Alessandra Colfi

With this dissertation, I intend to explore the therapeutic relationship of transformation/change between facilitator and client(s) and the empathy aroused in the client/artist(s) through their manifested expressions in all the arts, using the ‘intermodal approach’ (Paolo Knill, 2004). The creative process that takes place during the engagement with the expressive arts is the vehicle for accessing emotional content and raw memories from both the conscious and the unconscious mind. Emotional expression can occur with or without self-awareness, even when an individual’s desire is to control such expression and may have deliberate intent in displaying it.

The empathic relationship between the artist and his/her creative expression is assumed encouraging and fostering the ability to establish empathy among people and therefore reach into relationship within communities and among diverse communities, such as states, countries.

The premise for this assumption is that self-exploration and introspection allow for greater knowing of oneself, better understanding, which leads to becoming more empathic towards others. ‘If I am aware of my feelings and the unconscious attitudes through which I view the world, I am more likely to be sensitive to others.’ (Shaun McNiff, 1992). Shaun McNiff calls it ‘sympathy’; sympathy is defined as the ability to enter into, understand, or share somebody else's feelings; while empathy shares the same meaning, it adds the attribution of feelings to an object: the transfer of somebody's own feelings and emotions to an object such as a painting – this is the instance when art ‘moves’ a person emotionally. In the Greek empatheia "affection, passion".

Rom Brafman, Ph.D. (2008) tells us of the following study: a team of psycho-neurological researchers wanted to get to the bottom of this. They invited volunteers to step into a functional MRI machine and look at some pictures. Half the volunteers were shown photos of arms and legs. Nothing out of the ordinary. And, as expected, their brain images, which were recorded by the MRI, didn't reveal anything unusual. The other half of the group, though, saw pictures that were similar in nature but which indicated pain. In other words, these volunteers were exposed to images of arms and legs situated in such a position that would indicate discomfort and physical pain.

When the researchers looked at the MRI brain scans of the volunteers who saw the "painful" pictures, the part of the brain that is associated with the experience of pain lighted up. Although the volunteers themselves did not experience physical pain, the mere act of witnessing an image of someone else's painful experience elicits a neuro-physiological pain reaction. When we see others in situation of pain--even when we know that pain is just an image and real--we still physiologically experience a reaction.

It's what psychologist James Bugental referred to as "presence." It's the ability to relate to a client not only on an intellectual level but also to really be there experientially. To allow yourself to empathize and relate on a deeper level.

To express is a transitive verb to state thoughts or feelings in words, to convey meaning by gesture, behavior, representation in art, music or drama, or in some other symbolic way.

It is easy to observe that the word express ‘always carried the connotation of something definite and explicit’ (Mala Betensky, 1973); it also alludes to ‘rapid delivery’, fast and direct.

I submit that the expressive arts process is a direct and often fast way to go from point A to point B, being A the unconscious mind/psyche/soul of the artist/client and B the artwork/music/poetry/enactment, or the manifestation of having accessed the information, resulting in authentic self-expression. It’s important to note that ‘every work of art … expresses and means something’. It does ‘something to the observer.’ (M. Betensky, 1973); the artwork/music/poetry/enactment communicates back to the artist and elicits an emotional experience in him/her.

At the same time, I intend to offer an account of and investigate my own process as I learn about a client and prepare for each session and interaction, and why I choose the kind of approach and tools that are most appropriate for the client to open up to a different approach or prospective. This is motivated by a very common occurrence: what I plan to do with a client in preparation of a given session, often changes based on the perception of where the client is in that particular moment and what I instinctively realize is a suitable prompt or activity to best and most comfortably move him/her towards the desired therapeutic goals. In other words, this is an inquiry about my experience of empathy.

My Expressive Arts practice is an integrated multi-arts experience using Expressive Arts Therapy’s fulfilling and rewarding intermodal approach, its dynamic and transformative processes in a gentle, playful and yet profoundly meaningful experience.

I intend to create this dissertation as a web-based teaching vehicle offering resources available to the academic community, foremost IUPS students and practitioners - a step into creating teaching tools to serve the University-Without-Wall concept.

A website is a great platform for an art-based dissertation also for these very important reasons:

· Collage is my preferred art medium – designing a website is very much like a collage – which I regard as a metaphor for life itself; images, elements, colors, symbols and content show up and interact among themselves and with the artist, who shapes his/her own experience and his/her life.

· Multi-layers and links/inquiries are a metaphor for EXT processes. Researching and writing a dissertation on a web-based platform allows me to be more intuitive, to be in a natural process of researching, creating and collecting content, and organizing all the parts like multiple, interconnected sets of Russian dolls (a hollow painted wooden doll in which the top and bottom come apart to reveal a smaller, similar doll inside, which similarly comes apart to reveal a smaller doll, and so on). All the features of the dissertation are at my fingertips, as well as at the fingertips of any reader/user. Navigation of such website is facilitated by links, and exemplified by meaningful, pertinent images, videos, references, quotes, etc.

The expressive arts process reveals information in layers as it surfaces from the unconscious, its interconnections with emotional content, memory, desires and intent to control both the expression and the emotional experience.

The interconnectedness is very important, as it is in my spiritual approach to understanding the Self, human suffering and empathy as the way of peace.

· It provides a visual/functional framework that is conducive to a visual artist like me, who also thrives in and incorporates all the arts - dance/movement, music, story telling, etc. ;

· Flexibility of combining text, images, PPT presentations, video, links to reference materials and links to sources for future expansion of the material and of the field of EXT;

· Flexibility in the development and evolution of the dissertation itself, which is a dynamic living organism, as opposed to a static book;

· It can easily be edited and printed in book form if desired – the content will be the same.

· I learned about WEB-BASED dissertations in ‘The Authentic Dissertation – Alternative ways of knowing, research, and presentation’, by Four Arrows, aka, Don Trent Jacobs, 2008, where Simon Pockley, Ph.D from Australia contributes to this collection of essays with his pioneer dissertation and mention the Electronic Thesis & Dissertation Movement or ETD; universities have incorporated his protocol, such as Virginia Tech, and the University of Vermont among others.

I offer the assumption that this dynamic of ‘tuning in’ and being present with the client’s needs in the moment and acting on it is a manifestation of empathy, it is generated by empathy. This is a key factor for the therapeutic relationship to be successful, in such a way that generates trust in the client towards the therapist, which then opens up to the possibility of change, transformation and growth.

The experiential aspect of expressive arts therapy fits perfectly with the notion of ‘embodying’ the relationship between conscious and unconscious plane; empathy allows for a deeper, instinctive approach into the relationship with both media and client.

Empathy is defined as the understanding of another’s feelings, or the ability to identify with and understand somebody else's feelings or difficulties; this process generates a caring attitude and moves to compassionate thoughts and hopefully, to compassionate actions and choices. Moreover, empathy is identified with the transfer of somebody's own feelings and emotions to an object such as a painting, a piece of music, a dance. This is revealed in the clients’ self-expression and in the aroused emotional experience.

The working assumption is that our psyche doesn’t distinguish between our personal experience of an event or emotion and seeing someone else having the same experience, or seeing it in a movie or playing it out in enactment, ritual, etc. The simulation “links imaginative stories to lived narratives” (Feldman, From Molecule to Metaphor, 2006). It works well for athletes who are able to ‘rehearse’ their performance in their minds; increased blood flow to the muscles and measurable muscle contraction has been recorded during visualization resulting in improved athletic performance (Mike Samules, MD and Nancy Samuels, Seeing with the Mind’s Eye, 1975).

This is based on a theory in neuroscience about Mirror Neuron Circuitry, integrating action and perception. According to this theory we have neuron circuits in the pre-motor cortex that ‘fire’ when we either perform a given action or see someone else performing the same action or imagining it. Although I won’t be able to delve into the field of neuroscience, which is outside the field and scope of this dissertation, it suffices to say that the arts are valuable and meaningful expressions as catalysts for understanding and transformation.

The focus will be on the experience of empathy during my work with clients and groups, the experience of empathy and peace as it pertains to the perceived quality of life in cancer patients, the cultivation of empathy in the general population of children and adults and the manifested behavior of developmentally disabled adults.

The materials and references providing the substratum for this dissertation are authentic and verified as belonging to scholars and students of the academic world, their research, writings and activities. In addition, I will deliberately refer to and include authentic and meaningful content generated from actual Expressive Arts Therapy processes either from my personal experience, from my interaction with clients and from accounts of other respected practitioners.