From Liminality to Transformation: Creating an Art Therapist Identity Through Myths, Metaphors, and Self-Portraits (De la liminalité à la transformation : création de l’identité de l’art-thérapeute à travers mythes, métaphores et autoportraits)

Abstract

This paper addresses a gap in the literature on art therapy identity by providing an arts-based autoethnographic account of the author’s identity and growth-related experiences while training as an art therapist and developing a private practice. The data analyzed included personal journaling (written and art-based), course papers, and art made over a six-year period. Using organic inquiry, narrative presentation, and qualitative thematic coding, analyses of the writing and art revealed evidence for the macrolevel themes of liminality (feeling between identities) and transformation (experiencing transformative growth and self/identity integration). Within those macrolevel themes, the art and writing were related to expressive metaphors. For the period of liminality, the metaphors included: (a) hanging between worlds; (b) seeing without sight; (c) shapeshifting; and (d) dark night of the soul. Within the period of transformation, they included moving from: (a) darkness to light; (b) dismemberment to “rememberment”; and (c) death to rebirth. Throughout the narrative, the roles of identity processes (e.g., contemplation), myths, metaphors, and art-making, especially self-portraiture, are discussed as important tools for self-identity development during and after art therapy training.

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