Therapeutically Expressing Anxiety and Mental Illness through Art Therapy

[Emily]

Expressing Anxiety and Mental Illness through Art Therapy

By Living with Anxiety, Fri, July 13, 2012

Artistic skill is not required to participate in art therapy. Whether you sketch people as stick figures or awesomely as Da Vinci, mastery is not what art therapists look for. They see art as a self expression that facilitates healing and allows people to reveal themselves symbolically. It is a means of communication.

Art therapy is a mid 20th century invention that started with an observation. Doctors noticed that people diagnosed with a severe mental illness frequently communicated better through art than by speaking. Over the decades, this discovery has continuously grown and developed...