Submitted by Dr Patrick Campbell.

The Psyche in the Arts Research Network presents:

Creative Encounters: Arts as Culture / Arts as Therapy?
Wednesday 3^rd July 2013, 9.30am-5pm
The University of Northampton School of the Arts, Avenue Campus

Things Not Seen by David Parker

Throughout his life, Jung’s experiences of art making clearly had a significant influence on the development of his psychology. The tensions between creative imagination and scientific procedure were central to his work as he sought to develop an effective method by which to help alleviate the psychological problems of his patients in therapy.

Taking this ‘tension’ as a creative encounter in itself, this symposium will aim to critically examine the perceived relationship between art as therapy and art as culture. It will take as its starting point the proposition that all artistic expression, when viewed from a psychological perspective, contains both personal and transpersonal imagery and expression, mediated by the specific qualities inherent within its material, form and content.

As cultural expression, emphasis is on the collective, where art making and its appreciation centres on cultural values and needs — engaging both viewer and artist in an imaginative relationship reflecting shared, culturally situated and experienced, exigencies and values.

As therapeutic expression, emphasis is on the personal, the psychological condition of the individual. Here art, and its imaginative lining, assists in developing spiritual and emotional wellbeing and/or resolving psychological trauma.

Symposium Programme

9.30-10am: Coffee and registration

10 – 10.45am: Keynote speaker: Margaret Pikes, Roy Hart Theatre (France/Germany) – “The Inner Artist – Personal Reflections on Roy Hart’s Voice Work”

10.45 – 11.15am: Keynote Q & A

11.15 – 12.15pm: First Panel:

• Prof. Jane Bacon, University of Chichester (UK) – “The Embodiment of Spirit: Authentic Movement and arts making”
• Dr. Michael Evans, University of Northampton (UK)- “Process Painting as Psychic Defence or Meta-Therapy?”
• Dr. David Parker, University of Northampton (UK) – “Painting as Process: Image and Imagination as Therapy in Culture”

12.15 – 12.45pm: Panel Q&A

12.45 – 1.30pm: Lunch

1.30 – 2.30pm: Second Panel

• Dr. Rachel Karafistan, COSmino Theatre (Germany) – “Imagination and the Shaman as Healer”
• Iami Rebouças Freire, Federal University of Bahia (Brazil) – “Ulterities – Alterity, Uterus, Ulterior: A specular methodological approach to devising performance based on the actor-spectator/character-persona-person dialectic”
• Dr. Patrick Campbell, University of Northampton (UK) – “Tracing the Transcendent Function in Post-Grotowskian Theatre”

2.30 – 3pm: Panel Q&A

3.00 – 3.30pm: Coffee

3.30 – 4.10pm: Third Panel

• Dr. Natalie Pilard, University of Aberdeen (Scotland, UK) – “Between cultural and psychological art : Art Brut through the example of Giselle’s automatic drawings “Femmes-objets””
• Stephanie Spindler, contemporary artist (UK) – “The Search for Meaning: exploring the common denominators between art and therapy”

4.10-4.30pm: Panel Q&A

4.30-5pm: Concluding remarks

For further details please download the symposium PDF.

Attendance at this symposium is FREE, however spaces are limited and must be booked in advance by contacting Dr. Patrick Campbell (patrick.campbell@northampton.ac.uk).

Image: Things Not Seen by David Parker