Women re-imagining life through art: A/r/tographical discoveries in a community expressive arts studio

摘要

This article introduces an art-based research study reflecting on women's individual/collective experiences of personal transformation as they engage in visual art-making, writing, storytelling and ritual in a community expressive arts studio. The author shares how she investigated her practice of studio expressive arts therapy, where individual and therapeutic artistic work took place in a relational context through intermodal arts classes. Artist/participants become a community of alrl tographers, examining the relational aesthetic of studio practice through art-making and writing as well as the creation of an art exhibit and performance ritual. The researcher explores her contiguous roles as artist/researcher/teacher/therapist, disrupting traditional views of therapeutic practice while questioning the role of the arts in healing and community. These re-imaginings invite transdisciplinary considerations of a/r/tography while considering the therapeutic aesthetics of gifting alrl tographical works to public audiences.