Collage: Grief, Loss, and Expressive Arts Therapy

Held at the TAPS Heaquarters, this one-day didactic, experiential workshop for grief professionals, presented by Sharon Strouse, MA, ATR-BC, LCPAT, introduces collage as a transformative art therapy technique, effective in the treatment of traumatic loss. This multi-media approach highlights art therapy based theory and practices with grief/bereavement theories of Dr. Robert Neimeyer: Meaning Reconstruction; Dr. William Worden: Task Model of Bereavement; and Dr. Edward Rynearson: Restorative Retelling.

Featuring

 

Sharon Strouse, MA, ATR-BC, LCPAT Sharon is a board-certified art therapist and licensed clinical professional art therapist with 30 years of clinical experience with adults. A year after her 17-year old daughter Kristin ended her own life; Sharon immersed herself in a creative process involving collage which became the foundation for her book, Artful Grief: A Diary of Healing. Additional published works can be found in Techniques of Grief Therapy: Creative Practices for Counseling the Bereaved, Grief and the Expressive Arts: Practices for Creating Meaning,Exploring Ethical Issues in Art Therapy and Prescriptive Memory in Grief and Loss: The Art of Dreamscaping. She is a board member on the Johns Hopkins Medicine: Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and co-founder of The Kristin Rita Strouse Foundation.

Learning Objectives

At conclusion of the workshop, participants will be able to:

1. Identify three major Grief and Bereavement Theories as applied to the Expressive Arts. (Neimeyer: Meaning Reconstruction; Worden: Task Model of Bereavement; and Rynearson: Restorative Retelling Model)
2. Understand the collage process and product through a Meaning Reconstruction focus on the event story and back story narrative.
3. Understand how three questions support a creative process that is grounded in Rynearson’s: Restorative Retelling. (How did it happen, Who am I, and Why did it happen)
4. Effectively describe three creative interventions that support grief work, anchored in Neimeyer’s framework of bracing, pacing and facing.
5. Understand the essential elements of Art Therapy as an effective treatment modality for those suffering traumatic loss.

Registration Details

Seating is limited. Registration fee is $85 and includes continuing education fee and lunch. Continuing education (5 hours) is available from a variety of boards through the TAPS Institute for Hope and Healing®.

Instructions for obtaining CEs will be provided at the event. View list of board approvals.