The wild beyond: Creativity, play, and the future of expressive arts therapy

Abstract

Aligning with Harney and Moten’s (2013) concept of the Undercommons , this article challenges conventional psychological practice frameworks that have, arguably, marginalized arts-based healing practices, sometimes reducing them to mere tools for analysis rather than full recognition of their capacities. Such reductionist approaches have constrained the arts’ potential to contribute more holistically and transformatively to therapeutic practices. We therefore argue that these historical models often overlook the interconnectedness of humans and nonhuman entities as well as the embodied nature of identity and subjectivity, which are central themes to both the arts and therapeutic practices. Harney and Moten’s Undercommons envisions a space of subversion and resistance, where traditional knowledge and marginalized practices are nurtured, at a length from the institutional gaze that seems to co-opt them. Drawing on Harney and Moten’s work, along with a revisiting of phenomenology through the lens of posthumanism and new materialism and other interdisciplinary perspectives, this paper argues for a radical reorientation in the Expressive Arts. We propose working in the Undercommons, a space that is continuously in motion, engages the ‘wild beyond’ of established norms and pushes for a more expansive and interconnected artistic practice.

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