Participants’ artistic responses to creating a pathway to their future through art therapy.
Before returning to the orphanage after my initial planning visit, I realized that I needed to find someone to assist me in conducting the art therapy group. A friend from the Avatar Meher Baba Center agreed to help me. Anneke is Dutch by birth, raised her children in Spain and spends half of every year in India. Her background in interior design and mural making was really helpful. I briefed her on what I planned to do. Prior to the end of the semester some of my art therapy graduate students at Albertus cut out multiple tracings of a footprint that I had drawn onto a heavy grade paper. I carried these footprint cutouts with me to India. At the time these footprints were created, I had no idea how I would use them. However, after my initial meeting with Stella at the orphanage, I realized that they could provide a visual metaphor for the participants. I created my own art work on one of the footprints so that the participants would quickly understand visually how to proceed and brought my cutout pattern, along with the art materials, to this group.
After I returned to the orphanage with Anneke, we entered a very large open-air courtyard. Students were sitting at desks in various places studying, reading, and doing homework. The azure blue sky above, and the sunlight spilling into the patio warmed me from the inside out, and gave me the courage to proceed into the unknown.
A boy named Joy depicts his wish to become a priest.
A girl who wants to become a jet pilot, depicting details on the studying her future career will require.
We entered the classroom, where some of the students, of various ages including older teens, were sitting in rows on the floor. It is common in India to sit on the floor to read and study; alternatively, students also use desks, but the desks had been cleared out of the room so that we could have more space. The students politely addressed me by saying “Welcome, Madam.” After some brief introductions I invited them to rise and to follow me outdoors into the courtyard. I asked them to feel their feet, to look at their feet as they walked, and how their feet mobilize them in the world, carry them places, and help them to get from one place to another. “Think about how your feet will also carry you into your futures. I’d like to invite each one of you to come to the center of the circle, tell us your name, and describe what you would like to do as a young adult.” The girls wanted to become medical doctors, jet pilots, engineers, accountants, soldiers, and teachers. The boys wanted to become aeronautical engineers, law enforcement professionals, detectives, soldiers, artists, and one wanted to become a priest.
After we returned to the classroom, I dispensed with the hierarchy of rows by inviting them to sit in a circle. I first did a demonstration with the art materials, showing them how to use brush pens with dual tips
Professor Lindemann shows the group how to use some of the art materials.
(one tip has a brush effect and the other tip creates a fine line). I showed them how to use oil pastels and how to blend colors. “Imagine your future now, and visually depict your future profession and some of the steps required for you to achieve it. What kind of studying will you need to do?” I showed them the pattern I had made, gave each of them a blank footprint matrix, and invited them to begin. They drew on both the front and back side of the footprint, and each one expressed their dreams for the future creatively and colorfully. Their energy and openness to creating their designs inspired us. They shared materials, helped one another, and cooperated with the process. Once they had finished, we returned to the sunny courtyard, where they placed their footprint designs in a circle on the ground. The group’s collection of footprints created a unique and beautiful pattern of individual expressions. We looked at them with amazement, discussed what it was like to create them, and then returned to the classroom,where we mounted these brightly colored footprints on the board in front of the classroom.
Our second project for the day involved creating a group mural together, something that required them to shift from an individual perspective to a group collaboration. The mural content centered around creating a garden. This is a common theme in India where flowers, plants, and trees flourish with adequate water, and where these students have daily exposure to a country environment. We had a conversation about what types of
This young man works to complete a three dimensional tree house for the group mural.
creatures and plant life they wanted in their garden. And then they began drawing and constructing both two- and three-dimensional objects for their garden mural. They constructed a tree house, large butterflies, worms, and bright three-dimensional flowers with multiple colors. The mural revealed weather patterns, from white clouds to dark storm clouds, water sources, birds, and two figures. Afterwards, I mounted the garden landscape underneath the footprint display in front of the classroom. We discussed what they had accomplished working together as a group. A rich conversation ensued in which they expressed palpable excitement about both of their projects.
Several days later I found out that Stella kept all the art work in place and invited the entire school of 700 students to visit this classroom to see what the group had created. She wanted to make more footprints and have all the students in the school make their own. I was thrilled to learn that our visit and projects would be expanded for the other students, using art materials as a means of creative expression.
The participants express their involvement in their art making.
About the Author
Evie Lindemann is an Associate Professor in the Master of Arts in Art Therapy and Counseling Program at Albertus. Prior to her joining the faculty in 2007, she conducted research at the Yale School of Nursing on pediatric type 1 diabetes. She is a fifth generation Californian, a Marriage and Family Therapist, and a board certified art therapist. She is also a printmaking artist, and regularly exhibits her work at Open Studios in New Haven, CT each fall. She has worked with combat veterans, hospice patients, families, and students, all of whom have helped her to express the creative impulse inherent in being human.