The art therapist's imagery as a response to a therapeutic dialogue∗†

LET ME make you imagine that I stand before you. I am aware of a number of nonverbal cues that seem to emanate around me. I’m aware of the various postures and facial expressions of my audience; I feel and experience a number of body cues that impinge upon me. The room, the smells, the noises all converge to give a total gestalt that has its own internal rhythm and voice. I try not to be aware of my subject but attempt to lose control and let something happen. At times I seem to approach a new state of existence where various images, fantasies, and feelings swell up inside of me. But first let me reach back on to the conscious level of order and reason and ‘tell you something about myself. I teach art therapists and my genesis and frame of reference come from the world of psychoanalysis. I sculpt, theorize and attempt to make some meaning out of the creative dialogue. My purpose here today is to synthesize some of these experiences and talk about the use of the therapist’s imagery as a creative response to a self-actualizing relationship. Now picture if you will a group of art therapy students sitting in a small seminar. They are meeting in my living room. The room is small and we are aware of one another in spite of ourselves. Some are sitting on chairs, others are sitting on the floor. At first there is a tense, expectant air in the room. No one speaks. I look, I wait and wonder what is going to happen. I feel somewhat tense myself. I feel myself to be pushy and controlling. The students in the group have been aware of this, and have reacted in the past in kind. Now this image of my past, this dominating, controlling figure lies somewhat subdued as a stronger sense of me loosens up and springs towards freedom. This is our last session for the year and the reports are due. Then quietly and poignantly one of the students states that he has something to read. Slowly a volley of poetic images and perceptions flow forth as he describes his work with a young boy. I will read you part of this report by Pierre Boenig. But first a few comments. Pierre works in a school for emotionally disturbed children and his report describes the inner life experience of his work with a particular child. I will not attempt to give any of the history but offer to you one paragraph of his report which so much describes what we have been working towards this year. “Mark goes with me to get my coffee, pours the coffee and then spits in the cup. Exploring the hallway further and further, visiting the class across the hall for a few minutes, hiding when strangers come into our room or trying to kick them out, cursing anyone inside or outside, demanding to be carried. Now I am walking, protecting, stopping, holding, comforting, an ally; fighting, killing and being killed; and also I am the strength, the power where frustration, anger, fear, cries and tears mix, and melt through my acceptance of him. How much is it me, how much is it him. I give my resources, he gives his will to fight the suffocation, the rigidity, the conformity, and all of a sudden he is by himself, with himself, his face dry. “Two days ago I told Mark that his mother would be coming to visit. For two days he worries what she will do to his position in the school. Now