Expressive Arts Therapy at Raw Art Works

Community-Based Arts Therapy with Youth

8:00-9:30 New York/ 13:00-14:30 London/ 20:00-21:30 Beijing & HongKong/ 22:00 – 23:30 Sydney

**This event will be recorded. Registrants will receive the recording link via email after the live session.**

Webinar Description

Introduction to first 34 years of Raw Art Works, a community-based creative arts therapy organization, founded on the mission to ignite the desire to create and the confidence to succeed in underserved youth, and the belief that every young person has a story to tell. A series of exhibits, and a film taking us behind the scenes of one exhibit are shared, providing a view into a way of working with young people and the arts that builds on their assets while providing structure and safe, brave spaces for them to tell their stories—”creative youth development” is also introduced.

Raw Art Works, a community-based creative arts therapy organization, was founded by art therapists who believed in the power of art for young people to tell their stories, own their stories, share their wisdom with each other and the community, and help to vision their ways forward, beyond the stories which they were living. With the mission to ignite the desire to create and the confidence to succeed in underserved youth, RAW moved from working with incarcerated youth into a community setting called RAW Space.

It started a multi-generational journey founded on principles and practices of creative arts therapy and belief that through the arts, young people could not only transcend the struggles of their lives, but transform their way forward, and become leaders in the community. A series of exhibits, and a survey of the concepts and guiding questions beyond the core themse of the exhibits, is explored in this webinar.

A brief film from RAW’s “Real to Reel” digital film school is screened, which takes us behind the scenes of one exhibit, allowing participants insights from the youth point of view. This overview provides the framework for a breakout session where participants will create an outline of such an exhibit, rooted in expressive arts therapy, from theme, to warm ups, to concept, to guiding questions, considering a multi-arts perspective, right through to opening night. The intersection of arts therapy and the relatively new field identified in the US called creative youth development/CYD” is also introduced. Both CYD and EAT/Creative Arts Therapy share the belief in the transformative power of creativity.

Speaker

Kit Jenkins

Nonprofit leader and educator in arts and culture field for 35+ years. This work has inspired colleagues, students, and rising leaders across the country and internationally, and I have been impacted and inspired by their work in return. I co-led a grassroots project from its earliest days to becoming a field leader serving tens of thousands of youth over the years, a practice rooted in creative art therapies. As founding Program Director, then Executive Director, at Raw Art Works, now a highly-respected organization in the nonprofit sector, I led the effort to raise over $35M funding annual growth and visionary investments along the way. I passionately support mission-driven work, and am currently working with organizations focusing on the health, well-being, and safety of immigrants and children. My greatest joy is spending time outdoors with my beloved twins—one a writer and one a musician—who turn 21 two days after the webinar.

Expected Outcomes:

• Witnessing the studio concepts rooted in art therapy used by creative arts therapists at RAW, design a theme for an exhibit which reflects a common concern of the population with whom you work now or may work in the future. Design a warm up or series of warm ups to invite group members into the content of the theme. How will you use the arts to warm group members up, invite them to play with the theme, through the arts, and over how many sessions?
• Develop at least two separate but related concepts for groups within the population, concepts that derive from that theme. How can these concepts explore that theme in a way that is suited to the particular characteristics of the group members, such as a common developmental stage or shared life experiences? Develop a set of guiding questions to help group members explore their relationship to this concept.
• Identify how exploration of these concepts within the studio may be structured–think about materials, process, and end product in a way that allows for individual expression. Start to map out a timeline (number of sessions) and sequence of steps/stages in the creative process to help guide participants through each of the concepts to a completed product. If more than one art will be used in the exploration, how might that look?
• Imagine how these final pieces may be exhibited, and how you will engage the participants in the opening event. Keep in mind that this is an opportunity for participants to feel a sense of agency and pride in the honesty and integrity of the process and product of creating the works for this exhibit.

This event is free for IACAET Registered members