The Exposure of Art Therapy Projects

Art therapy projects are short-term art therapy events that students and board-certified art therapists actively create to encourage a wide range of community partnership, assessing the art therapy project's objectives and its end result. Many other individuals can be involved in it, such as social service for the individual and family, community centers and healthcare, educational school systems, corporations, and alternative sites.

New York's "Village Voice" printed an article, "Battling Mental Illness with a Paintbrush," on how a special art therapy project is helping the mentally ill, with Judith Raskin-Rosenthal's Gallery 300. Clients of an organization called The Bridge, Inc.", 61 of her student's works were hung on the walls. These clients belonged to a mental-health agency on West 108th Street, calling themselves the Bridge Group Artists. Disorders such as bipolar disorder, physical disability, and schizophrenia are just a few of the client's conditions which have leased a new life with their art work.  Each artist had their own style, saying their own message, with the hopes of selling their work to supplement their meager incomes.

Special projects involve specific art therapy projects, with a multitude of goals involved for not only the community but also the students involved in the art therapy projects. Another such example is an Art Therapy Project in the Bellevue Hospital by Valerie Sereno, M.A., ATR-B-C, Coordinator, Special Programs and Projects. This project had several goals involved in their art show between the art students, their art therapists, and the community:

• Providing addition experience in the artistic field, in addition to diverse client contact to the art therapy students.
• Promoting community partnership and collaboration.
• Introducing art therapy benefits to specific programs and populations that are totally unfamiliar with art therapy projects.
• Educating institutions, agencies, the public, and financial supporters about the extensive applications of art therapy and art therapy projects.
• Providing creative and therapeutic opportunities for social interaction, communication, expression and emotional development.
• Establishing partnerships with new organizations generating future placements, resources and employment for students. 
• Promoting the SVA Master Program in Art Therapy Projects.

Most of the art therapy projects involve themselves with the community they belong to, considering itself its strongest member who acts as a force for positive social change. Some art therapy projects for unique ideas are Community Art Programs for Children, Art for America Benefit, Bellevue Hospital: Adult Rehabilitation Unit, Long Island College Hospital: Partial-Hospitalization Psych Unit, New Alternatives for Children: Children with Chronic Illness and Disabilities, Fight Against Childhood Epilepsy and Seizures, Early Childhood Therapeutic Learning Center for Foster Care, Catholic Charities, and Residential Substance Abuse Rehabilitation for Teens.