RACHAEL JOHNSON
1:30 – 4:30 pm All Afternoon Workshop
Catcher by Rachael Johnson
Neurosequential Bottom-Up Approach to Trauma Repair
BIO
Art Therapy Training: Cork 1999-2002 (PG Dip), 2008 (MA)
Client groups have included non-national clients (Women’s Prison, Dublin), women impacted by intimate partner violence (Women’s Aid), male perpetrators of matricide and sex crimes against women (Forensic Psychiatric Unit, Germany), ‘end-of-life’ clients (Palliative Care), traveller children at risk (Dublin), children/young people on the autism spectrum and children/young people impacted by conflict and transgenerational trauma (Northern Ireland). I have also been working for approx. 18 years as an Art Therapist with clients in specialist residential care (7-17 years old) presenting with symptoms of developmental trauma.
‘I tend towards an integrative arts therapies approach in my practice (Malchiodi, McNiff), supported by current neuroscientific research in the field of complex trauma (Perry, Van der Kolk, Siegel) and have a personal interest in ancient healing arts practices. I have had the privilege of working alongside and co-facilitating integrative workshops with drama, music and dance/movement therapists and sensory integration therapists as a member of different multidisciplinary teams over the years and I use both drumming and rhythmic movement in my art room’.
WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION
Introduction and Theoretical Presentation (approx. 30 mins)
A brief overview of the impact of adverse childhood experiences on neurodevelopment
Creative Warm-Up (30 mins)
“For therapy to be helpful, we must offer something which focuses on calming the brain stem and the body first, before we invite the child to be reflective in therapy” Beacon House
Grounding and down-regulating techniques
Interactive creative group activity
Bilateral/cross-body mark-making
Case Presentation (30 mins)
A journey through psychophysical levels of the creative process ‘from the bottom-up’ illustrated with images of artwork created by a young client over a period of 4 years.
Experiential Workshop (50 mins)
An invitation to engage in a range of creative activities individually and as a group using Perrys neurosequential ‘bottom-up’ approach to trauma repair. The stages are linked to Lusebrinks ‘expressive therapies continuum’ model of creative functioning
“Traumatised clients hold energy in the form of tension in their bodies which has to be released before they can really engage in exploring emotion and narrative…. The “bottom-up” approach is a progression that begins with the body’s sensory and somatic experiences as the foundation for eventual exploration of emotions (affect) and personal narratives (cognition)” Cathy Malchiodi.
Kinaesthetic-Sensory: Rhythmic, tactile, and sensual activities
Perceptual-Affective: Expression and integration/relationship awareness
Cognitive-Symbolic: A journey along a creative continuum
Q&A and evaluation
LEARNING OUTCOMES
How current research in neurobiology might inform work with clients impacted by developmental trauma.
Building a toolkit of creative strategies for down-regulating the sensory-nervous system
An integrative arts approach to trauma-informed therapeutic practice has roots in ancient practices.
Catchers by Rachael Johnson
JENNIFER SLATER AND ANNE MARIE WALKER
1:30 – 3:00 pm Workshop
WORKING IN THE DARK
A Cyanotype by Anne Marie Walker
JENNIFER SLATER
BIO
Jennifer Slater is an artist and art therapist from Co. Louth. She completed her M. Sc in Art Therapy in 2007. Since then she has worked predominantly as an art therapist in mental health settings such as CAMHS and acute adult inpatient services.
ANNE MARIE WALKER
BIO
Anne Marie Walker was born in Dublin. She studied Fine Art at N.C.A.D. and continued her study for 2 years on a scholarship from the French Department of the Belgian Ministry for Culture at l’Ecole le “ 75 “, Brusselsunder Yves Auquier.
She is a lecturer in Fine Art, Photography, Professional Practice and Arts & Health in the School of Art & Design, TU Dublin and has lectured extensively across a wide range of programmes including Photography, Interior Design and Environmental Resource Management.
Her work is rooted in Slow Photography, engaging in constant dialogue with physical materials of the image.
She has exhibited in Ireland, U.K. Europe & U.S.A.
WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION
Navigating uncertainty is a large component of our work as therapists and artists. In this inter-disciplinary workshop we will use the photographic darkroom and equipment to explore how working with personal objects and natural materials can offer opportunities for inner resourcing and self-care. Participants are invited to bring small personal objects of their choosing.
Our aim in this workshop is to explore the theme of Frontiers by working together as an artist and art therapist duo, to see how we may support and learn from the experience of each other, whilst honoring our own unique skill sets and differences. We believe this approach is a frontier concept as it embraces a pluralistic framework and is collaborative as opposed to binary either/ or art therapy versus artist practitioner paradigm. We see this as an experimental process in which artists and arts therapists may find ways to work together, whilst maintaining awareness of the limits and scope of our respective practices. We also are interested in how therapists may learn new creative techniques from artists which can either support their work directly by adding to the creative options they may be able to offer their clients in the future, but also in nurturing the inner artistry of the therapist. We hope also that through collaboration the artist may become more aware of some of the art psychotherapy principles inherent in our work, which may in turn have an impact on their own professional practice as artists.
LEARNING OUTCOMES
Learn how to use equipment in the darkroom such as an exposure unit and developing techniques
Know how to make cyanotypes and anthrotypes at home using the sun and natural materials to produce photograms
Explore their own inner resourcing and self-care needs
Boatbody by Jenny Slater
BERNADETTE DIVILLY AND ANNA FIONA KEOGH
1:30 – 3:00 pm Workshop
BREATHING BODIES
BIO
BERNADETTE DIVILLY
Photograph of Bernadette Divilly. Photo Credit: Cormac Coyne
I am a senior dance movement psychotherapist working in private practice in the West of Ireland. I am also a dance movement artist using socially-engaged practices centred on the body-mind relationship.
My current research interests are exploring the connections between language, landscape and body with curiosity about how this influences our health and well being. I am currently artist in residence with Áras Éanna in the Gaeltacht, having secured an Arts Council Bursary in 2022.
My dance practice involves contemplating our body-mind relationship, our capacity for acting, and for generating creatively expressed and expressive relationships with, and within, the environment and with each other. As a dance movement artist, using socially-engaged practices centred on somatic awareness and connection to ancestry, I advocate, along with a growing number of international practitioners, for the intelligence of the body as central to politics, governance and working with conflict.
Bernadette Divilly’s Website
ANNA FIONA KEOGH
BIO
I qualified with an MA in Dance Movement Psychotherapy (DMP) from Goldsmiths University of London in 2008. I have a particular interest in supporting clients through significant life and identity transitions and decisions, such as living and recovering from addiction, living with illness, entering parenthood, loss and bereavement, the beginnings or endings of relationships, or changes in life direction or livelihood. I am very much influenced by ecopsychology, creative and somatic approaches. I also draw from a number of other frameworks including psychodynamic, humanistic and mindfulness based approaches. I am curious about how creative movement and dance supports our wellbeing, and in particular how our relationship with the more-than-human world brings healing. In addition to my therapy practice, I work as the editorial assistant for the Taylor and Francis journal Body, Movement and Dance in Psychotherapy.
Anna Fiona Keogh’s Website
http://www.movingthemoment.ie/
WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION
In this workshop we will explore through breath and movement how our bodyminds respond to the ‘Teorainneacha’/ Frontiers we encounter. How can we reach out and make connections whilst maintaining a sense of connection to ourselves? We will witness the intelligence of our breathing skin to navigate boundaries and to tune into the frontiers to which we are constantly responding, reacting and adapting. Our attention will be on offering somatic resources to develop our capacity to heal and modulate our interpersonal and intrapersonal connections through awareness of breath, movement and touch with a focus on our permeable membrane. Also we will invite participants to consider our place in our ecological system and to make connections with the more than human. We will demonstrate the efficacy of our profession to tread kindly on the delicacy of cultural histories and identities shaped sometimes by institualized violence towards humans and more than human relationships.
MAGGIE O NEILL AND ROWENA KEAVENEY
1:30 – 3:00 pm Workshop
EXPLORING YOUR PUBLISHING POTENTIAL WITH POLYPHONY: JOURNAL OF THE IRISH ASSOCIATION OF CREATIVE ARTS THERAPISTS
Link to Polyphony: Journal of the Irish Association of Creative Arts Therapists
BIOS
MAGGIE O NEILL AND ROWENA KEAVENEY
MAGGIE O’NEILL
Maggie O’Neill is a researcher in the University of Galway. Her research interests centre on issues of representation and inclusion. Her background is interdisciplinary, in academic writing, literary and cultural studies, social gerontology, and relational psychoanalytic theory. Maggie is co-editor of Polyphony journal.
ROWENA KEAVENEY
Rowena Keaveny is an Art Therapist based in Offaly, Ireland. She has a special research interest in the use of technology and digital narrative to facilitate an understanding of individual experience, its impact, and, as an additional tool, to aid self-discovery and recovery. Rowena is also a practising artist. Rowena is co-editor of Polyphony journal.
WORKSHOP PRESENTATION
The proposed workshop, “Exploring Your Publishing Potential with Polyphony,” aims to encourage creative arts therapists to share their personal and professional journeys, thereby pushing the frontiers of their practice. Polyphony, an online journal, serves as a vibrant and dynamic platform that resonates with the diverse communication styles of creative arts therapists. The digital platform of Polyphony crosses frontiers of publication outlets, offering increased accessibility with no paywall, and allowing for the crossing of disciplinary boundaries. The workshop will interact with the theme of ‘Frontiers as a practitioner’ by encouraging participants to experiment with various mediums such as voice, sound, image, and performance, in addition to written submissions. This approach aligns with the essence of creative arts therapy, which often involves exploring new frontiers in therapeutic practice and communication. The workshop will support participants in structuring, designing, and presenting their ideas, thereby fostering their potential to contribute to the journal and the broader creative arts therapy community.Participants will understand the value of sharing their personal and professional journeys through publishing.
LEARNING OUTCOMES
Participants will gain knowledge about different mediums for communication and how to use them effectively in their submissions.
Participants will learn how to structure, design, and present their ideas for publication.
Participants will be encouraged to experiment with new forms of expression.
Participants will gain confidence in their potential to contribute to the creative arts therapy community through publishing.
ADRIENNE CASSIDY
1:30 – 3:00 pm Workshop
REBALANCING WORKSHOP
BIO
Adrienne is a dramatherapist with the First Fortnight Creative Therapy Service in Dublin. She currently works across all age groups in the areas of homelessness and mental health, domestic violence and direct provision. Adrienne has previously worked in the areas of education, special needs, and overseas development work. She is a trained and practicing creative therapeutic supervisor.
Her background is in social work, and she has been an occasional lecturer with the MSW in UCD since 2012. Post Covid, she co-facilitated self-care and rebalancing workshops with professional teams in medical settings. Adrienne works from a humanistic and person-centred perspective, drawing on trauma informed practice inspired by Mooli Lahad, Sue Jennings and Babette Rothschild. She is also informed by recent developments in neuroscience, in particular by Bruce Perry. She believes in being present with clients and meeting them where they are at so that together they can build trust, instil hope, and explore possibilities for reconnecting with themselves and with others. She integrates dramatic play, voicework, art, clay, craft and percussion in her creative therapeutic work.
WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION
This workshop has evolved from an activity around ‘The Giving Tree’ – a piece of work that I developed with a group of women in direct provision (see images below). The tree emerged as a symbol for safety, solidity, personal strength, personal growth, and kindling hope for putting down new roots. The women concluded by attaching messages of hope and support to the tree.
In this workshop you will have the opportunity to engage in object and embodiment work to explore inner resourcefulness, reconnecting to self, and rebalancing. Through movement and creative work, we will explore the use of the tree as a symbol for strength, stability and rerooting. We will engage in movement with scarves in pairs and a group activity.
As humans, in our various responses to trauma we can become stuck and disconnected, losing sight of our ‘selves’ and the elements that root us in our own identity. My aim in this workshop is to provide an opportunity to reconnect with our ‘sense of self’ and explore possibilities for ‘rebalancing’ and ‘re-rooting’.
We will begin with object and embodiment work for individual rebalancing. Through pair movement and group creative work we will then explore the use of the tree as a symbol for strength and stability. We will close with an explorative piece around re-rooting.
The workshop will have two components:
A) Experiential piece (70 minutes) and B) Reflective piece (20 minutes).
LEARNING OUTCOMES
To explore the relationship between objects, embodiment, and movement for self-care.
To explore the techniques used and their application in various settings.
Workshop Description
As humans, in our various responses to trauma we can become stuck and disconnected, losing sight of our ‘selves’ and the elements that root us in our own identity. My aim in this workshop is to provide an opportunity to reconnect with our ‘sense of self’ and explore possibilities for ‘rebalancing’ and ‘re-rooting’.
We will begin with object and embodiment work for individual rebalancing. Through pair movement and group creative work we will then explore the use of the tree as a symbol for strength and stability. We will close with an explorative piece around re-rooting.
The workshop will have two components –
A) Experiential piece (70 minutes) & B) Reflective piece (20 minutes).
Photo Credits: Adrienne Cassidy
EILEEN MCCOURT, DEIRDE NI ARGAIN, LIAM PLANT, CARYL SIBBETT, DAVE STEWART, JANET OHAGAN, SUZIE CAHN, MAEVE KEANE
3:20 – 4:50 pm Workshop
BORDER CROSSINGS
A workshop offering a space to reanimate and reflect on the historical contacts and evolving relationship between art therapists north and south of the border.
Border Crossings by Liam Plant
BIOS
EILEEN MCCOURT
Eileen McCourt trained as an art therapist in 1987. She was a full-time art therapist for the Probation Board for NI until her retirement in 2012. She is President of the Northern Ireland Group for Art as Therapy (NIGAT) and she is on the committee of BAAT NI – the Northern Ireland Regional Group for the British Association of Arts Therapists.
LIAM PLANT
Liam Plant is an Art Therapist/Psychotherapist, Gestalt Therapist and Counselling supervisor. He has been practicing in Dublin since 1985, is an accredited member of the Irish Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy and was a founding member of the Irish Association of Creative Arts Therapists.
Liam gives lectures and workshops in Art Therapy, Mindfulness and Counselling Supervision.
DEIRDRE NI ARGAIN
Deirdre Ní Argáin was a founder member of IACAT. She worked as an art therapist for 30 years mainly in palliative care settings. She is now an artist and a family carer.
DAVE STEWART
Dave has been a therapist for over 30 years. He started his career as a music therapist in the early 1990s when there were few arts therapists working on the island of Ireland. Collaboration with the arts therapy community – both North and South – during this time was vital to maintaining a sense of professional identity, connectedness and growth. Dave has gone on to specialise in the area of psychological trauma, in particular trauma related to the Northern Irish conflict, and worked in this area for many years. He is currently an accredited counsellor-psychotherapist with the British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP). A career long interest in working with children and young people, Dave has been the lead for school-based counselling in Barnardo’s Northern Ireland for the last 15 years. During his time in Barnardo’s Dave has developed a specific delivery model and currently trains teams across the UK to use this approach in their therapy work with children, young people and families.
CARYL SIBBETT
Caryl is an Art Psychotherapist, BACP Registered (Senior Accredited) Counsellor, supervisor and
trainer. She has worked in diverse contexts including: complex and severe mental health settings, forensic
settings, cancer care and therapy organisations, as well as schools, community and private practice. She provides supervision and teaching and has led Masters training courses in Art Therapy and
Counselling. She has been active in NIGAT for many years. A core strand of her practice, supervision, training and research work is “eARTherapy” – promoting creativity and health through working with
and for nature.
SUZI CAHN
Suzie Cahn qualified as an Art Therapist in 1991, completing her Master’s Degree in New York. Her 30 years of experience included working extensively aiding survivors of sexual abuse and in hospice care and providing art therapy and supervision to individuals. Suzie also offered art therapy in various community roles, alongside being a community arts facilitator and artist in residence.
Her awareness of our connection to the natural world and interest in sustainable food systems led her to volunteer in school and community gardens and eventually establish Carraig Dulra, a social enterprise focused on regenerative ecological design. In 2021, she retired from art therapy to focus on community activation and engagement work. Suzie currently directs an all-island project for the Wheel and coordinates a training program in the Just Transition region. She remains involved in Art Therapy by tutoring on the MTU Art Therapy Masters programme, integrating arts and nature, and teaching on Irish Hospice Foundation programmes.
JANET O HAGAN
Janet is a seasoned dramatherapist, her work focuses on developing a supportive internal framework through harvesting the wisdom from things cyclical. Her special interest is in Irish mythology, along with Indigenous rituals and customs.
MAEVE KEANE
I graduated from National College of Art and Design in Education and Textile Design in 1988. I studied for a Masters Degree in Art Therapy and Special Education from Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, New York from 1990 -1992. I returned to Ireland and worked with young offenders in Oberstown Detention School from 1992 – 2020. I am currently a self employed Art Therapist working through the School Completion Programme in a cluster of Primary and Secondary schools.
Border Crossings by Maeve Keane
WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION
The arts therapies have had parallel beginnings globally and this was true in Ireland, north and south of the border. This experiential workshop will draw on the improvisation and playfulness of pioneers who wanted to make a connection and become part of each other’s story and the evolving history of arts therapies on the island.
The workshop will give you the opportunity to define, develop and learn when and how to cross a border while also maintaining safe ethical boundaries. While it is suitable for all levels of experience, you will be encouraged to approach it with a “beginner’s mind” remaining open and receptive and curious about the now, and the new, and the yet to be encountered. You will depart with some navigational skills and a renewed awareness of how the continuity of past and present professional practice contributes to the crossing of current arts therapies frontiers.
Border Crossings by Maeve Keane
BOBBY LLOYD AND MIRIAM USISKIN, ART REFUGE
AND MUNSTER TECHNOLOGICAL UNIVERSITY AND ULSTER UNIVERSITY ART THERAPY TRAINEES:
LINDA MORICHETTI, ASIA O’DRISCOLL, LEESHA CUNNINGHAM, SARAH WILSON
THE COMMUNITY TABLE
3:20 – 4:50 pm Workshop
BIOS
Bobby Lloyd is a visual artist, UK HCPC registered art therapist, lecturer and supervisor. Based in London, she has worked over many years in the NHS and community settings in the UK, and internationally in contexts of conflict and upheaval. She has also worked on long-term socially engaged art collaborations and brief interventions, and exhibited widely in galleries, site-specific and public settings. For the past 8 years she has been CEO of Art Refuge, and has focused her therapeutic work in Calais and Folkestone, on either side of the English Channel. She has developed a specialist focus in the fields of art and art therapy with people who are displaced and in crisis settings, working with themes of displacement, community, crisis support, co-production and social justice. She co-wrote “The Portable Studio” and “Art Therapy and Political Violence”, and writes collaboratively about practice and ideas, including the development of The Community Table model.
Miriam Usiskin is a UK HCPC registered art therapist, clinical supervisor and educator. Based in London, for many years she worked as the lead art therapist in acute settings within the NHS. Since 2016 she has been a core member of the Art Refuge team, and works on the charity’s cross-border work with displaced people in Calais, Northern France and in Kent, South East England. She is a senior lecturer on the MA Art Therapy at the University of Hertfordshire where she is currently undertaking a professional doctorate researching the work of Art Refuge, looking specifically at The Community Table model. Her work in Europe and internationally has led to a specialist focus on themes around resilience, displacement, refugees, social inclusion, imagination and hope.
THE COMMUNITY TABLE is an innovative model of open access, group-based, mental health support originally developed by Art Refuge for people seeking asylum who are often isolated, marginalised and living in hostile, precarious situations. At the heart of the charity’s responsive, arts-based trauma-informed approaches to supporting people in the asylum system, art is used as a way of connecting people in the here-and-now to help build resilience, increase agency, and support creative thinking. Art materials and other resources are adapted for each setting, responding to the culture, language, experience, skills,potential and richness of people attending. Inviting other frontline staff, local artists and visitors to participate at the table makes way for a different kind of dialogue, sharing of knowledge, skills and capacity that is open and convivial. The Community Table offers a unique opportunity to strengthen connections between people through intersections of differences and similarities, in turn increasing and strengthening links with other services. The Community Table is adapted for other settings and communities of interest. https://www.artrefuge.org.uk/community-table
WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION
This workshop reflects the principles underpinning The Community Table model. It is a collaboration between Bobby Lloyd and Miriam Usiskin from Art Refuge and Munster Technological University and Ulster University Art Therapy Trainees: Linda Morichetti, Asia O’driscoll, Leesha Cunningham and Sarah Wilson. At a large table, covered in maps and materials brought by this group, everyone seated will be invited to make and explore the materials together. Miriam and Bobby will also show some images and discuss with those present the history and evolution of The Community Table model of practice.
LEARNING OUTCOMES
To explore collaboratively and actively how The Community Table works in this particular context.
To learn more about the history and evolution of The Community Table model of practice.
Art Refuge (UK charity no 1114353) uses socially engaged art and art therapy to support the mental health and well-being of people displaced due to conflict, persecution and poverty, both in the UK and internationally. Ongoing programmes take place in the UK and France in collaboration with other organisations, with shorter-term projects, exhibitions and research in other settings. Art Refuge also delivers tailor-made arts-based training, crisis support and skills-sharing workshops in the UK, internationally and online. All the work is delivered by a freelance team of artists and art therapists, including artists with lived experience of displacement. www.artrefuge.org.uk
JOANNE BOAL
LIFE STORIES ON PAPER
3:20 – 4:50 pm Workshop
BIO
Joanne Boal has worked for Cancer Focus as a full time art therapist since 2008. She has worked with clients as young as 3 and as old as 94! She studied general art and design then moved to England to study fashion. After working in Paris for four years she saw through all the hype and wanted to work with people rather than dictate how they should look. Coming home, she worked at Corrymeela as Artist in Residence (and bus driver!) before going on to volunteer with the Probation Board for Northern Ireland. Mentored by the fabulous Eileen McCourt! Jo will share her journey with art journaling, starting with sketch books into diaries and combining creative writing and artwork into art journals over 30 years. She will talk about the art journalling courses she runs for cancer patients to enable them to journal in both art and words in and out of hospital, using their journals as a container/ companion for difficult emotions.
WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION
A workshop demonstrating both art and creative writing for reflexive practice.
I have been creating art journals for over 30 years. My job has allowed me to offer this creative approach to art therapy to cancer patients and carers. The journals are a place to reflect upon the cancer journey and notice changes in mood and energy.
Art journals offer containment for difficult feelings and emotions that remain private unless they choose to be shared with professionals or a loved one. They are also a place to write down questions for health professionals.
Overall I believe that it is beneficial for people to take their journals in and out of hospital, helping like a personal companion or best friend giving them confidence to ask difficult questions of their medical team.
LEARNING OUTCOME
Expanding your horizons in art journalling and finding new ways to express your feelings in a safe place.
Art Journals by Joanne Boal
ÁILBHE hEIDHIN (HINES)
POTENTIAL SPACES IN VIRTUAL PLACES
3:20 – 4:50 pm Workshop
BIO
Áilbhe Hines is an interdisciplinary artist and creative arts therapist. They use various art forms as a means of inquiry, research, interaction and presentation. These inquiries consider our ecological, relational and structural interactions. They are interested in how artworks can consider knowledge/knowing intersectionally. They are interested in the interactions between artist, viewer and the wider environment. They are concerned with socially engaged interdisciplinary therapy practice. They experiment with ways in how communication of ideas through artforms can have multiple layers of meaning and affect.
WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION
Áilbhe Hines will facilitate a remote session exploring nature connection and the adaptation and integration of modalities. Relevant themes are those concerned with the potential of Creative Arts Therapies in diverse communites of care and with trauma informed practice. Participants will be led in sensory and mark making exercises.
The potential for creative expressive work within an environmental lens can enable alternative forms of connection through an online platform.
LEARNING OUTCOMES
To adapt creative arts therapy practice for community access and potential.
To explore trauma informed approaches—from safe space to brave space
To integrate a nature and virtual connection within art therapy.
To explore social justice themes as part of the workshop experience.
Frontiers—Creative Arts Therapies and Arts Therapies Conference 