Understanding Children’s Drawings PDF
Preview Understanding Children’s Drawings
Understanding Children's Drawings This page intentionally left blank Understanding Children's Drawings CATHY A. MALCHIODI Foreword by Eliana Gil THE GUILFORD PRESS New York London © 1998 by Cathy A. Malchiodi Published by The Guilford Press A Division of Guilford Publications 370 Seventh Avenue, Suite 1200, New York, NY 10001 www.guilford.com All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher. This book is printed on acid-free paper. Last digit is print number: 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Malchiodi, Cathy A. Understanding children's drawings / Cathy A. Malchiodi. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 9784-57230-351-5 (he.). — ISBN 978-1-57230-372-0 (pbk.) 1. Children's drawings—Psychological aspects. 2. Art therapy for children. 3. Brief psychotherapy. I. Title. AJ505.A7M353 1998 155.4—dc21 9847311 CIP To Rawley Silver and Jimmy Santiago Baca in admiration of their work with children through art This page intentionally left blank Foreword Cassie, a 6-year-old child who worried about her mother's drug abuse, drew a picture of a cave with bats hanging on the cave walls. She was quite artistic and the "life of the picture" was grim and foreboding. Such was the child's externalization of nighttime fears about the dan- gerous environment in which her mother lived. When I asked Cassie to tell me about the cave and the bats who lived in it, she seemed surprised. Her previous therapist did not know how to talk with Cassie about her drawings and had missed some valu- able clues that could have been helpful in understanding what Cassie was trying to communicate in her art. In exploring Cassie's drawing with her, and in speaking with her grandmother, I found out that Cassie's bats were very real to her. Her grandmother confided that, in a drug-induced state, Cassie's mother swatted away imaginary bats. Through her drawing, Cassie was conveying not only her mother's hallucination, but also her wish to be heard and understood through her art. A wide variety of therapists who work with children, including myself, stock our therapy rooms with toys, art materials, sandtrays, and miniatures. When we do so we invite our child clients to engage with these materials. This invitation is an awesome opportunity to facili- tate, enhance, and promote the child's therapy. Yet clinicians may not take full advantage of what they can learn from children's art. My own professional curiosity, education, and experience of children's artwork has evolved over time. I look back and feel mortified about clients I did not see or hear as perceptively as I might have. I can't tell you how many times I've said to myself, "If only I'd known then what I know now...." Understanding clients' art expressions is an important clinical skill. It involves learning how to introduce art in therapy, how to vii viii Foreword think about it, and how to respond. As my skill level increases, my perception of art and its value in therapy is transformed, and my re- spect for the process, the power, and the potential of therapeutic art deepens. And this brings me to the reason Pm writing this foreword. Cathy Malchiodi is one of the foremost art therapists in the country. She is one of the most respected theorists and practitioners, with an active involvement in all phases of the current evolution of art thera- py as a distinct field of study. I studied her work long before I met her, and she has been a constant source of wonder to me. Her first book, Breaking the Silence: Art Therapy with Children from Violent Homes, chronicled the experience of children who lived with their mothers at battered women's shelters. That book changed my perception of the value of children's artwork and its uses in therapy. This new volume is a thorough, inspired, and scholarly work which I savored in my first reading and which will prove invaluable in rereading. Malchiodi utilizes her vast background as an art educator and therapist to bring to the surface substantive knowledge combined with rich clinical experience. The end product is an accessible, infor- mative, ethical book filled with practical suggestions of "what to do," with clear guidelines for approaching the work with sensitivity and care. Malchiodi documents the broad utilization of both the process and the content of art in therapy as a vehicle for the child to accom- plish many things: to express feelings, thoughts, and perceptions; to communicate through symbols and visual narratives; to provide relief from distressing emotions; to work through trauma and loss; to express somatic concerns; and to encourage interaction with the therapist. At the same time, drawings provide the therapist with a nonthreatening tool in enhancing communication; they can assist the therapist in evaluating growth and development; help in understanding children's perceptions of self and family; and aid in the assessment of trauma, emotional difficulties, and interpersonal problems. In this book, children are seen in their full complexity: what they draw and the way they draw are not simply reflections of the child's needs, wishes, and fears, but are strongly influenced by other factors such as the child's stage of development, sociocultural influences, and the context in which the child is drawing. Malchiodi puts aside as- sumptions that a drawing could have a fixed meaning and guides and Foreword ix. challenges the therapist to address the multidimensional aspects of children's drawings and to respect the uniqueness of each child's art- work. I am so enthusiastic about the wisdom in the following pages that I want to end this foreword so you can start on your learning journey. At last there is a single source that synthesizes the vast database gleaned from empirical and clinical sources. This book will greatly enhance your understanding of children's drawings created in therapy. At the same time, it will fortify and stretch your perceptions, insights, and competence level by giving you a firm knowledge base, clear guidelines and directions, and a solid foundation in theory and practice. ELIANA GIL, PHD Starbright Training Institute for Child and Family Play Therapy Rockvitte, MD
The list of books you might like
