evaluation, and thoughtful and
responsive interaction rather than a reactive response. ‘An exam­
ination of motivations and intentions is essential to ethical practice.
Unexamined attitudes and practices can perpetuate inequality in any
cross-cultural situation’ (Potash et al. 2017, p.75). 
The team members are all visual artists who understand that
each material or art medium has its own qualities and characteristics,
alongside the need to be intentional when choosing materials for the
widely disparate settings we encounter in Calais. Moon explores
related ethical issues, stating, ‘Ongoing, intentional consideration of
the potential impact of materials on clients is an ethical responsibility
of the art therapist’ (Moon 2000 cited in Moon 2010, p.11). In
addition, the team collectively carries a rich and diverse history
of studying visual art; of gallery and museum visits worldwide; of
270 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

making, exhibiting and involvement in art practices; of collecting

books, postcards and other resources. As practitioners, we find that
there is shared acknowledgement of the need to actively engage in
contemporary art practice, researching appropriate images and
references, and of keeping the work alive when not physically present
in Calais. 
A key element of the work is choosing context-specific materials,
explored by Kalmanowitz and Lloyd (2016) when considering the
use of kites in the makeshift Calais camp and the Idomeni camp on
Greece’s northern border with Macedonia in 2016:

The making of kites honoured the tradition of the artist, art

therapist and the kite makers. The therapists supported this
physical engagement and creative problem-solving alongside
the different psychological and social meanings. This work was
tailored specifically to the people and context. (p.154) 

Our work takes place in very particular locations influenced by their

smells, physicality and sounds; the weather, the diversity of cultures
we encounter; our perspective as a British team working in France;
as well as the immediate social context, history and politics. Creating
a space that is safe enough to make the work possible is imperative.
With some individuals, we have seen an ability to relate to something
outside themselves, perhaps as a means of alleviating feelings of
being homesick. ‘Homesick individuals have little interest in the
new environment, which makes adaptation and settling virtually
impossible’ (Dieterich-Hartwell and Koch 2017, p.2).
This sense of homesickness is explored by Papadopoulos (2002),
who proposes the idea of ‘nostalgic disorientation’ that sets off a
yearning for a specific, tangible state of home and belonging. Much of
the work we do involves holding this notion of homesickness in mind
and trying to create some kind of space which can be temporarily
inhabited – poignant in Calais, a border town and place of transit for
so many who have not yet reached their hoped-for destination.
Temporary, Portable and Virtual 271

Art installation 
Installation art has been a major strand of contemporary art practice
since the 1960s. Often site specific, it might involve construction
and assemblage and usually temporarily transforms a particular
site into an active, and at times immersive, space that encourages
an interactive experience (Bishop 2005; Gingko Press 2014). This
idea helps us further enrich our understanding of the work, and
was explored by Kalmanowitz and Lloyd (2011) to allow them to
imaginatively re-vision their diverse studio spaces into viable working
environments. We can also think about it in terms of the role of
temporary galleries. Moon (2008) writes about installation as a site-
specific artwork, the intention of which ‘is to create a sense of place
that is to be experienced rather than viewed’ (p.82), which further
helps us understand the context of the temporary gallery space, as
below. 
This first extract from our Facebook posts (Art Refuge UK 2016–
18) comes from our work in a purpose-built psychosocial tent that
we shared with Médecins du Monde over a number of months in
2016. 

Extract one: 8–9 September, 2016 

We returned to the Médecins du Monde space in the camp to

prepare for the day. This involved laying out approximately
200 plasticine animals, objects and people made in the tent over
the last few months so as to document, repair and re-present
them back as a temporary art installation for those using the
space [see Figure 12.1]. Several men recognised pieces they had
made and new figures were added.  As with yesterday, we felt
acutely the harsh reality of distance, a sense of yearning; of the
unbearableness of loss of family; of wanting familial attention
with another person; of needing to tell aspects of the journey from
home; of wanting to connect on an authentic level. Yesterday it
was with us as mothers, today as fellow human beings – mothers,
sisters, aunts. 
272 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Figure 12.1 Plasticine installation

The plasticine objects transformed the tent into a space that indi­
viduals could inhabit. For this to happen we drew on our own identity
as artists, and our experiences in transforming unlikely spaces into
those for exhibition. Moon (2008) develops these ideas further: 

If we are to cultivate an artist identity in all aspects of our work, it

makes sense that we use our artistic sensibilities to reconceptualize
our workspaces. To consider our environments as works of art
brings an intentional focus to the creation of therapeutic space
Temporary, Portable and Virtual 273

and engages our artist identity in the process. Architecture,

interior design, environmental sculpture, and installation art all
have relevance for us when we begin to think of our physical
spaces as works of art in and of themselves. (p.83)

The following extract is from our work at the Maria Skobtsova

House in Calais. Maria Skobtsova (Smith 1967) was a Russian
noblewoman, poet, nun, member of the French resistance and
canonised martyr, who in 1930s Paris opened her house to refugees,
the vulnerable, homeless and lonely. It also became a site for theo­
logical and intellectual discussion. The safe house in Calais works
in this spirit to provide emergency accommodation and support for
up to 22 vulnerable unaccompanied refugees of all faiths, while also
acting as a house for prayer. At the time of writing, the house largely
accommodates young men from Eritrea and Ethiopia. Since late
2016 we have offered three-hour sessions there on Friday afternoons
around the dining room table, which then also becomes the site
for installation. 

Extract two: 6–7 April, 2017 

The evening session was grounded by the presence at the table

of the trusted safe house staff. Bringing a LEGO® boat, some
ornamental model trees, rocks and concrete bricks onto the
table allowed new landscapes to once again emerge, along with
touching exchanges and periods of creative collaboration. An
important historic Eritrean site was created by the same young
man who had made a truck two weeks ago that represented the
overcrowded vehicle he had been driven across the Sahara desert
in on a frightening journey that most of these young men have
experienced. After temporarily struggling with the bricks, he
produced three towers in a landscape, pulling together a powerful
scene, much as he had poignantly willed the making of the desert
truck. In parallel, a second young man who had been director of
lighting two weeks earlier now directed those around the table,
inspired by the LEGO® boat to make his own plasticine sculpture
of the boat he had travelled in from Libya to Italy. With humour
and yet insistence that the forty or so tiny figures be made to
274 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

his specification, each wearing a life jacket, he also managed

to create a powerful object embodying his experience. The two
young men ended the afternoon stage-managing their artworks
with backdrops, lighting and filters on their phones [Figure 12.2].
We were deeply moved that they had shared with us and the
group such intimate experiences, and that the boat held meaning
for all of them, as had the truck two weeks earlier. 

Figure 12.2 Stage-managing the boat

Box of postcards 
We regularly use a collection of postcards in a small, map-lined
cardboard suitcase. The small, portable size of the postcard has, by
and large, remained uniform across time and cultures, hence their
ability to stack neatly together in a box. This also makes them
intimate. Our box of postcards referenced in the extracts below
is carried, constantly re-formed and carefully curated, as an alive,
collective, intercultural resource and acts in itself in the work like
a mini portable gallery or museum containing meaningful contents.
Temporary, Portable and Virtual 275

The postcard has been a distinct artistic medium since the middle
of the 20th century and this continues into contemporary art practice.
The images in our eclectic collection range from landscapes to holiday
destinations, reproductions of old masters to contemporary artists
from around the world, and include images of artworks made by
refugees within our work in Calais, which have been professionally
printed up as postcards. Choosing an image from this wide collection
allows for a subjective element and the potential connection with
personal cultural narratives not imposed from the outside.
Postcards as a genre have particular resonance for our work with
refugees. Phillips (2000) describes them as ‘receptacles of memory,
bearers of images and carriers of news’ (p.16). Originating in the
mid-19th century, they act as social tools and accessible forms for
correspondence, communication, visual engagement, and advertising
– of a place, idea, object, something perhaps longed for. Traditionally
meant to be sent to another person as a form of communication,
postcards are often sent across national borders. It is ironic that
the images they hold can sometimes unwittingly cause religious or
political offence, raising legal issues (Phillips 2000). As with those
seeking asylum, the cards are also sometimes returned to the country
of origin. 
Berger (1974) talks about the intimacy of home noticeboards as
another form of miniature museum or container for experience that
are curated and displayed by individuals, and this again resonates
with our work:

[A]ll the images belong to the same language and all are more or
less equal within it, because they have been chosen in a highly
personal way to match and express the experience of the room’s
inhabitant. Logically, these boards should replace museums.
(p.30)

A session we delivered in an apartment in Calais with a group of

refugee friends from Sudan, Pakistan and Iran illustrates this well.
We took our box of postcards and were moved by the poignant
activity that followed between people, place, postcard and object,
with an impromptu art exhibition resulting on the kitchen table. 
276 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Extract three: 5–6 October, 2017 

The afternoon was spent with a familiar group of refugees in

an apartment in Calais, the cosy domain of someone who has
recently gained asylum in France. We sat sipping tea… We noticed
the relocation of familiar clay and plasticine figures that had been
made in previous groups at the hostel (where some of the men
were currently living in temporary accommodation), which had
then been physically moved by the group to the safer home of the
apartment to be cared for and to bring comfort. The art objects
brought identity into the space, making it personal, allowing it
to become a home; being filled with friends both literally and
figuratively. The friendship circle formed, the group sifted
through postcards, choosing images and creating an impromptu
exhibition [Figure 12.3]. The images held portraits from around
the world, linking different people and cultures. The exhibition
allowed those unable to use a shared verbal language to express
themselves by sharing images. 

Figure 12.3 Postcard exhibition on the table

Temporary, Portable and Virtual 277

For the final few months of the Calais camp’s life, a designated youth
area was set up to support hundreds of unaccompanied minors living
in the camp and who were considered of particular concern due
to their vulnerability to traffickers, abuse and neglect. We offered
weekly sessions from a shipping container with our partner Médecins
Sans Frontières. The postcards as an art medium came into their own
given their intimate size, helping to activate the space into one that
felt emotionally contained and in which therapeutic work could
take place.

Extract four: 8–9 September, 2016 

Around 35 unaccompanied teenage boys joined us throughout

the afternoon, both inside the container and on a table outside
in the sun. One young man, when offered the box of postcards
to look through, chose one that sparked his curiosity, leading
him to embark on a watercolour. Others followed his lead. The
postcards seemed to lend themselves to the size of the space and
their inherent transience seemed to allow for both intimacy and
familiarity for these boys so used to navigating small spaces
[Figure 12.4]. There were extended periods of joint visual
attention [Isserow 2013], the boys seeking close proximity with
us and with each other. Several talked about hunger, lack of
shoes, and fingerprints being taken forcefully in other countries
in Europe. The area outside the container allowed for space
around things, connection with other services, as well as freedom
to come in and out of the art therapy space. A couple of hours
into the afternoon, heavy tear gas (sprayed by the CRS police
nearby) led several boys to join those already in the container,
invited in by us and each other to find refuge in the space as if
coming in from bad weather or a storm at sea. There was a sense
of the space inside as safe in spite of the intrusion of the gas and
the unlikely environment of a hot shipping container, as well as
an atmosphere of camaraderie. 
278 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Figure 12.4 Drawing postcards in the shipping container

The collection of postcards inspires new drawings, watercolour

paintings and visual translations which we often photograph and
include in our weekly Facebook post (described below). These new
reproductions cross borders digitally, carrying news or a narrative in
much the same way a postcard might. This is in a context in which
displacement, invisibility and lack of agency are commonly felt
experiences. 

Large map 
The large map is an ongoing artwork exhibited in a range of settings.
A first map covering Europe, Northern Africa and the Middle East
began its journey taped to the outside of a wooden community space,
later to the canvas walls within the Médecins du Monde tent, both
in the southern half of the Calais camp (spring 2016). A second
version was taped to the Médecins du Monde ambulance at the main
distribution point (from autumn 2017) and has been used since, with
Temporary, Portable and Virtual 279

a new world map added from May 2018. Individuals are invited to
mark their routes from their country of origin to Calais.
A number of authors refer to a state of limbo as a liminal space
in which the individual no longer feels at home (Dieterich-Hartwell
and Koch 2017; Harris 2009). It is not a place in which a person
can even begin to feel settled, since they have not reached their
final destination. ‘Liminality may be experienced with discomfort
and uncertainty, yet this “in-between space” carries a significant
potential for transformation and change’ (Dieterich-Hartwell and
Koch 2017,  p.2). In our work in Calais over a number of years,
this transitional space is always one of limbo which carries with it
both pain and the potential for something to happen. The map here
becomes a construct, a point of reference that is temporarily fixed
in space. It is an object printed in vivid colour, deliberately chosen.
It glows in the dark, on dull days and in all weathers. The map is
robust (printed on a strong plastic material), and able to withstand
the fierce Calais winds and driving rain. It is monumental; its scale
and colour ensure it holds a strong presence as an artwork in its
own right. It draws curiosity from refugees, volunteers, visitors and
journalists alike. People come to the map to view it as they would a
picture in a gallery, but the map is not fixed inside the four walls of a
gallery space, it is taped to the side of a community space in a refugee
camp, or the medical team’s ambulance, or tied to the tall fence that
cordons off one of the many spaces meant to deter refugees from
setting up shelter. 
The map is an interactive artwork installed in a specific place. The
routes marked out are drawn over and over again by new visitors to
the map. The map has become a snapshot of a particular time and
place in history, with specific routes all leading to Calais. The map
becomes not just a statement of the current situation on the France–
UK border and a shared perspective, but a participatory art piece
in situ. It draws attention to the environment in which it is shown,
as much as it draws attention to itself and to those who view it or
interact with it. In this sense, the map encourages the space around
it to be occupied and activated, as in a site-specific art installation.
280 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Extract five: 2–3 November, 2017 

Several hundred people gathered at the distribution area across

an afternoon with a clear blue sky and in strong autumnal sun.
The Red Cross, Médecins du Monde’s doctors, nurses and
psychologist, and services providing food, clothing, toilets and
youth support were all present. Groups gathered and football
was played on the tarmac road. As usual, we placed the map on
the outside of the ambulance, with two small tables that held
postcards, plasticine and drawing materials. Around fifty or so
individuals from Afghanistan, Sudan and Eritrea joined us, many
in small groups, often with friends, drawn towards the large map.
Many stayed for a while in conversation around the map and for
art-making. As images or objects were made, a small, impromptu
exhibition was created on the ambulance itself [Figure 12.5] next
to the map.

Figure 12.5 Viewing the map and exhibition

The routes described on the surface of the map may appear similar,
yet all carry a unique narrative, a personal resonance. The lines are
Temporary, Portable and Virtual 281

marked with different pens; gold and silver intermingle with black,
red and green, the routes become iridescent and multidimensional;
they seem to lift off the map’s surface. Certain places are obscured
as the traffic of pen marks becomes heavier. Each individual has left
something behind but also made a mark on the changing face of
Europe, lines and routes marked all over. Because of the ‘pen traffic’,
Italy at certain sites becomes obliterated. The notion of being able
to mark and contextualise where one was, where one is now, gives
credence to the lines added; the marking becomes part of the map
itself, adding to the marks already on the printed surface. There is
curiosity about which country is where, a real sense of people looking
together at the map. Borders are redrawn, and anticipated or hoped-
for journeys are added. The map holds a collective narrative that can
be viewed [Figure 12.6]. 

Figure 12.6 Viewing the map at night

In the final extract, the map and fence it is tied to are activated by its
viewers to become a site for installation.
282 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Extract six: 21–22 February, 2018 

It was freezing cold with blue skies and temperatures dropping.

There was a tense edge to the air with fewer refugees and isolated
outbursts of aggressive, confrontational behaviour from some
individuals towards others they did not know. With a table set
up with bricks in the winter sunshine, it was only the map that
offered useful diversion. We had first placed it on the ambulance
out of the sun, only to move it to the border fence behind the
van where it attracted small groups and acted as a catalyst
for discussion. It also served as the focus for two men to talk
independently of their plans to navigate different countries prior
to finding the country they want to settle in. The cold appeared to
make people draw upon internal resources, allowing their minds
to wander. The security fence became an extended mapping area,
with Canada, Iceland, South Africa and Australia marked out
further on to the metal fence with imaginary lines. 

Virtual galleries 
Our active use of social media forms a key element of the work,
acting as a platform from which this work can be shared and those
participating in our groups can actively find voice and visibility.
Each Friday evening, on our journey home from Calais to London
via the Eurotunnel, we use the time to debrief about our work over
the previous two days. We look through the images taken on our
phones, reflect on the political context, weather, conversations and
emerging themes. We choose a title. One of the team then sets about
writing a Facebook post on their phone, read out to the team and
re-edited before being shared online on the Art Refuge UK page by
late Friday evening.
This editing and re-editing process is reminiscent of curating an
exhibition or gallery space. It takes consultation by the team about
what images might work and where and how words link to images.
These are presented in the public domain and serve as a visual wit­
ness to the work of that particular week. The post is later adapted
for Instagram and Twitter. The cumulative nature of the posts also
means that we have a gallery archive and written narrative of the
Temporary, Portable and Virtual 283

entire body of work from September 2015, which is recorded on

the website as an ongoing blog and another form of viewing. 
This work on the France–UK border takes place in a highly charged
political context and often the nuanced experiences that we have
each week on the ground in Calais can inform better than the voice
of a visiting journalist. We document not just the violations taking
place in this context, but also the psychological resilience, creativity
and imaginative capacities of those we work with. The  posts are
regularly shared beyond our page. They also sit alongside an ongoing
dialogue with the other NGOs working in Calais and with refugees
across Europe, contributing to an online community of activists and
aid organisations, and an alternative discourse to the dominant and
dehumanising rhetoric of ‘the refugee crisis’ (The  Guardian 2018)
and all that follows in its wake. 
Facebook is a contemporary medium, a virtual, participatory
space. As a team, we try to have an informed understanding of the
changing culture of social media and we think carefully about the
potential pitfalls and ethical issues of posting images online. We
monitor and debate these on an ongoing basis both among ourselves,
with our trustees and partners and – where we can – with the parti­
cipants themselves. 
Artworks within our work increasingly take the form of temporary
structures, installations or large-scale maps. They are photographed
by us week by week, the photographs holding a visual record, and
some participants take photos on their own mobile phones. We are
careful to ask permission of individuals before taking images of their
work, and often invite them to photograph their own artwork using
our mobile phones. Where possible, we show the Facebook page to
those participating in our groups alongside the potential context in
which an image might be shared. We are scrupulous to ensure that no
one can be identified through the posts, given the obvious sensitivity
of the work. 
Belkofer and McNutt (2011) suggest that social media offers
an opportunity in many ways ‘to revisit old models of storytelling’
(p.160). They also explore ethical considerations for art thera­
pists using social media, drawing on Martin (2008) and Rice (2009)
and stating:
284 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

It is evident that for many people, participation in digital media

is providing a home base and a sense of control and certainty in
a postmodern world where identity, community, and meaning
are increasingly difficult to experience and define. (Belkofer and
McNutt 2011, p.160)   

There is an urgent, live debate in the art therapy profession about the
role of social media in contemporary practice, demonstrated recently
in Garner (2016) and Malchiodi (2018) who talk of harnessing the
digital developments possible with social media while engaging with
ethical issues. Malchiodi (2018) identifies the pitfalls and possibilities
of using different social media platforms, such as Facebook, Instagram
and Twitter, but also proposes that core ethical principles of practice
can translate to these areas when consideration and respect for those
we are working with are kept core to the work itself.
We have found social media to offer our work a powerful,
contemporary tool that contributes to interpersonal learning and
social participation. Ritual and routine allow for the work to feel
responsibly held by the team; posting into the online community
often feels cathartic for us as practitioners, but also allows it to enter
a different zone where information sharing, advocacy, education and
the influence of an online audience all become possible. 
At the time of writing, Facebook is also the primary form of social
media used by refugees for navigating routes, finding information
and connecting with family and friends. As documented by Griswold
(2018) who maps the journeys of Syria’s diaspora artists, ‘They are,
at most, only half in France, Zeid explained. “Syria has moved to
Facebook,” she said. Salman added, “My home is the people, not the
land”’ (Griswold 2018). 
From September 2015 to the time of writing this chapter, the
posts are regularly looked at by the refugee artists and users of our
spaces. These individuals have few possessions beyond the clothes
they are wearing and, for many, their mobile phones. Knowing that
we carefully select images to post online has provided reassurance for
refugees who tell us that they can return to view them on their own
mobiles, and discuss them with others, thus carrying on connections
and a wider support network on which to draw. 
Temporary, Portable and Virtual 285

When fire destroyed swathes of shelters in the large camp, one

man from Kurdistan was relieved to know his artwork was not
only physically in our safekeeping, but also digitally recorded. He
asked if we could send him his portfolio via Messenger, so he could
view  his images, copy, and potentially download them when he
reached his final destination. Another man from Sudan who joined
our groups over a number of months in the Calais camp, his asylum
claim now secure, sent us photos of himself standing in front of the
‘Mona Lisa’ and other famous images in the Louvre. He was finding
a way through his museum visit and the common language of images,
to safely and privately bridge the physical space between us.

Conclusion 
The work in France is ongoing at the point of writing this chapter
(2019), the team travelling from London to Calais on Thursday
mornings and returning to the UK the following evening. The NGOs
working in Calais are at capacity in providing for the basic needs
of refugees: water, food, clothing, medical care. Until the closure
of the large camp, this list included provision of shelter, largely not
tolerated by the French state since the end of 2016. Psychological
spaces continue to be scarce, even though the need for mental health
support has been identified as urgent by our partners, other agencies
and the refugees themselves (Einhorn Jardin 2015; Monk, Stanton and
Welander 2017; Lloyd et al. 2018b), and evidenced by ongoing and
constant numbers of people who continue to join our spaces. 
The unique physical position on the border crossing of France
and the UK creates an in-between space. Our practice has had to
adapt to the continually changing political climate and local context
in Calais, itself a tiny element in a much wider refugee situation that
has developed across Europe since 2015.
Our response is interpersonal and improvisational. Through care­
ful selection of art media, the work aims to actively connect with art
historical and contemporary art practice references across cultures.
The notion of creating site-specific installations and spaces in which
postcards from across the world and large maps can be viewed both
individually and collectively has become significant in a setting where
286 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

the emergent themes are related to disorientation, dehumanisation

and displacement. 
In this context, shared activity of curating and viewing resonates
with those we work with, as well as with the volunteers and workers.
This underpins the key components of the work in which resilience is
such a profound element. The viewer, the viewing and the viewed all
have a place and role, the work taking place in groups, with others,
in company, with witnesses and co-producers. 

Acknowledgements 
We would like to thank: our partners Médecins du Monde, Médecins
Sans Frontières, Secours Catholique, Maria Skobtsova House; the
wider Art Refuge UK team in France, including Anna Kälin, Jess
Linton, Tony Gammidge, Sarah Robinson and Jayne McConkey;
our dedicated board of trustees, funders (individual donors and
family trusts); and our families for their ongoing support. Above all,
we would like to acknowledge all those individuals who have par­
ticipated in our work in northern France from whom we have learned
so much about imagination, survival and what it is to be human.

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Belkofer, C.M.  and McNutt, J.V.  (2011) ‘Understanding social media culture
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American Art Therapy Association 28, 4, 159–164.  
Berger, J. (1974) Ways of Seeing. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books. 
Bishop, C. (2005) Installation Art. London: Tate Publishing. 
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Dieterich-Hartwell, R. and Koch, C. (2017) ‘Creative arts therapies as temporary
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Constats et des Préconisations d’Actions. Médecins du Monde, unpaginated.
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Garner, R. (ed.) (2016) Digital Art Therapy: Material, Methods and Applications.
London and Philadelphia, PA: Jessica Kingsley Publishers. 
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when a culture disperses?’ The New Yorker. Accessed on 20/6/18 at www.
newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/mapping-the-journeys-of-syrias-artists. 
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at www.theguardian.com/news/2018/jun/05/five-myths-about-the-refugee-
crisis. 
Harris, D.A. (2009) ‘The paradox of expressing speechless terror: Ritual
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centreborder-criminologies/blog/2018/10/mental-health.
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and M. Knobel (eds) Digital Literacies. New York, NY: Peter Lang.
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Phillips, T. (2000) The Postcard Century: 2000 Cards and Their Messages 1900–
2000. London: Hansjorg Mayer, Thames and Hudson.
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Refugee-Rights-Europe.pdf.
 CHAPTER 13 

Art Therapy and Museums

in the Colombian Context
Co-leading Collective Transformations 

Andrée Salom 

Introduction 
The union between art therapy and museums is one that produces
transformation in both fields. With the union, museums become spaces
of therapeutic deed. Art therapy expands to highlight community
and social actions. This chapter incorporates community art therapy
perspectives and art therapists’ ability to integrate different areas of
knowledge as foundations for the art therapy/museum collaboration.
The first exhibition that I describe illustrates the transformation
that occurs when different elements are mixed together. It serves as
a metaphor for the transformations pertinent to this inquiry, which
includes personal and cultural change. The other museum exhibitions
and activities in the chapter show that the art scene in Colombia
implements social themes related to a recent agreed-on peace treaty.
The exhibitions have been unrelated to art therapy until now, when
I contextualise them in therapeutic terms. I then portray potential
art  therapy directives related to four of the shows, to exemplify
how art therapists can add to the intentional bond between art and
wellbeing in the museum context. All of the museum endeavours
presented are pertinent to our field as they evidence Colombians’
readiness for art therapy/museum collaborations.

289
290 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Transformation 
I went to see artist Hicham Berrada mix reactive substances inside
clear glass beakers filled with base solutions. He projected the
microcosms created inside the beakers onto a big wall for everyone
to see in the Sala de Proyectos El Garaje, at the Miguel Urrutia Art
Museum (MUMA) in Bogotá. The title of the exhibition was Reactive
Landscapes and the specific performance was titled Pressage. Writing
on the wall described a reactive as ‘a substance that produces a
chemical reaction the moment it interacts with another substance.
The result is a product of different characteristics and properties’
(Subgerencia Cultural del Banco de la República 2017).
He sprinkled and poured ingredients, handled with surgeon’s
gloves, into one container at a time. Complementing or contrast­
ing colour substances rose and fell. As they came into contact with
one another, elements stretched, yielded, swirled and slid. Some were
sandy, some cloudy, others glossy. As if breathing, the combinations
produced tiny and large bubbles. Slowly, slowly, yet in retrospect rela­
tively quickly, the elements interacted, creating suspensions, growth,
tensions, expansions, collapses, resistance, support, and hide-and-
seek dynamics. In relative speeds, transformation was visible: poetic
transformation, scientific transformation, lifelike transformation. 
I was attentive to Berrada and his choices, to the projection on
the wall, to what its moving image impressed on me. I was curious
about what the images caused in the other viewers, the children,
the families. I wondered how the creative act would influence their
dynamics after the show. I perceived everything and everyone as
being transformed, at the very least influenced. Reactions arose.
Potential space (Winnicott 1971, 1989) refers to the phenomenon
of transformation that happens when internal and external realities
interact through play. Potential space is initiated in childhood and
lasts throughout the lifespan by means of cultural venues (ibid.). It
has been studied in relationship to museums (Froggett and Trustram
2014; Salom 2015). In part, the parallel is possible given that new
museum paradigms and the postmodern view of art in general
(Anderson 2004; Cameron 1971; Rancière 2009) promote interactions
between the viewer of art and the art itself. Such interactions facilitate
the ongoing construction and re-evaluation of interpretation, of the
Art Therapy and Museums in the Colombian Context 291

personal and subjective view attributed to external reality. The defi­

nition of the museum as a forum (Cameron 1971) opened doors for
the socially responsible and inclusive functions of museums. Such
an aperture enhances the transformation that can happen for a wide
range of visitors of diverse backgrounds, as well as the meaning
attributed to museums and the works they carry (Anderson 2004;
Lavine and Karp 1991; Camic and Chatterjee 2013; Chatterjee and
Noble 2013; De Montebello 2005; Silverman 2010). Regardless of
being public, exhibitions transform us privately. In turn, we add to
them; whether we say something or not, we interact with them, we
infuse them with meaning (Froggett and Trustram 2014).
Colombian artist Carolina Rodriguez (personal communication
22 June 2017) said that the art scene benefits from exhibitions
like Pressage, where illusion is present and the impact of the show
persists long after the visit. Her words echo Silverstone (1992), who
wrote that ‘the meaning of an object [in an exhibit] continues in
the imaginative work of the visitor who brings to it his or her own
agenda, experiences and feelings’ (p.35) and Rancière (2009), who
defended viewers’ subjective interpretation of art pieces (pp.14–17).
Albeit not coming from psychoanalytic theory, they were referring
to notions central to Winnicott’s (1971) concept of potential space. 

The Colombian political climate 

At the time of writing (2018), after more than 50 years of violent
confrontation, the Colombian population is currently traversing a
collective social transformation, framed by the challenges of a peace
process. The internal conflict in the country has many sources of
influence. Tension between conservative and liberal parties starting
in the 1940s led to a civil war, complicated by communist guerrilla
groups that lost their ideals, violent paramilitary organisations that
started out as counter-guerrilla armies, corruption, drug trafficking,
and the war on drugs (Lobo-Guerrero 2013). There have been brutal
confrontations between armed groups in rural areas for decades.
This has forced more than seven million individuals (a third of whom
are children and many of whom belong to a minority group) to move
from their home areas and seek safety elsewhere within the country
(ACNUR 2016).
292 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

A peace agreement was signed between the Colombian National

Government and the armed guerrilla group FARC-EP in November
2016. The agreement aims to ‘end...the enormous suffering that the
conflict has caused’ (Colombian National Government and FARC-
EP 2016, p.6), and ensure ‘that social conflicts can be resolved
through [democratic] institutional channels’ (p.6). The fifth point
of the document is titled ‘Agreements regarding the Victims of the
Conflict: Comprehensive system of truth, justice, reparation and non
recurrence, including special jurisdiction for peace; and commitment
on human rights’ (p.132). This chapter recognises victims as citizens
who have experienced human rights violations and who are entitled
to judicial and extrajudicial systems that can establish the truth of
what occurred (p.131).
For the process of peacebuilding, the document emphasises
participation and inclusion, not only through pluralistic political
involvement, but also through social movements and organisations
(p.35). It states that ‘the participation of and dialogue between the
various sectors of society contribute to a climate of trust and pro­
mote  a culture of tolerance, respect, and coexistence’ (p.7). The
agreement specifies an ‘equality-based and gender-based approach’
(p.136) towards reparation, which considers the particularities of the
victims, their territory, vulnerability, ethnicity and background.
Post-traumatic stress has been correlated with (although not
limited to) victims and civilians living in situations of political vio­
lence (Summerfield in Lobo-Guerrero 2013, p.26). This correlation
is pertinent to the Colombia population (p.1) as victims and civilians
have undergone or witnessed massacres, tortures, disappearances of
loved ones, kidnappings, the effects of anti-personnel mines, and many
other atrocities related to the internal conflict. Although individual
treatment can be useful, the Colombian problem is a social one,
and thus merits social interventions (Ottemiller and Awais 2016).
Individual psychotherapy is expensive and culturally alien for many
Colombian groups. In addition, the Colombian population tends to
process difficulty collectively (CNRR-GMH 2010), as is implied by
the social emphasis of the peace agreement (Colombian National
Government and FARC-EP 2016).
Art Therapy and Museums in the Colombian Context 293

Arts and health at a collective level in Colombia 

Colombia houses a cultural mix that includes tens of indigenous
traditions, Afro-Colombian heritages, and European and Middle
Eastern roots. This cultural amalgam comes with complex issues of
privilege and power, reflected in the country’s conflicts and artistic
heritage. Imagery in Colombia has been used to influence social
structures since before the Spanish conquest (Salom 2017); artistic
elements such as golden masks and grand depictions of Spanish
viceroys, and later of creole revolutionaries, have helped establish
the ruling classes of the times (Londoño Vélez 2005). 
Images have also been used to influence religious power. ‘La
Lechuga’ (Figure 13.1) is the most famous Colombian monstrance,
a liturgical object used in the Catholic ritual. It was finished in 1707
and is now exhibited at Museo La Casa de la Moneda del Banco de la
República. ‘La Lechuga’ provides an example of the superimposition
of symbols used to induce the conversion of indigenous people to
Catholicism. The monstrance holds a consecrated host and a Christian
cross in the traditional Catholic way. However, it was crafted
using Colombian gold and 1485 emeralds found in the territory,
and emphasises a detailed sun, a star revered by pre-Colombian
ethnicities. The superimposition of symbols helps to establish the
stories derived from images. To influence evangelisation, Londoño
Vélez (in Salom 2017) explains that ‘Catholic images were attributed
with miraculous properties deriving from the spiritual traditions of
Native and Afro-descendent population’ (p.7).
The arts have also been used by the different ethnicities in
Colombia to maintain and honour their cultural roots and identity,
and to communicate with one another (CNRR-GMH 2010; Cobo
2013; Lobo-Guerrero 2013; Salom 2017). The different traditions
in the territory have found means of expression and co-existence
through carnivals, folk crafts, music, dance, and other cultural activi­
ties (ibid.). Many ritualistic, folkloric, academic and common uses of
the arts are evident in Colombia for making sense of personal as well
as social challenges (Salom 2017). As the themes of the Colombian
art scene described below show, art has been applied to challenge
established hierarchies, bond communities and promote citizen par­
ticipation (ibid., p.70). 
294 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Figure 13.1 ‘La Lechuga’ (drawing by author)

Among the unique themes that can be found in contemporary

Colombian art, galleries, and art fairs, the role of memory stands out
as a recurrent topic. Artists have documented historic events (many
of them violent) with works which demand that public attention
toward atrocity be paid and that it is not left unnoticed. Political and
social themes related to power and privilege are being examined, as
are ecological and geosocial topics, collective works, and initiatives
that make analogies between art and education (ibid.). 
Visual and performing arts have also been conventionally used in
the country to process the particular atrocities of violence (CNRR-
GMH 2010; Lobo-Guerrero 2013, p.30). Solutions to emotional
needs produced by the socio-political conflict have drawn from this
tradition, and thus community art initiatives are widespread (Lobo-
Guerrero 2013). For instance, song writing and storytelling have been
Art Therapy and Museums in the Colombian Context 295

adapted to include themes related to hostility (p.30), and women have

formed embroidery groups to process grief caused by human rights
violations (p.31). The Director of Arts at the Ministry of Culture,
Giomar Uribe, recognised the community and trust-building benefits
that artistic programmes provide in the areas of the country that
have been most affected by the war (Artera 2017). The prevalence
of the arts as a tool for processing social injustice is fortunate, given
that art can provide a means of bodily and environmental control
that can be beneficial in the face of trauma (Herman 1997).
Professional art therapy initiatives in relationship to the post-
conflict situation are slowly being initiated. For example, Proyecto
Chiva is an art therapy process that art therapist Maria Reyes and
I developed for displaced populations. Through it, individuals
create a moving means of transportation (predominantly traditional
Colombian buses) and fill it with those elements that they wish to
take along with them throughout life. The elements may be objects,
people, emotions, thoughts or values. The results from an initial pilot
programme are being studied for publication. 
Because the arts are innately used in Colombia ‘to adapt and
undergo cultural change’ (Salom 2017, p.5) as well as to elaborate
on conflict and pain (CNRR-GMH 2010; Lobo-Guerrero 2013), the
establishment of art therapy in Colombia may take a prevalently
social and community path. As such, art therapists in Colombia may
form alliances with cultural institutions from early on. 

Art therapy and museums 

In museum visits, as in community art-making, emotional growth
may be motivated even when the objectives of museum disciplines
are far removed from the technical languages and frames of therapy
(Salom 2008; Silverman 2010). However, in parallel to their natural
emotional and educational influence, museums’ explicit therapeutic
potential is being developed and implemented by art therapists
(Betts et al. 2015; Colbert et al. 2013; Coles and Harrison 2018;
Deane, Carman and Fitch 2000; Kaufman et al. 2014; Pantagoutsou,
Ioannides and Vaslamatzis 2017; Peacock 2012; Thaler et al. 2017;
Treadon, Rosal and Thompson Wylder 2006; Salom 2011, 2015;
296 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Shaer et al. 2008; Spraggins Rochford 2017). Art therapy programmes

in museums have addressed issues of empathy, development, life
stages, mental/physical health, trauma and disaster relief, among
others. Collaborations between art therapists and museums have
served a wide range of populations, including children, young adults
and older adults, with psychological challenges (Coles and Harrison
2018; Pantagoutsou et al. 2017), eating disorders (Thaler et al.
2017), emotional and behavioural difficulties (Treadon et al. 2006)
and a variety of health and social needs (Shaer et al. 2008). Through
art therapy processes, the museum experience has gained therapeu­
tic leverage. 
A project developed by Coles and Harrison (2018) provided a
clear example of art therapists’ objectives when working in museums.
Their programme ran 18 art therapy sessions for young adults with
severe mental difficulties, at two museums in Gloucester. The aims
established were ‘to help participants to understand themselves better;
to foster the ability to form and sustain positive relationships with
others; to encourage social inclusion; and to inspire creativity’ (ibid.,
p.115). As the objectives illustrate, among the value that art therapy
adds to the museum experience there is an emphasis on ‘learning
about ourselves through the content in [museums]’ (Salom 2008,
p.1) and on the emotional growth that happens from intentionally
learning about others, from others and about the world (Peacock
2012; Salom 2008; Spraggins Rochford 2017). Art therapists aim to
create safe spaces, where it is possible to handle difficult emotional
subjects and interpersonal conflicts (Ottemiller and Awais 2016,
p.145). The conscious and deliberate transformation of individuals’
subjective interpretations marks the distinction from related practices
(Marxen 2009; Salom 2015). These transformations can be associated
to psychological, relational and social contexts (Kaplan 2007). The
collective aspect of the art therapy/museum collaboration may be
useful in Colombia, as social engagement may lessen the sense of
isolation that is prevalent in many individuals who have undergone
traumatic experiences (Herman 1997). 
There are a variety of theoretical frameworks that have been
applied in the art therapy/museum partnership, as Peacock (2012)
and Spraggins Rochford (2017) have described in detail. The range
Art Therapy and Museums in the Colombian Context 297

in logistics, themes and frameworks corresponds to the wide scope

of foci within the art therapy field (Bucciarelli 2016; Salom 2017).
Some are closer to the psychotherapeutic end of the art therapy
spectrum (Coles and Harrison 2018; Pantagoutsou et al. 2017).
Some programmes focus on art processes as the primary therapeutic
element. Other projects lean towards social action (Betts et al. 2015;
Colbert et al. 2013; Deane et al. 2000; Kaufaman et al. 2014; Peacock
2012). All art therapy approaches in museums foster creativity and
wellbeing and can be used in tandem with one another, depending
on the population, the objectives and the therapists’ training. They
confront the definition, boundaries and application of both the art
therapy and the museum fields and invite their evolution. With the
collaboration, museums can offer deliberate therapeutic assistance,
thus becoming institutions that can provide mental health services;
simultaneously, art therapy can expand a museum’s community and
social action reach, as explained below.

Social action art therapy, community-based

practices and the transdisciplinary view 
Socially oriented art therapy/museum collaborations are suitable for
communities seeking social reparation, peacebuilding, and citizen
participation on a large scale. In the introduction to the book Art
Therapy and Social Action, Frances Kaplan (2007) described art
therapy starting out ‘as a form of psychoanalysis that used visual
imagery’ (p.12). The field transformed to include group formats,
diverse types of foci, and cultural sensitivity (ibid., p.12). Introducing
the rationale for social action art therapy, Kaplan (2007) proposed that
cultural and social factors should be considered along with ‘personal
and relationship factors’ (p.15). Similarly, Ottemiller and Awais
(2016) advocated for the expansion of art therapy into ‘community-
based practices that embrace wellness and prevention’ (p.144).
As we introduce art therapy into different cultures and contexts
which process social factors in a collective manner, a transdisciplinary
view may benefit the growth of the profession. The transdisciplinary
art therapy model proposed by Bucciarelli (2016) includes five areas
that interact and support one another according to the needs of the
298 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

population. The areas are: art techniques and processes, psychological

theories, biological understanding, sociocultural constructs, and edu­
cational models (ibid., p.152). The areas do not compete, nor do they
interact lightly. Rather, they are integrated into cohesive practices,
with complex fusions unique to art therapy (ibid.). The model can
embrace the different social, relational, systemic and social justice
theories related to community-based art therapy practices (Ottemiller
and Awais 2016, p.144). 
The different areas within the profession enrich and foster the
others through interaction (Salom 2017) and, like the reactive sub­
stances in Berrada’s performance, respond to create entirely new
dynamics reminiscent of potential space. Art therapists who can
understand and speak several technical languages can establish
relationships with professionals from various disciplines additional
to psychologists, psychiatrists, social workers and occupational
therapists. ‘To further a culturally situated identity for the profession’
(ibid., p.72) attuned to community values, multidisciplinary collab­
orations may include experts on trauma, peace, social justice and
museums as well as ‘artisans, festival organizers, [and] community
leaders’ (ibid., p.72). The range of training of art therapy profes­
sionals, which includes psychological and artistic proficiency among
other skills related to human development, can provide cohesive
collaborations with many groups of people (Bucciarelli 2016;
Salom 2017). Our education and practice, which includes artistic,
educational and sociocultural aspects, is akin to, and may facilitate
the bond with, museums’ undertakings.

Colombian museums and social action 

Contemporary exhibitions and art initiatives inside Colombian
museums indicate artists’ and curators’ roles in the building of a
more just, dignified and peaceful society. Those described below
reflect themes included in Chapter 5 of the 2016 peace agreement
(Colombian National Government and FARC-EP 2016), even though
some occurred before the current peace process was initiated. Premises
and narratives related to social responsibility, symbolic restitution,
reintegration and citizen participation are present throughout.
Art Therapy and Museums in the Colombian Context 299

The War We Have Not Seen was an exhibition at MAMBO

(Museo de Arte Moderno de Bogotá) in autumn 2009. The title
marked the need to evidence the truth of events related to the armed
conflict. It showed 90 paintings created by 80 individuals who had
previously participated in armed guerrilla groups, paramilitary
groups or the government’s army. As the show’s curator expressed
(Tiscornia 2009), the exhibition thus challenged notions about
the relationships between members of opposing sides in the war.
Previous adversaries suspended judgement to paint, during a two-
year span. Participants had no formal art instruction yet the works
were detailed and expressive. They depicted personal memories,
accounts and affidavits that defied the Colombian tendency towards
the normalisation of violence, and disallowed forgetfulness of the
war that occurred (ibid.). Artist Juan Manuel Echavarria created the
event (ibid.). 
An exhibition of Pedro Ruiz’s work, GOLD: Spirit and Nature
of a Territory, was also shown at MAMBO in 2009. The exhibition
depicted canoes filled with rich icons of the cultural and geographic
identity of internally displaced populations in Colombia. The icons
included exuberant, blown-up images of fauna and flora. Internally
displaced refugees in Colombia face extreme circumstances and
acculturation challenges as they adapt to urban life, cultural differ­
ences, dispossession of belongings and the lack of even the most
essential of basic needs. The delicacy of the images contrasted starkly
with the broken identity and economic poverty of many displaced
individuals. The work portrayed abundant and splendid heritages
amidst the conflict, and delved into the concept of natural and
cultural wealth (Ruiz 2009). Despite being the sole painter in the
exhibition, Ruiz described this project as collective because it drew
from the personal experiences of many (ibid.).
Diana Rico and Richard Décaillet, through Colectivo 4 Direc­
ciones, presented The Origin of the Night at the Museo de Arte
de la Universidad Nacional in 2016. A sound installation, looping
the chants of spiritual leaders from six different ethnicities, it was
intended to convert the ‘art museum into a maloca igniting the
spiritual healing of visitors’ [emphasis added] (Rico and Décalliet
2016). A maloca is a community home, traditional to the indigenous
300 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

people of the Amazons; 4 Direcciones brought the healing vibrations

found inside malocas into the middle of the city, via the museum.
Among the objectives, the exhibition intended to preserve, honour
and carry forward the values and practices of indigenous peoples,
as well as denounce the calamity that their cultures have faced in
relation to Western paradigms and the internal conflict (ibid.). The
exhibition destabilised the oppressive power dynamics, which rarely
include indigenous expressions in the Colombian art scene. A tribute
was made to heritage, multicultural collaboration and equality. 
In a more metaphorical way, El Museo del Oro added to the
collective notion of reparation through a temporary exhibition in
2018 called Can this be Fixed: How and Why we Repair Things.
This show took place two years after the peace agreement was signed,
showing a commitment to the ongoing and long-term process of
change that is needed. The show presented techniques for repairing
both precious and ordinary objects from different time periods. It
included methods from pre-Hispanic times, such as hinges made from
rolled out links of golden metal. Some techniques resemble the ones
used to craft the pieces, while others are greatly different, combining
the fundamental materials used in the original piece (such as clay)
with another material (such as a cotton cord). Without directly men­
tioning the task of social reparation that the country is facing, the
exhibit suggested reflections about brokenness, deterioration, use,
value, ancestry and need. One of the exhibition labels addressed the
issue succinctly: ‘We fix things not only because it is possible to do
so, but because it is personally, socially and culturally necessary’
(Subgerencia Cultural del Banco de la República 2018).
Along with exhibitions, Colombian museums offer programmes
to educate about  peacemaking. The Museo Nacional, housing
archaeological, ethnographic, historic and art collections, showed
The Past, Present and Future of Peace in Colombia in 2018. The
exhibition contained a series of iconographic posters that informed
viewers about the peace agreements that have been signed in the
country during the 20th and 21st centuries. The posters were freely
distributed to libraries, museums and other institutions around the
country (Museo Nacional de Colombia 2018).
Art Therapy and Museums in the Colombian Context 301

The museums of the Banco de la República (Subgerencia Cultural

del Banco de la República 2013a) have an initiative called La Paz
se Toma la Palabra – a play on words which can be translated as
Peace Speaks Up. The initiative generates and implements cultural
dynamics for the construction of peace. For instance, the project called
Children Think About Peace offered literary workshops for children
around Colombia. It concluded with an illustrated book that presents
children’s written perspectives and requests related to the conflict
(Gaviria and Naranjo Moreno 2015). The book includes directives
for educators who want to replicate the workshops. Facing an Other:
Drawings in the Post Conflict was initiated in 2013 (Subgerencia
Cultural del Banco de la República 2013b) and was framed within an
intervention to help 130 individuals reintegrate back into civilian life
after leaving an armed group. Professional experts on reintegration
worked alongside 12 graphic artists to lead drawing and comic-strip
workshops. The resulting self-portraits generated discussion about
identity and belonging. 

Museums as art therapists’ co-leaders 

Animistic thought, found in the Colombian territory during pre-
Hispanic times and still alive within many communities today,
portrays objects and places as having autonomous intentions. Using
animistic cosmology, it is viable to say that contemporary museums,
exhibitions – and even individual art pieces – carry an active agency;
each carries a certain theme and contains form, texture and colour
configurations that influence visitors in particular ways. I worded this
concept in the language of art therapy when I described the museum
as an art therapy ‘co-leader’, and wrote that ‘museums can confront
or contain experiences, allow different pacing rhythms, and offer or
restrain choices according to the population being served’ (Salom
2011, p.82). Thinking about each museum as a ‘co-leader’ resonates
with art therapists’ training in metaphorical thought. This metaphor
can be useful when planning what each museum and exhibition can
provide in terms of content, history, atmosphere and logistics (ibid.).
For instance, the themes of the temporary exhibitions and
projects described above responded to some of the collective needs
302 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

of Colombian society and to the peacebuilding processes in various

ways. Each exhibition, in a unique manner, documented the atrocities
experienced by segments of the population, and did so in an aesthetic
way that enhanced the life-affirming qualities of creativity. They
leaned towards reparation by integrating the experiences, wisdom and
knowing of different people, including marginalised and oppressed
groups and adversaries. The exhibitions made problems visible. They
modelled peaceful co-existence through art-making and addressed
Colombian identity, inviting audiences to rethink it as resilient and
culturally rich. The shows imparted historical information, promoting
truth and memory. They produced reflections about transitions,
change, tolerance, identity, equality, inclusion, participation and
empowerment. They evidenced our need, desire and ability to repair
and shift oppressive power dynamics. The museum exhibitions spoke
to the process of social reconciliation through symbolic means and
proposed restorative and socially participatory actions.
Art therapists can translate the objectives of exhibitions into
therapeutic terms, as I have done above. However, we have a big­
ger influence to bring into action. First, art therapists’ experience,
training, supervision and ethical considerations can prevent many
trial-and-error situations in the social arts initiatives that happen
outside our discipline (Kalmanowitz and Potash 2010; Marxen
2009; Ottemiller and Awais 2016). As experts on processes of trans­
formation kindled through metaphors, symbols, intrapersonal and
interpersonal dynamics, we have a role to play in the evolution of the
museum as an agent of social change. 
Second, museums as ‘co-leaders’ point towards a socially and
collectively inclined art therapy. As mentioned earlier, learning about
ourselves includes learning about ourselves in a group and as part
of society at large (Kaplan 2007; Ottemiller and Awais 2016). In
museums, personal and relational themes can be explored as well
as social, environmental and cultural ones (Kaplan 2007, p.15).
We can design community-based art therapy directives (Betts et al.
2015; Spraggins Rochford 2017) to facilitate collective non-verbal
dialogues between diverse populations (Ottemiller and Awais 2016;
Peacock 2012). In further forging the transformation of art therapy
and museums in socially based arenas, and as they react to each
Art Therapy and Museums in the Colombian Context 303

other’s proximity, we can strive to ease personal as well as collective

suffering.
The exhibitions described above stand out in my mind as trans­
formative and socially restorative and, from an art therapist’s
perspective, visitors to the exhibitions can be involved therapeutically:
emotionally, artistically and socially. Below, I discuss potential art
therapy directives for visitors to four of the exhibitions.

Collective visual narratives 

I envision visitors painting inside museums in response to the images
shown in The War We Have Not Seen. Depending on the objectives
established, art therapists could invite visitors to pictorially ex­
press their own memories, their own role in the unseen conflict,
their empathy towards the actors in the war, and their grievances.
Museum visitors could thus expand on the graphical documentation
and processing of what has occurred. This would involve discussion
with the artists, exhibition organisers and museum personnel
about logistical considerations, and expectations, and informing
visitors about the risks and benefits of participating (Ottemiller and
Awais 2016; Salom 2011; Wadeson 2000). With agreement from
participants, carefully chosen art responses could be delivered to the
original artists, their families and their communities. With consent,
reproductions of response art could travel along with reproductions
of the original pieces to remote places in the country. Alternatively,
the originals could be exhibited together with the responses at
national museums and galleries. A public thread of collective visual
narrative could emerge to elaborate events related to the war. 

Personal totems 
Like Pedro Ruiz’s GOLD, Proyecto Chiva addresses identity, change
and permanency. I propose for the two to be implemented in con­
junction with one another. In my proposal, a work area overseen by
an art therapist would be set behind the images of the golden canoes,
providing durable three-dimensional art materials. Proyecto Chiva
involves building a means of transportation and placing symbols of
valuable resources inside it (Figure 13.2). I imagine visitors of all ages
304 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

and backgrounds being inspired by GOLD, making and filling canoes

with totems of their own fertile talents, their innate wild beauty
and their creative capabilities. Proyecto Chiva includes a moment
for sharing the sculptures and verbally elucidating the trajectories
that they represent. This moment can happen at the work area or
during scheduled workshops held by art therapists at museums. The
constructed pieces can provoke extensive visual and verbal dialogues
related to Colombians’ collective resilience. The individual canoes
can be taken home as reminders of personal esteem.

Figure 13.2 A personal chiva (drawing by author)

Shift in leadership 
The Origin of the Night ignited in me a desire for a collective per­
formance in which every participant adds a personal piece to the
whole: an in situ woven mural of contrasting materials inspired
by the chants, for instance. However, when collaborating with
indigenous populations who have unbroken lineages related to the
use of ritual and who have been underserved by cultural institutions,
I believe the art therapist’s first role is to ask questions and learn
from the cultural traditions. Therefore, the initial art therapy action
in relationship to this exhibition would include a dialogue with the
presenters, the curators and the public. The dialogue could include
verbal and art-based responses to the following questions: What
Art Therapy and Museums in the Colombian Context 305

occurred in each one of us as we listened to the deep voices being

reproduced? Would it be culturally attuned to propose an additional
collective action? Would the six indigenous groups be interested in
leading such creation? Can it be safe for participants to transgress
the boundaries between cosmologies and engage in collective work?
Cultural sensitivity, awareness of power structures and use of systems
perspectives can add to how art therapy approaches community
dynamics (Ottemiler and Awais 2016).

Citizen participation 
After seeing Can this be Fixed, I fancied the city filled with repair
carts, loaded with tools for fixing all kinds of objects. In my proposed
action, crafts people, technicians and volunteers lead the travelling
workshops, assessing damaged items and providing strategies for
restoration. For some individuals, the repair of their precious objects
might be enough. For others, conversations about reparation could
be taken into the personal, relational and social arenas, guided and
structured by art therapists. Such conversations could happen as
objects are being repaired, or later at an organised forum led by art
therapists. Social participation steered by art therapists and museums
can include extended groups of the population, both inside and
beyond the walls of the museum.

Conclusion 
Art therapy interventions in museums can adopt various unconven­
tional formats. They can happen in large groups, or art therapists can
be available for individual visitors wishing to gain personal insight
through exhibitions. Whether made in a group, or in an individual
session, visitors’ artwork can be itinerant, taken home, curated or
exhibited collectively in different cultural sites. The work can form
part of printed booklets, formal books or video productions. Large-
scale initiatives can help identify social problems and bring about
dialogues regarding solutions (Kaplan 2007). Response art made by
visitors at museums can provide further dynamism in the collective
construction of meaning.
306 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

The theoretical frames, therapeutic boundaries and ethical

considerations of collective work may stem from traditional group
and individual art therapy approaches and from the emphasis that
art therapists place on safe space. However, it is yet to be seen how
these elements undergo a transformation and adapt to the needs of
large-scale arrangements. A focus on clear expectations, limitations
and goals can differentiate between community and clinical processes
(Ottemiller and Awais 2016; Wadeson 2000). Clear theoretical
frames and significant therapeutic relationships can demarcate the
boundaries between art therapy and related practices (Arrington
2001; Marxen 2009).
I informally asked a few visitors for their responses to the Pressage
performance. A woman told me she disliked the music because it
induced emotion. One girl saw a castle projected on the wall. Another
saw an alien and told me a whole story that developed from there
on. A physicist explained minerals, the beginning of life on earth and
bacterial mouth plaque. A mother showed me a video that she took
of her son’s silhouette moving in relation to a projection on the wall:
an exploding flower, a boy reaching for it. People played, projected
their intimacies and saw according to their training, life stories and
circumstances. The elements in the beakers were transformed, as well
as the viewers. 
The art therapy/museum junction is kindling a change in both
disciplines involved. In turn, their interaction can be generative
for museum visitors, their view of the world and their subjective
experiences. By stabilising our bond with museum educators to
provide ongoing art therapy services, we can play an important
role, not only for the benefit of marginalised groups but also for the
wellbeing of the public at large. Our cultural beliefs around social
conflict, psychological suffering, collective identity and creativity
can be modified through transdisciplinary initiatives. As cultural
institutions continue to provide transformative experiences for citizen
participation and reparation, novel dynamics and social justice will
be part of the art therapy/museum agenda.
Art Therapy and Museums in the Colombian Context 307

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 Biographies 

Mary Chamberlain has worked for over twenty years as a creative

practitioner with marginalised people. Her experience includes work
within the NHS, Modern Art Oxford, Support a Survivor of Torture and
the Helen Bamber Foundation. She is also a professional artist, trained
art therapist and has served as a trustee of Arts and Health South West.

Ali Coles has master’s degrees in art psychotherapy and in museum and
gallery management. She is an art psychotherapist for Gloucestershire
Health and Care NHS Foundation Trust in England and lectures in art
psychotherapy at the University of South Wales.

Michael Fischer has worked as an art therapist in child and adolescent

mental health services for 17 years. He is also a practising sculptor
focusing on woodcarving and ceramics. 

Fiona Fitzpatrick is an art psychotherapist and founder and Director

of the community interest company Arts Psychotherapies UK, working
with a wide range of groups and individual clients. 

Louise Giroux, BA, BFA, has worked in museum education for more
than 20 years and is Programme Officer for Well-Being at the Montreal
Museum of Fine Arts. She is committed to the principle and practice that
art brings people together in their shared humanity. 

Sheila Grandison is an art psychotherapist (Goldsmiths) and group-

analytic supervisor (IGA). She is currently Training & Development
Lead for Arts Therapies, East London NHS Foundation Trust, and
Visiting Lecturer, School of Health Sciences, City, University of London.

310
Biographies 311

Simon Hackett, PhD, is Principal Arts Psychotherapist at Northum­

berland, Tyne and Wear NHS Foundation Trust and Honorary Senior
Clinical Lecturer at the Institute of Health and Society, Newcastle
University. Simon is a clinical-academic art psychotherapist.

Emma Hollamby is Art and Dementia Programme Manager at Ben Uri

Gallery and Museum. Broadening access to visual art and understanding
its benefit, particularly for older people, has led Emma to both facilitation
and research. 

Sue Holttum, PhD, AFBPsS, CPsychol, works as a senior lecturer at the

Salomons Institute for Applied Psychology, Canterbury Christ Church
University, England, and as a part-time research officer for the British
Association of Art Therapists.

Elaine Homer is a UK HCPC registered art psychotherapist working in

schools and with adults in the community.  With a background in media
education, she also offers professional development for teachers. 

Helen Jury established the MA in Art Psychotherapy at the University

of South Wales, then moved to doctoral research at University College
London. Art psychotherapist experience in the NHS, CAMHS,
institutional, and supervisory work informs her current practice in
student psychological services and independent practice. 

Marilyn Lajeunesse, BA, BEd, MEd, has worked in museum education for
over 25 years. She has created programmes, educational texts and audio
guides. She initiated and continues to coordinate the ongoing Montreal
Museum of Fine Arts Sharing the Museum inclusion programme. 

Jane Landes is a UK HCPC registered art therapist with a background

in adult mental health, private practice and art therapy education. Her
focus is now on her own visual art practice. 

Stephen Legari, MA, MSc(A), ATPQ, ATR, CFT, is an art therapist,

couple and family therapist, and art therapy supervisor based in
Montreal, Quebec. He is the Programme Officer for Art Therapy at the
Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. 
312 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Bobby Lloyd is a visual artist, HCPC registered art therapist, supervisor

and educator working in the UK and internationally. As Chief Executive
Officer of Art Refuge UK, she leads its programme in northern France.

Karen Lund is an art therapist who facilitates groups with poor mental
health, multiple sclerosis and brain damage in private practice and
organisations, and with groups at risk of social exclusion, in the Bilbao
Fine Arts Museum. 

Ruth McGovern, PhD, is a lecturer in public health research and

National Institute for Health Research Postdoctoral Research Fellow at
the Institute of Health and Society, Newcastle University. Ruth’s research
aims to reduce lifestyle risk to help improve health and social outcomes.

Jordan Potash, PhD, ATR-BC, REAT, LCAT, LPCAT is a US registered,

board certified, and licensed art therapist, a registered expressive arts
therapist, and Associate Professor, Art Therapy Graduate Program, The
George Washington University. 

Naomi Press is an HCPC registered art therapist, supervisor, educator

and visual artist based in France and working internationally. She is a
core member of the Art Refuge UK team working in northern France.  

Andrée Salom, MPS, ATR, is Academic Director of the Creative Arts

Program at Universidad de los Andes and Co-founder of the Colombian
Art Therapy Association. She is a children’s book author and runs an art
therapy practice in Bogotá. 

Whittaker Scott has worked in the NHS as an art psychotherapist in

England with children and young people since 1996. He also has an
interest in landscape photography and landscape painting. 

Miriam Usiskin is an HCPC registered art therapist, educator and

supervisor. Working in the UK and internationally, she is senior lecturer
at the University of Hertfordshire and a core Art Refuge UK team
member in northern France.

Nana Zhvitiashvili MA is a UK HCPC registered art psychotherapist,

group therapy practitioner and art historian. She worked as a museum
curator, developing art therapy programmes. She works in paediatric
and adult oncology.
 Subject Index

accessibility and Rembrandt self- BALTIC Centre for

in art therapy 57 portraits 245–8, Contemporary Art
in museums 57–8 250, 258–9, 262–3, artist in art therapy
alcohol misuse 247 group 231–3
and Creative Dialogues review in 246–257, 259, attendance at project
project 133–54 261–265 231
‘Associate Artists’ scheme role of the portrait in background to project in
(Modern Art Oxford) 247–8 224–5
65, 66–7 time, space and process discussions with local
adults with eating in 252–5 NHS 229–30
disorders Art Refuge UK 265, 266, exhibition from project
research on art therapy 267, 282 234–6
33–4 art therapy initial networking 229
adults with mental health accessibility and outcomes from project
issues inclusivity in 57 236–40
research on art therapy and emotional parent/carer involvement
31–3 attachment to 231
adults without identified museums 47–8 recruitment for project
health difficulties ideas of containment in 230–1
research on art therapy 49–50 space and equipment for
34 research on 28–34 project 233–4
Aivazovsky, Ivan 90, 91 research on in museums Beck Youth Inventories
art galleries 159–60, 170, 237
environment of 72 171–3 Ben Uri Gallery and
focus on visual in 96 and social action 297–8 Museum see Starting
Art Hive (Montreal therapeutic benefits with Art project
Museum of Fine Arts) of 27 Berrada, Hicham 290
173–4 therapeutic factors Berson, Lazar 109
art psychotherapy in museums and Beveridge, Philippa 11–12
absence of portraits galleries 35–6 Bilbao Fine Arts Museum
257–60 art therapy courses 170–1 (BFAM) see Let’s
clinical context 250–2 Art Therapy and Social Include the Museum
and gallery artworks Action (Kaplan) 297 programme
244–5 arts activities Blacklock, James 231
internal dialogic space in access to 181, 182–3 Body Satisfaction Scale 172
255–7 benefits of 26–7
process of 249–50 asylum seekers Calais transit camps
reflective space for and Making Space Safe art installation 271–4
260–1 group 63–79 box of postcards 274–8
context of 266–7

313
314 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Calais transit camps cont. ELFT/Tate partnership Korzinski, Michael 64

description of project art therapy context for
265–6 183–8
map in artwork 278–82 description of 182 Lajeunesse, Marilyn 175
nature of work 267–70 group dialogue in 194–9 Lambert, Jacinthe 173
virtual galleries in 282–5 phases of 190 Lamy, Yvon 163
cancer policy context for Leading Change, Adding
research on art therapy 188–93 Value: A Framework
28 working model for for Nursing,
Colombian museums 193–4 Midwifery and Care
collective arts in 293–5 Ellis, Liz 189 Staff (NHS England)
Hicham Berrada Equality, Diversity and the 192
installation 290 Creative Case (Arts Lees, Diane 183
museums as art therapy Council England) 181 Legari, Stephen 160
co-leaders in 301–5 ethnic minorities Let’s Include the Museum
political background to attitude to museums programme
291–2 48–9 creative responses to
social action in 298–301 evaluation 213–14
cost-effectiveness of art of art therapy in evaluation of 211–12
therapy 38–9 museums 94 experiences of 214–20
Creative Dialogues project Let’s Include the formation of group
art therapist’s role in Museum 212–13
144–5 programme 211–12 objectives of 204–5
background to 133–6 at Montreal Museum of structure of activities
exhibition from 146–51 Fine Arts 162, 172 208–11
group agreement 139 research on 31–2, 36–7 setting up 203–4
museum visits 137–42 Starting with Art project Lingard, Rebecca 190
results of 151–4 126–8 ‘Lost and Found’
themes of 136–7 Evans, Laura 172 (Beveridge) 11–12
Culture on Demand
(DCMS) 189
Fischer, Michael 231, 238 MacDougall, Sarah 117
curatorial staff
Fitzpatrick, Fiona 134 Making Space Safe group
and art therapy 97–102
Fuirer, Michèle 189 (Modern Art Oxford)
skill sharing 96–7
future approaches for and ‘Associate Artists’
staff education 96–7
research 36–9 scheme 65, 66–7
background to group 64
Décaillet, Richard 299 basement usage 75–8
dementia Glasser, David 110 description of group
and the arts 109 67–9
in Starting with Art name for 63–4, 71
Hackett, Simon 134 physical setting for
project 108–30
Hall, Rose 190 65–6, 72–8
statistics on 109
Hands, Stephanie 190 in Project Space 72–5
drug misuse
Helen Bamber Foundation referral process for
and Creative Dialogues
(HBF) 64 69–70
project 133–54
Heller, Vera 171–2 setting of Modern Art
Oxford 70–1
East London NHS Manifesto for a Humanist
inclusion
Foundation Trust Fine Arts Museum
in art therapy 57
see ELFT/Tate 158–9
in museums 57–8
partnership McGovern, Ruth 134
integration
eating disorders meaning making 100–1
encouragement of 94–5
research on art therapy
33–4
Subject Index 315

Médecins du Monde as custodians of heritage Public Perceptions of

266–7, 270, 277, 278, 49–53 – and Attitudes to
280 differing interpretations – the Purposes of
mental health carers in 102 Museums in Society
research on art therapy as educational space (BritainThinks) 45–6
29–30 53–6
mental health issues and ethnic minorities Quirion, Rémi 171
and ELFT/Tate 48–9
partnership ideas about 44–5
181–200 inclusion in 57–8 reflective practice
at BALTIC Centre for interactions in 101–2, development of 93
Contemporary Art 290–1 refugees
223–41 meaning making in and Calais transit camps
research on art therapy 100–1 project 265–86
31–3 negative attitudes about and Making Space Safe
mental health staff 48 group 63–79
research on art therapy as places of play 56 research on art therapy
30 positive attitudes about adults with eating
military veterans 46–8 disorders 33–4
research on art therapy purpose of 45–6 adults with mental
33 research on art therapy health difficulties
Modern Art Oxford see in 159–60, 170, 31–3
Making Space Safe 171–3, 227–8, adults without identified
group 295–7 health difficulties
Montreal Museum of Fine skill sharing 96–7 34
Arts (MMFA) staff education 96–7 cancer diagnosis 28
Art Hive 173–4 threats to 58–9 cost-effectiveness of
art therapy at 160–2 38–9
art therapy courses at National Gallery, London evaluation in 31–2, 36–7
170–1 21, 246–249, 252, future approaches 36–9
co-creation in 161 260–261, 265 mental health carers
description of 157–8 National Portrait Gallery 29–30
early collaborations at 44 mental health staff 30
163–7 Neale, Aimee 190 military veterans 33
evaluation at 162, 172 in museums 159–60,
exhibitions of 170, 171–3, 227–8,
participants 162 older people 295–7
humanist approach in research on art therapy older people 30–1
158–9 30–1 therapeutic factors 35–6
later collaborations at in Starting with Art wellbeing 37–8
167–9 project 108–30 young people 28–9,
philanthropy in 176–7 226–8
roles in 161–2 Revised Children’s Anxiety
partnerships and Depression Scale
sharing best practice
importance of 92 237
174–6
Philippa Beveridge 11–12 Reyes, Maria 295
museum collections
Platonova, Olga 87 Riach 260
multiple interpretations
Profile of Mood States Rice, Barbara 189–90
of 92–3
(POMS-BI) 172 Rico, Diana 299
narratives through
Project Space (Modern Art Rose, Lesley-Anne 231,
99–100
Oxford) 72–5 238
museums
Psychological Rosenberg Self-Esteem
accessibility in 57–8
Outcome Profiles Scale 31, 37, 237, 240
as co-leaders in art
(PSYCHLOPS) 31–2, Ruiz, Pedro 299
therapy 301–5
37
316 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Russia Starting with Art project Through Different Eyes

development of (Ben Uri Gallery and exhibition (State
museum-based art Museum) Russian Museum)
therapy 82–6 art-making in 124–5 84–6
working with young artworks used 118–21 Timm-Bottos, Janis 170–1,
people with clinical placement in 173
learning difficulties 112–13
88–91 day centre for 114
description of museum Universal Declaration
109–10 of Human Rights
safe spaces evaluation of 126–8 (United Nations
importance of 77–8 group for chosen 1948) 181
Sandford, Stephen 190 115–16 University College London
Scott, Whittaker 229, 231, identity as theme 123–4 (UCL) Museum
238 migration as theme Wellbeing Measure
Seeds of Hope: An arts- 121–3 31, 32, 37–8, 126,
based approach to museum visits 116–17 127
raising awareness reasons for using art
about suicide and therapy 112
fostering resiliency Vestergaard, Claire 190
results of 128–30
project 171–2 start of project 110–12
Sharing the Museum (Le Stone, Emily 189 Warwick-Edinburgh
Musée en partage) Strengths and Difficulties Mental Wellbeing
program (Montreal Questionnaire (SDQ) Scale 37
Museum of Fine Art– 37 wellbeing
MMFA) 175–6 substance misuse research on 37–8
Silverman, Yehudit 171 and Creative Dialogues Williams, Jamie 190
skill sharing in museums project 133–54
96–7, 174–6
Smallwood, Ellen 173 young people
social action Tan, Fiona 234 at BALTIC Centre for
and art therapy 297–8 Tate Encounters: Contemporary Art
and Colombian Britishness and Visual 223–41
museums 298–301 Culture (Dewdney, research on art therapy
social prescribing 98–9 Dibosa and Walsh) 28–9, 226–8
Somerset House 117 194 young people with learning
staff education 96–7 Tate Modern see ELFT/ difficulties
Standards of Proficiency Tate partnership Russian case study
for Arts Therapists Taylor, Aimée 111 88–91
(HCPC) 125, 244 Young Person’s CORE 237
 Author Index

ACNUR 291 Bedford, L. 54, 152 Byers, A. 124

Age and Opportunity 30 Belkofer, C.M. 283, 284 Bygren, I.O. 26, 27, 98
Age UK Policy and Ben-Simon, N. 226
Research Department Ben Uri 110, 128
128 Bennington, R. 159 Callaghan, K. 78
Aletraris, L. 136 Berger, J. 101, 245, 246, Cameron, D.F. 290, 291
All-Party Parliamentary 247–8, 255, 259, 275 Camic, P.M. 27, 47, 168,
Group on Arts, Betts, D.J. 34, 295, 297, 291
Health and Wellbeing 302 Canas, F. 159
(APPGAHW) 26, 27, Bilbao Fine Arts Museum Carman, M. 28, 159, 295
31, 35, 36, 37, 38, 76, (BFAM) 214 Carr, D. 50, 54
160, 199 Bion, W. 50, 101 Carr, S. 248
Allen, P.B. 174 Bishop, C. 271 Case, C. 50, 205, 206
Alter-Muri, S. 159, 214 Bochenek, M.G. 268 Casement, P. 211
Alzheimer’s Society 109 Bockler, J. 39 Cavendish, C. 190
Andemicael, A. 268 Bollas, C. 44, 60 Chaney, D. 96
Ander, F. 48, 58 Bolwerk, A. 27, 31 Chatterjee, H.J. 31, 38, 47,
Anderson, R. 226, 290, Bondil, N. 158 126, 152, 168, 291
291 Bourdieu, P. 137, 154 Choi, S. 227
Arrington, D. 306 Borghol, N. 27 Chorpita, B. 237
Art Refuge UK 271 Bottorff, J.L. 173 Clarke, V. 30, 38
Artera, C. 296 Bourriaud, N. 97 Cloud, W. 136, 153, 154
Arts Council England 181, Bowlby, J. 47 Clow, A. 27
182, 183, 194 Boyko, A. 102 CNRR-GMH 292, 293,
Ashworth, M. 31, 37 Braun, V. 30, 38 294, 295
Aston-Mansfield 184 BritainThinks 45, 46, 47, Cobo, M. 293
Awais, Y.J. 292, 296, 298, 48, 49, 52, 53, 58, 60 Colbert, S. 31, 36, 159,
302, 303, 305, 306 British Association of Art 295, 297
Therapists 49, 116, Cole, A. 226
122 Coles, A. 31, 32, 33, 36,
Babock, J.L. 170 British Association of Art 47, 48, 50, 51, 52, 53,
Bachelard, G. 75 Therapists – Museums 54, 56, 58, 99, 127,
Baddeley, G. 33, 165, 172, and Galleries Special 159, 228, 260, 295,
173 Interest Group 296, 297
Baker, J. 251 (MagSIG) 113 Collie, K. 173
BALTIC Centre for Brooker, J. 140 Colombian National
Contemporary Art Bruner, J. 235 Government and
224, 234, 236 Bucciarelli, A. 297, 298 FARC-EP 292, 298
Barrett, S.H. 82 Bull, S. 87 Concordia University 171
Beard, R.I. 112, 126 Burnham, J. 194 Congreave, E. 226
Beck, A.T. 237 Burns, M. 171 Cozolino, L. 27

317
318 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Crawford, M.J. 186 Francis, R. 190 Heynen, E. 54

Creative Dialogues 133, Fredhoi, C. 27 Higenbottam, W. 226
141, 146, 150, 152 Freud, S. 99 Ho, R.T.H. 34
Critchley, S. 87 Froggett, L. 50, 53, 54, 55, Hogan, S. 269
Curtis, E.K. 249, 250, 255 99, 101, 290, 291 Holden, H. 39
Fry, C.E. 227 Holttum, S. 38
Horsburgh, M. 30
Dalley, T. 50, 203, 204, Hosea, H. 174
205, 206, 210 Gabel, A. 27, 32, 35, 36, Housen, A. 96
Darlington, A. 226 38 Huet, V. 30, 35, 38, 99,
De Botton, A. 72 Gantt, L. 52 235
De Montebello, P. 291 Garner, R. 284
Deane, K. 28, 29, 32, 36, Gaviria, P. 301
159, 173, 174, 295, Gerlach, G. 268 International Council
297 Gilroy, A. 97, 209, 213 of Museums
Décaillet, R. 299 Gingko Press 271 Documentation
Deco, S. 174 Giroux, Louise 176 Committee 51
Deeny, K. 192 Glasser, D. 110 INVOLVE 38
Delaney, H. 185 Goldschmidt, M. 120 Ioannides, E. 34, 35, 50,
Deliss, C. 71 Goodman, A. 37 54–5, 57, 99, 111,
Delucia, J.M. 32, 33, 36 Goodman, R. 37 159, 295
Department for Culture, Granfield, R. 137, 153, Isserow, J. 93, 235
Media and Sport 189 154
Department for Digital, Greater London Authority
Culture, Media and 182 James, I. 114
Sport 49 Greenblatt, S. 99 Janes, R.R. 55
Derry, C. 56 Greenwood, H. 232 Jang, H. 227
Desmarais, S. 152 Griswold, E. 284 Jensen, S.M. 112
Dewdney, A. 194 Guardian, The 283 Jones, C. 85
Dibosa, D. 194 Jordanova, L. 100
Dieterich-Hartwell, R. Jury, H. 35, 113, 159, 245,
270, 279 Hackett, S. 136 246, 252, 255, 258
Dodd, J. 85 Hamblin, K. 30
Doering, Z. 57 Hamil, S. 113, 159, 170
Hancock, S. 248 Kalmanowitz, D. 136, 268,
Dumison, K. 113
Harper, S. 30 269, 270, 271, 302
Harris, D.A. 279 Kaplan, F. 57, 297, 302,
Edlin, G. 120 Harrison, F. 31, 32, 33, 36, 305
Edson, G. 54 47, 52, 54, 56, 58, 99, Karp, I. 291
Edwards, D. 50, 144 127, 159, 228, 295, Kaufman, R. 227, 295,
Ehresman, C. 109, 112 296, 297 297
Einhorn Jardin, L. 285 Havlena, J. 173 Keller, M. 160
Ellis, M.L. 250, 262 Havsteen-Franklin, D. 233 Killick, K. 101, 102
Hawley Reagan, L. 97, King, I. 170
98, 102 Kislev, E. 207
Falk, A. 123 Heal, S. 54 Klein, D.L. 170, 214
Fancourt, D. 27 Health and Care Koch, C. 270, 279
Federov, N. 85 Professions Council Krezinski, A.J. 173
Firm, K. 171 (HCPC) 57, 125 Kurimanzutto 142
Fisher, S. 172 Health Education England
Fitch, M. 28, 159, 295 190
Flatt, J.D. 30 Lackoi, K. 138
Hennessy, E.A. 136
Fleming, D. 55 Lambert, J. 173
Herman, J.I. 69, 295, 296
Foucault, M. 84 Landes, J. 35, 113, 159
Author Index 319

Langley, K. 227 Montreal Museum of Fine Pink, S. 38

Laub, J.H. 154 Arts (MMFA) 163, Pisani, R. 186
Lavine, S. 291 168 Platonova, O. 92
Layton, G. 232 Moon, B. 269, 271, 272–3 Point of Care Foundation
Leavy, P. 38 Moreau, A. 170 38
Leggett, J.A. 30 Murphy, D. 33 Potash, J. 269, 302
Liebmann, M. 210 Museums Association Press, N. 269
Linesch, D. 28, 29, 31, 36, 45–6, 47, 57, 58 Prokofiev, F. 249
226, 227 Museo Nacional de Putnam, R. 137
Lloyd, B. 136, 268, 269, Colombia 300
270, 271 Mustonen, T. 228
Lobban, J. 33 Radermacher, H. 63, 69,
Lobo-Guerrero, N. 291, 78
292, 293, 294, 295 Naranjo Moreno, J. 301 Ramos i Portas, C. 207
London, I. 138 Nathoo, S.S. 47 Rancière, J. 290, 291
London Arts in Health National Collaborating Ranger, D. 173
Forum 109 Centre for Mental Rasanen, M. 88–9
Londoño Vélez, S. 293 Health (NCCMH) Rasmuson, S. 26
Long, B.C. 173 185 Rayner, E. 125
Longabaugh, R. 154 National Gallery of Art 13 Rees, M. 87
López Martínez, M.D. 214 National Health Service Reilly, R.C. 174
Lorr, M. 172 (NHS) 127 Riach, A. 260
National Institute for Arts Rice, J. 283
in Health 160 Rico, D. 299
MacDougall, S. 117, 123, National Institute for Riley, S. 226
124 Health and Care Robb, M. 27, 32, 35, 36,
Maclagan, D. 209 Excellence 109, 185 38
Macpherson of Cluny, W. Nekrasova-Karateeva, Roberts, S. 27, 29
187 O. 92 Rochford, J.S. 174
MagSIG 113 NHS England 192 Rodriguez, C. 291
Mahony, J. 209 Noble, G. 291 Rogers, C. 158
Malchiodi, C. 174, 284 Ronnestad, M.H. 113
Malone, E. 228 Rosal, M. 29, 85, 174,
Marin, A. 159 O’Brien, F. 141–2, 149 227, 295
Marshall-Tierney, A. 233 O’Doherty, B. 76–7 Rosen, M. 182–3
Martin, A. 283 O’Farrell, K. 87 Rosenberg, M. 31, 37,
Marxen, E. 97, 296, 302, O’Neill, M. 98–9 237, 240
306 Osorina, M. 92 Rothwell, K. 136
McGuigan, K.A. 30 Ottemiller, D. 292, 296, Royal College of
McLaughlin, K.A. 29 298, 302, 303, 305, Psychiatrists 185
McNair, D.M. 172 306 Ruiz, P. 299
McNeilly, G. 232 Rusted, L. 129
McNiff, S. 35, 146 Rynders, J. 228
Pantagoutsou, A. 34, 35,
McNutt, J.V. 283, 284
295, 296, 297
Memphis Brooks Museum
Papadopoulos, R.K. 64, Sainsbury Centre for
of Art 160
270 Mental Health 188
Mermer-Welly, M.J. 159,
Parashak, S.T. 159, 174 Salom, A. 30, 35, 37, 47,
228
Patterson, S. 186 53, 54, 228, 290, 293,
Miller, G. 227
Peacock, K. 99, 113, 295, 295, 296, 297, 298,
Moffat, A. 260
296, 297, 302 301, 303
Monk, L. 285
Pearce, S.M. 52 Sampson, R.J. 154
Pepper Goldsmith, T. 226 Sandell, R. 55, 57
Phillips, T. 275
320 ART THERAPY IN MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

Sandler, I. 29 Tanizaki, J. 77 Wacquant, L. 137, 154

Scaife, M. 235 Tapia, J.M. 82 Wadeson, H. 174, 303,
Schaverien, J. 50, 104, Taylor, P. 109 306
118, 136, 138 Thaler, I. 33, 34, 38, 159, Wald, J. 124
Schleien, S. 228 165, 166, 167, 172, Waller, D. 96, 109, 114,
Schubert, K. 97 295, 296 126, 129, 207, 210,
Shaer, D. 29, 30, 58, 100, Thompson, G. 29, 159 226
159, 202, 215, 296 Thompson Wylder, V.D. Walsh, V. 194
Sheldon Memory Lab 173 29, 85, 174, 227, 295 Welander, M. 266, 268,
Shelton, K.H. 227 Thomson, I.J. 37, 126, 160 285
Sheppard, L. 129 Thumin, N. 100 Wertheim-Cahen, T. 69
Silverman, I.H. 295 Thyme, K.F. 173 Whelan, G. 39
Silverman, L. 50, 60, 227 Times of Israel 121 White, W. 137
Silverman, Y. 171 Timm-Bottos, J. 174 Willig, C. 37
Silverstone, R. 291 Tinnin, L.W. 52 Winnicott, D.W. 49, 56,
Simon, N. 195 Tiscornia, A. 299 99, 101, 148, 219,
Simpson, M.G. 83 Tissier, D. 49 290, 291
Skovholt, T.M. 113 Todd, S. 33, 47 Wieseman, M.E. 246
Slade, P.D. 172 Townsend, P. 251 Wood, C. 29
Slayton, S. 226 Treadon, C.B. 29, 85, 170,
Sloan, L. 170 174, 227, 295
Smallwood, E. 173 Trustrum, M. 44–5, 49, Yalom, I. 30, 31, 35, 53,
Smith, A. 120 50, 53, 54, 55, 59, 60, 118
Smith, F. 171 99, 101, 290, 291 Yenawine, P. 96
Smith, S. 273 Twigg, E. 237 Yin, R. 37
Solway, R. 100 Yukhnevich, M. 83
Spooner, H. 160
Spraggins Rochford, J. United Nations 181
Usiskin, M. 269 Zhvitiashvili, N. 92
159, 296, 302
Zinchenko, V. 96
Springham, N. 27
Stafstrom, C.E. 173
Van Butsele, G. 12
Stanton, N. 266, 285
Van der Kolk, B. 52, 68,
Stern, D. 248
77
Stevens, J. 36, 38
Van Lith, T. 160
Stewart-Brown, S. 37
Vaslamatzis, G. 34, 295
Stiles, G.J. 159, 228
Victoria and Albert
Subgerencia Cultural del
Museum 55
Banco de la República
Visnola, D. 27
290, 300, 301