Making Whole: Healing Through Art: Doorways through Time

by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal.  

The basic timeline has been used to depict and review a persons life path in a therapeutic way for decades. A simple line with demarcations for years and notations of important events help remind us of our journey, accomplishments, defeats, and choices along the way. 

As a visual tool, a timeline has endless possibilities for life reflection. A more creative approach means realizing that no ones life takes a straight line with a neat and orderly list of data and statistics. Our lives, and all the choices we have made, all the people who have come in and out of it, who we have loved and lost, all of our mistakes and successes, are made up of color, texture, scars and depth. 

In this approach to a life-reflection timeline, I ask you to consider your most impactful moments, the moments that have shaped you, hurt you, and healed you as doorways you have walked through to get to the next part of your journey.  Each doorway, from start to where you are today would look differently... perhaps the very first door that you entered into this world would look golden bright and new... perhaps a doorway to a toxic relationship would look battered, made of wood and broken.  

Use paint, pencils, collage materials, old photographs, any medium you feel most comfortable in, and create your time line of doorways and doors... 

Once finished, look at your journey. What does it tell you about the choices you have made? What are your doors made of? Have you had to squeeze through them? Have they been easy to open? to see through? Have you been able to guess what was behind them before you opened them? How can looking at them now help you in the future? 

Create an image of the next door you want to walk through.  Make it the most beautiful door you can dream of... post it somewhere you can see it everyday and make that choice a reality. 


Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

Making Whole: Healing Through Art: All The News That's Fit To Report

 by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal.  

The following process is based upon a project I wrote about in my third book Art as Therapy, Inspiration, Innovation and Ideas.  

It's a collage process that utilizes the newspaper as almost a spontaneous word association therapy session in a creative way that can open up new ideas about your own motivations, inner thoughts and emotions.


Here's what you need:
Daily newspapers, including comic sections, advertisements, everything.
18x24" Masonite board,
Modge Podge decoupage medium,
Sponge brushes.

• Pull apart the newspaper sections and pile in a heap on the table near your Masonite board and Modge Podge.

• Close your eyes and relax, clear your mind of any preconceived ideas of what you Want to create. Allow yourself to accept what comes to you.

• Reach into the pile of papers and glance over the headlines, images and words that jump out at you. As you see things that relate to you, how you are feeling or that just resonate with you in some way, rip them out of the paper and put them in a pile in front of you.  Continue to do this as you work your way through the newspapers.

• Once you have a good selection of collage/torn newspapers in front of you, begin to glue them onto your Masonite board with the Modge Podge glue. First put some glue onto the board, then apply the newsprint.  Do not try to put the newspaper in neat, orderly, easy-to-read columns, mix them up, in a collage fashion. Overlap, turn, flip and rotate in a careless, random fashion.  Cover the entire board.

• Once the whole board is covered go over the entire board with one more coat of the Modge Podge to seal.  Allow to dry.

Once dry, look at the piece as a whole. What words come out over and over again? What is the overall feel to the piece? Is there a theme? Is it an optimistic themed piece? or does it dwell on the dark side of the news? Is there a balance to the words and images, both negative and positive? Do the words represent things that have happened to you or how you feel? How do you feel when you look at the piece.

Hang the piece in a central area and invite close friends to give their opinion of how the piece makes them feel? How does their reaction make You feel? Talk to your friends about the process.

What you will find is that you have picked out words and images that relate to your current state of mind, you current inner thought process and inner emotions. They may not be things you are comfortable letting other see in you everyday, they may be feelings or thoughts you are more comfortable keeping hidden, but when you use the "news" to talk about these feelings, you can open up a discussion about these deeper parts of you, and begin to work through them and bring them to the light, whether with close friends or family, or just for yourself to further work on or accept.


Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

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Making Whole: Healing Through Art: What Are You Made Of?

 by Diane Steinbach

Making Whole is a bi-monthly art therapy column focused on art to heal.  

Paper dolls can have hinged appendages or be simple silhouette forms

Using the self-portrait in any of its forms as a tool to self-analyze is always useful.  It helps us visually identify how we feel about ourselves, and how the thoughts we have about ourselves can impact the way we feel and deal with our daily lives.

In this self-portrait activity, we start with a paper-doll form cut out of cardboard and using collage picture images of textures like stones, rocks, wood, and feathers and actual textural collage materials like lightweight fabrics, small screws and nails we create a tactile and visual representation of our how we see ourselves.

First gather materials. Find papers or magazine images of textures like images of rocks and stones, and actual fabrics.  Glue stick, super glue, and scissors.

Cut out a paper doll form that is at least 12 inches tall out of cardboard.

Using collage materials, cover the form with images of materials that relate to how that part of your body acts or feels.

For instance, if you head feels fuzzy, use cotton balls to cover it.  If you think you are hardheaded, cover it with pictures of granite or concrete.  If you think you have a screw loose, put screws or pictures of screws on the head. Get the idea?  

Do the same for all the areas of the body on the doll form.

Once complete, look at the complete form… at the representation you created of YOU.  When you see it complete, what does it tell you? What do you think others would see or think if they saw it? Do you think it is an accurate description of you?

Let the doll sit in your space for a few days.  Look at it and see if it still seems to fit who you think you are. 

Are there things you would like to change about it? Would you like to be less hardheaded for example?  How would you do that? Can you make a change on the doll to represent that? Do so. 

Continue to work on the doll to change the things you want to change… one thing at a time.  Look at the doll continually to remind yourself of the changes you’d like to make.

Remember, a self-portrait only captures your interpretation of you in that moment of time, and you, like your portrait, are always a work in progress… the journey continues.

 Diane Steinbach is an art therapist and the author of: Art As Therapy: Innovations, Inspiration and Ideas:, Art Activities for Groups: Providing Therapy, Fun and Function and A Practical Guide to Art Therapy Groups

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