Community Art Studios - Access and Ideas

Compassionate connection is an essential endurance value to manifest as the Coronavirus rages. People who are poor and struggling with access to the internet, transportation, reliable healthcare, childcare, or funds to replenish home food stores need innovative forms of relational contact. Essentially, the most vulnerable are the most susceptible to the compounding social injustices associated with this pandemic. Consider the arts as a way to build and nurture simple connections. Sharing creative work can take many forms like communities of friends creating a virtual gallery, front yard or sidewalk displays. The Naropa Community Art Studio (NCAS) continues to research and innovate flexible roles for the socially engaged art therapist during these vulnerable times. 

For more information see: ArtisYoga.com

Photo, Michael A. Franklin - Libélula workshop focusing on school-based community art studios, Villa del Leyva, Colombia, South America

Fear, Art, and Finding New Opportunities During Covid

There is so much uncertainty now. One way to work with insecurity is to gently pursue the arts as a means to cope with ambiguity.  Each arriving unborn moment presents an exciting space for surfacing expressive possibility. Through activities like drawing, clay sculpture, and photography we can open to the uncertainty of now, as so eloquently presented by a blank canvas, raw piece of clay, or random moment waiting to be photographed. During Covid, consider the arts as a helpful way to coexist with the challenges of each disappointing or hard-hitting moment. And conversely, utilize the arts to celebrate each small victory!  From: “Art as Contemplative Practice: Expressive Pathways to the Self”

(The image below is a piece I created while leading a workshop for the clinic “Arkabace” in Istanbul, Turkey. It has been used by my colleagues Dr. Olcay Güner and Clinical Psychologist Nur Dinçer Genç, directors of the clinic, for the cover of their book, Sanat Terapisi.) https://www.kitapambari.com/kitap/sanat-terapisi-olcay-guner

You're Fired, Mr. President

The Opportunities of Now

As the COVID-19 virus sweeps across the world, the opportunities of now are ever-present. We are being shown, now, again, how to be global citizens – for governments to cooperate together, for people to resource each other, and for citizens to formulate habits and strategies for global warming, the other waiting challenge of our time. Our opportunity is to learn from this international moment and listen deeply to the signs and needed actions of a united global citizenry.  ~MAF

One never knows when the teacher will emerge... Are you listening?

Initiating a blog brings up many questions related to the challenging times we are all living through and trying to courageously face together. Human suffering, global warming, economic injustice, aggressive political speech, and access to educational resources are very much alive, ever-present subjects that deserve vigilant attention.

In order to flap a wing that might stir others to find their own butterfly-effect triggers and answers, I choose to share ideas related to contemplative life and practice.  Most of the content in this blog is based on the book I recently completed with SUNY Press: Art as Contemplative Practice: Expressive Pathways to the Self.

The text opens with a single acknowledgement:

One never knows when and where the teacher will emerge: For my students who continuously reveal this lesson to me…

Where are the teachers in our lives? Who are they? And, are we receptively listening to the people, objects, and nature-based forces all around that constantly instruct us?

Teachers are not only people – they can be animals, shifting weather patterns, and visual images created in paint or clay. How well am I listening? ~MAF

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