“When a vast, stifling denial in the public realm is felt by every individual yet there is no language, no depiction, of what is being denied, it becomes for each his or her own anxious predicament, a daily struggle to act ‘as if’ everything were normal.”—Adrienne Rich.
For all the mysteries of the world, the human mind is one enigma that has baffled scholars for centuries. A tangible presence or an abstract space, the human mind is the greatest achievement and one of our biggest assets. History stands as a testament to the marvels created by the human mind. But what if it runs awry?
The dark pages of history store many such stories to tell. They are stories precisely of ‘historic trauma’ and the dissociations and amnesia produced by it.
Events like colonisation, the forceful displacement of the indigenous population, the experiences of Swedish immigrant children whose parents were torture victims, the Holocaust, the Japanese American internment camps, any number of natural disasters and the cumulative experience of the people living in war-torn areas like the Palestinian youth, the people of Cyprus, and the Mexicans, expose the indelible impression of a trauma that history has left. A painful reality of oppression, victimisation and helplessness that we want to keep in oblivion.
The history of trauma as van Der Kolk states, “is a history of repeated gaps and ruptures with cyclical periods of attention and neglect of fascination and rejection” The impact of the Covid 19 pandemic is no different and certain aspects can, with time contribute to both individual and collective trauma.
In the 2020 edition of The Lancet review, researchers found a relation between isolation, quarantine and a number of negative psychological effects like confusion, anger, and even PTSD. Disruptions in daily life evidently had a negative impact on children. Past pandemic research on SARS and Ebola outbreaks provides some clues on the long term collective impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Reactions might range from stress, anxiety, a feeling of helplessness, depression, grief etc.
Fortunately for us, arts and culture for a long time have cultivated a space for the expression and discussion of challenging and stigmatized aspects of life experience. They do so quintessentially by taking the communicative risks that stimulate expression, action, and new norms. Thus, it is not a truism when one states that creative expression can have powerful healing effects on an individual and a community on the whole.
Pictures, stories, dances, and chants as healing rituals have been used by people throughout recorded history. Clinically, art as a therapy has been used for more than a century, however, it is an emerging and evolving discipline for professionals.
To put it simply, art therapy is a multimodal approach to help treat psychological disorders and enhance mental and physical well being. It may include writing, drama, dance, movement, painting, and/or music. In a time, when not only the practising performing artists but the general public mental health has taken a backseat, it becomes absolutely crucial for us to hold on to these essential yet seemingly waning life skills, as our surviving grace.
Experts tend to delineate two main types of art therapy: art as therapy and art in therapy.
When art is used as therapy the focus shifts on the creative process itself, without paying much attention to the end result. The process aims at working through thoughts and feelings. Meanwhile, the second method emphasizes the resulting piece, with as the experts put it ‘the therapist and patient working together to decipher the meaning behind the artwork as a window into the patient’s psyche’.
The past decade, have witnessed health psychologists taking a keen interest in utilising arts as a healing agent that might be used to treat emotional injuries, increase understanding of oneself and others, develop a capacity for self-reflection, reduce symptoms, and alter behaviours and thinking patterns. Creative expression is ubiquitous and its engagement is relatively easy. Thus, any psychological and physiological effects of this expression are essential for a suitable public health investigation.
Apart from a clinical perspective there are always certain social and environmental factors that converge to thrust our understanding of the relationship between art and health. Globalization with its increasing emphasis on cultural assimilation along with our personal and societal philosophies will shift our focus on creating, sharing and finding meaning in our expressions, which is the fundamental aspect of artistic creation.
It has been suggested that art be used to reach and convince people about steps they need to take to prevent the further spread of the Corona virus and also impart useful information regarding vaccination.
Encouraging their community to use video and online tools as an adapted form of their usual therapy, The American Art Therapy Association has taken a step further to promulgate the ever-growing importance of performing arts at this point in time.
Furthermore, the social support that one gets from its community is equally important but often neglected. Community leaders and researchers can work in tandem to create health agendas that impact not only those who are ill in hospitals but those in the community who want to experience greater wellness.
International programmes like Mindscape are actively engaged with the workings of aspects of life and thought which seem to help young people tackle anxiety or depression: ‘active ingredients that may enhance their resilience which may aid their treatment. Through exploring cultural variation they seek to support locally grounded conversations in a variety of international locations that have their own specific histories and experiences. Collaborations are being made across spaces like in Bengaluru, Berlin, New York, and Tokyo, with artists, researchers, galleries and other organisations, actively engaging for the same cause. Furthermore, satellite partnerships are also being developed in other international locations.
Although transitions like these have been met with apprehension and concerns, one must remember that using art as a healing tool does not contradict the medical view in bringing emotional, somatic, artistic, and spiritual dimensions to learning. Rather, the focus on the holistic nature of the person and not solely on the sickness and symptoms further the biomedical view. The effects of arts and its concomitant creative expression transcends an individual’s identity with illness. It creates congruence between their affective and conceptual selves.
We must remember that humans are much more than what is visible in flesh and blood. The more we explore our relationship with art the more intimately we understand ourselves.
In the words of James Baldwin:
“But the conquest of the physical world is not man’s only duty. He is also enjoined to conquer the great wilderness of himself. The precise role of the artist, then, is to illuminate that darkness, blaze roads through that vast forest, so that we will not, in all our doing, lose sight of its purpose, which is, after all, to make the world a more human dwelling place.” We, at Itisaras, believe that awareness and action are integral for change, and for the same we have launched a petition on change.org that urges the Ministry of Culture to extend institutional support to the people of the Performance Arts sector. Please join us and sign the petition – http://chng.it/zhFTnGdPMm
