Reframing art therapy to meet psychosocial and financial needs in homelessness

• Open studio participation was correlated with life achievement during homelessness.
• Selling artwork resulted in higher achievement than studio participation alone.
• Participants not selling artwork benefited more from each studio visit.
• Psychosocial and financial goals are necessary to serve diverse people.

Psychosocial and financial factors contribute to homelessness. This study investigated the benefit of addressing financial as well as psychosocial needs in art therapy for people experiencing homelessness. Clients at a community resource center participated in an open studio addressing primarily psychosocial needs such as increased coping skills, and an artists’ cooperative also meeting financial needs through art sales. Participation in the open studio was correlated with life achievement, but artists also in the cooperative attained higher life achievement on average. Interestingly, each visit to the open studio was correlated with a greater increase in life achievement for non-cooperative members. This suggests that the open studio and cooperative may have served different but overlapping groups. Case vignettes illustrate how different programs can work together to best serve people experiencing homelessness.