The Aesthetic Turn in Mental Health: Reflections on an Explorative Study into Practices in the Arts Therapies
Abstract
:1. Introduction
2. Art and Therapy
3. Art as Experience
4. Aesthetic Engagement in the Arts Therapies: An Explorative Study
4.1. Data Collection and Analysis
4.2. Participants
4.3. Results
5. Discussion
Towards a Tentative Conceptual Model
6. Concluding Remarks
The Significance of an Aesthetic Framework for the Arts Therapies
Acknowledgments
Conflicts of Interest
References
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Activity/Procedure | In the Arts | In Arts Therapy |
---|---|---|
Invite | into space of potentials; to discover new possibilities | therapist as holding partner creates a situation that offers holding and opportunities for sensing & acting |
Engage | into relation with materials, structures or partner | therapist creates the situation such as to afford development (into new action potentials) |
Play | use an “as if” perspective | use of aesthetic illusion to alleviate from stagnation or illness |
Explore | experiment with possibilities | experiment with new possibilities; try out and explore within enactive engagement |
Replicate | repeat structures or motives that occurred to suit the artistic choices; remember and reproduce, building a repertoire | repeat meaningful patterns and structures that fit personal preference, the situation or combine interpersonal differences; cognitive engagement during remembering; develop enactive cognition and executive functioning; rehearse behavioural changes and develop mastery |
Interact | address, show, connect, combine with partner’s materials | initially the therapist supports the patient to develop towards self-other-relatedness |
Share | show, play together in duet/ensemble | performativity, self-other relatedness |
Change | deliberately apply variations in structures, ways of playing/ways of moving | discover and explore alternative perspectives and actions |
Improvise | while playing find new possibilities of expressing and articulating; connecting small meaningful entities | develop flexibility and flow of action; weaving threads from smaller entities; flow between interacting players |
Select | select structures that fit the situation, or that are considered well suited to express personal experiences | learn to make decisions on what fit the personal preferences or capacities |
Compose | combine findings from improvisations into meaningful entities, combinations | meaning making; agency to form a gestalt |
Perform | show skills and expressive capacities | becoming visible, stand out |
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Samaritter, R. The Aesthetic Turn in Mental Health: Reflections on an Explorative Study into Practices in the Arts Therapies. Behav. Sci. 2018, 8, 41. https://doi.org/10.3390/bs8040041
Samaritter R. The Aesthetic Turn in Mental Health: Reflections on an Explorative Study into Practices in the Arts Therapies. Behavioral Sciences. 2018; 8(4):41. https://doi.org/10.3390/bs8040041
Chicago/Turabian StyleSamaritter, Rosemarie. 2018. "The Aesthetic Turn in Mental Health: Reflections on an Explorative Study into Practices in the Arts Therapies" Behavioral Sciences 8, no. 4: 41. https://doi.org/10.3390/bs8040041