Arthur Robbins – författare

Arthur Robbins has been a practising art therapist for many years, and is founder of the Pratt Graduate Art Therapy program, one of the first of its kind to introduce art therapy training in the United States. This new text recasts his early work within the framework of modern psychodynamic theory.The underlying principle of the early works - the amalgamation of the creative and therapeutic processes in the belief that the facilitation of creativity improves psychological health - remains in this text, together with a thread of object-relations theory that intertwines with other models of treatment. There is also an emphasis on transference and countertransference, and a core belief that every art therapist must possess and develop the soul and sensitivity of an artist, thus valuing authenticity and maintaining a respect for the uniqueness of personal expression. This perception and understanding of the art form will aid the understanding of the entire personality organization of the patient.In this text, diagnosis is not used for categorization, but to offer indications for possible treatment and so to develop a treatment plan. Some patients need the reinforcement of ego skills and defences, others need mirroring, and some need to deal with object loss and attachment. A creative art therapist should not be bogged down by cumbersome role definitions and should be willing to take the same sort of risks that the creative process requires. The creative intent of this text is to offer a structure that is not limited to one therapeutic model and to open up the doors for the creative art therapist to be effective with a wide range of patient populations.

In the therapeutic workplace, the interaction between patient and therapist is built upon cognitive, affective and expressive experiences. The contributors to this new book explore this interaction in depth, examining the concept of therapeutic presence, and the therapist's ability to maintain it.Arthur Robbins suggests that, since therapeutic presence calls for an openness and awareness of the intersubjective space between therapist and patient, therapists who become receptive to the subtle cues of sensory perceptual communication, as well as to the playful, mirroring and meditative interaction will find more successful and meaningful interactions with patients. Therapeutic presence requires a sensitivity to the concepts of centring and grounding, embodies the spatial and temporal characteristics of the therapeutic frame, and an experience of energy that may open, shut down, or disrupt the field of therapeutic contact.This stance can be applied to therapeutic modalities ranging from psychoanalysis to creative arts therapy, in work with both short term and long term populations, and Robbins suggests that the full use of the therapist's creative energies may provide the only solution to overwhelming therapeutic situations.

Arthur Robbins demonstrates how important countertransference reactions are as sources of information and understanding of patient/therapist interactions. For many therapists, forming supervisory/integration groups provides a means of articulating countertransference issues which allows for self-exploration, investigation and understanding. Robbins presents transcriptions of some of these group supervision sessions, which emphasize the mixture of cognitive and affective organization which the therapist is continually exploring with the patient. He examines the issues that are raised in each session, highlighting the difficulty for the therapist of maintaining objective emotional distance from the patient while remaining receptive, and the complex issue of how much of the therapist's own personality should be permitted to emerge during the therapeutic relationship. A special chapter addresses teh complex countertransference issues that specifically apply to creative art therapy.