The importance of making art for the creative arts therapist: An artistic inquiry

This poststructuralist research documents the value of creative arts therapists’ engagement with the artistic process outside of work. The research process and results are represented in a reflexive narrative, which is a postmodern, textual performance of three artistic inquiries conducted from 2004 to 2006, with 45 therapists, co-researchers, who utilize the creative arts working in psychiatric hospitals in New York City and unanimously reported making art outside of their jobs. Individual co-researchers created improvisations, music, sound, movement, writing, and art in response to two questions, “What is the relationship between your artistic pursuits outside of work and your work as a therapist in the hospital?” and “What happened to you when you stopped making art?” Subgroups were formed from an artistic analysis of individual responses. Each subgroup further distilled the essence of its members’ responses to the question by collectively creating a new art piece. The author describes in detail a selection of the inquiries, sharing her process of understanding their meanings while inviting multiple interpretations, without espousing one answer or truth.