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Painter of the Month 'Co-creation'All you have to do is take two seconds to look into their eyes, and there they are, as alive, as vital as you or me. But no, the masses cordon them off. Most of the sites we visit are shunted to light industrial areas of the city, lonely freight trains lumbering by. Out of sight, out of mind, right? Because most 'regular' people do not want to get close to anyone with severe physical challenges, the wonderful, vital, hot shot sassy jazzy young artists we know so well are driven out to the edge of town. And here, out of sight of the greater community, this population is treated to what they call art therapy. And here, in these two words lies the problem. This problem a most serious one. Most serious. A problem so haunting in its wrongness it should be a scandal. Why is it called art therapy and not Art? Think about it. Why aren't art therapists called art teachers? It's because of a way of seeing. A way of seeing those clients they work with. The clients, these individuals with severe physical challenges, are seen as something less than whole. This is the blunder. They are seen as damaged goods, incapable of making their own decisions, and so are given therapy art rather than the opportunity, freedom, and power, to make real art. Making real art brings the maker real power that courses through their mind, body, and spirit. Being given art therapy keeps them down, in a world of compromise, where they may have some contact with art materials, but are offered no means to control them in a way that has any chance to result in the creation of an object that truly reflects the individual’s thoughts and feelings. What the A.R.T. artists I've hung out with have told me they want is to have people stop feeling sorry for them. To have people stop treating them like they were idiots. They want what's real, not what's fake. And let's, for argument's sake, say art therapy is well-intended. But intentions don't count when the art therapist's approach leaves zero chance for the individual to take charge of the creative process. But isn't art therapy, with its limits, better than sitting in your wheelchair parked in the hall? Maybe it's better than sitting in the hall, maybe it’s not. Maybe it’s better to sit in the hall, because here you are simply yourself, while when with the art therapist you are engaged in an activity where your vision, your creative intuition is totally blocked, by the art therapist thinking she knows best, that what she's doing is therapy, the art a distant secondary matter. When you use art therapy with the population we work with, there is no real art, so all the power that could be generated from the individual remains untapped. While if you approach it as Art, the individual can come to life, real life, their inner life finding first realization on the canvas. What a feeling this is for the new A.R.T. artists. What a feeling. And when there is real art, Art, the therapeutic benefits flow, like wings opening, expanding, the sky the limit. A.R.T. sees every person we work with as whole, as having a full, fully unique, inner life. Because of this everything becomes possible. If you don't think they can do it, you won't give them the means to do it. If you know they can do it, and give them the means to do it themselves? They will. They can enter a process that operates at the highest levels, with all the power you see in a painting by Marc Rothko, Barnet Newman or Willem Dekooning. From anger to silence, from impish dancing delight to sensuous physicality, from delicate balance to storms of force. If you visit A.R.T.’s web gallery you can see the work created, all of it made by individuals with severe physical challenges, without one word of guidance from anyone. Okay, we're going to hone in on something scary. You ready? The following is not an isolated example of what's going on out there, but represents in largest part: the norm. Not as grandiose as this example but in approach kin none the less. Trust me. We've been traveling around the country doing A.R.T. for fifteen years, so we've seen it in person, so we know what we're talking about. We've seen it, but never have we gotten a written confession like the one referred to below. We know readers of Painter of the Month may look forward to the positive updraft of our successes, but we don't want to leave you in a state of unreality. Wherever A.R.T. gains entree the breakthrough blooms beautiful. But entree is not easy. Why? Allow us to sketch out one aspect of the barriers we're always trying to overleap. Imagine you can't walk, nor speak. Imagine not being able to use your hands. Take a minute to really let it sink in. Imagine yourself in this state, knowing you will be like this very likely for the rest of your life. You can't walk, talk, or use your hands, but you're exactly who you are right now. You know all this stuff. You have all these thoughts, these feelings, these things you want to do. You are you. Imagine, in your normal life, today, you are driving your car, and the person seated next to you pulls on the steering wheel, steering you off the road, the car veering onto some exit, taking you somewhere that has nothing to do with where YOU wanted to go. Let's get real. When the severely challenged artist is wheeled into their 'art' room? The art is over. One of these disabilities art therapists told a visitor who is a colleague of ours, "I like to have the client's work look perfect before it leaves here. So I fix it up." Oh, but why get worked up about this fraud? Why sweat it, right? The art lady is channeling from a higher source. Yeah, that's what we were told yesterday in an email. The art lady is, her friend wrote us, 'an angel'. And she doesn't need to learn about A.R.T., that's what we were told. No thanks. No interest. It doesn't take Sherlock Holmes to figure out why she doesn't want A.R.T. around. Once the world saw her 'clients' could all take full control of the creative process, making paintings with more depth than those she creates? The curtain would drop on her puppet theater. Here's a direct quote from the email that says it all: “Patty is an established artist on her own. She did not need to do this thing she does, it just happened, and she feels a need to co-create with individuals who are not known to contribute to society." Let's look at this again, shall we? "Patty is an established artist on her own. She did not need to do this thing..." What is she saying here about Patty? I'd say she's saying Patty is able-bodied, and to whatever degree, in her own mind, established as an artist. Haven't heard of her before but we'll take her word she's ‘established'. Then she says, 'she didn't have to do this thing', meaning: work with the physically challenged. She, it is inferred, is doing a good deed. Doing a favor for 'the kids'. Yet in spite of her smoking art career, Patty is drawn to co-create with those at the disabilities facility. She is bringing them a gift. And what is this gift? It's her! Patty is the gift! She's bowing down to them from her superior cloud, deigning to touch their paintings with her magic wand paint brush. The e-mail continues: "and she feels a need to co-create with individuals who are not known to contribute to society." Co-create? Co-create? You mean: puppet mastery over those who can't speak out against this abuse, this ripping off of their chance to express themselves, without this good witch stirring them into the brewing pot of her unformed inner child? And: Co-create with individuals who are not known to contribute to society? How the hell can they contribute if you're blocking them from decision-making? How can they contribute when you're using them like some ego fulfilling sock puppet? |