Author: Zemaye Uweme OkedijiPublisher:
ISBN:
Category : Art therapy
Languages : en
Pages : 49
Book Description
In 2020, the world forfeited “non-essential” in-person social engagements for virtual interactions in response to the uncertainty surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic. The police killing of George Floyd and the politics of public administration during a presidential election year, intensified the Black Lives Matter movement in the USA. People worldwide witnessed the racialized economic disparities plaguing the US healthcare and labor systems. This fueled civil unrest and had a domino effect on movements in other parts of the world. Technology, now a staple part of our lives, functions as a public health and safety tool to connect people around the globe. Photographic technology embedded in our phones, tablets, laptops, car monitors, doorbells and other everyday devices also helps develop a sense of safety and belonging. On social media platforms like Instagram, TikTok and Facebook, photos and videos that people in different time zones bond over, can also be isolating and depressing. Photography in art therapy can be used as an archiving tool for art-making processes that address the experience of collective trauma triggered by recent global events. Documentary photography for social justice and self-reflexivity, can be forms of therapeutic care that encourage belonging. This project employs photograms, video experimentation and photographic documentation in an art-based study of isolation and belonging during difficult times. An autoethnographic approach to developing art therapy mental health care protocols, art-making processes are presented as a way to understand and treat stress-related conditions that are widely experienced as a result of traumatic situations.
