As a trained child psychotherapist (TCPP, 1982) art therapist, social worker and expressive arts therapist, Ellen Levine has worked to bring aspects of psychoanalytic thinking and practice together with thinking and practice about the role of play, imagination and the arts in human experience. 

In the first part of the presentation, Ms. Levine will discuss the history of the emergence of the field of expressive arts therapy and the basic foundational ideas that inform the thinking and practice of the field.  She will also talk about her own movement from child analyst to expressive arts therapist. 

In the second part of the presentation, she will lead the group in an expressive arts exploration in order for participants to get a more experiential understanding of the way in which the arts can be brought into a therapeutic process.  No artistic experience is necessary–only two or three pieces of A4 size paper and a willingness to try something. 

Learning Objectives: 

1. To learn about the history of the emergence of the field of expressive arts therapy and its relationship to the other creative arts therapies
2. To understand the basic principles and practices of expressive arts therapy
3. To reaffirm the role of play, imagination, art-making and creativity in human experience
4. To add more to the thinking and the skill set of participants in terms of working with children in therapy

About the Presenter:
Ellen G. Levine, MSW, Ph.D., ATR-BC, REAT, RSW is co-founder of and faculty at The CREATE Institute in Toronto and Professor and Core Faculty at the European Graduate School in Switzerland.  From 1989 to 2019, Ellen was a social worker at the Gary Hurvitz Centre for Community Mental Health (formerly, the C.M.Hincks Centre, formerly the Hincks-Dellcrest Centre, formerly Sick Kids Centre for Community Mental Health)  Currently, Ellen has an on-line practice which includes supervision, therapy, teaching and training.  She is an author, co-author and editor of many books and articles some of which include Tending the Fire: Studies in Art, Therapy and Creativity, Principles and Practice of Expressive Arts Therapy: Toward a Therapeutic Aesthetics, and Play and Art in Child Psychotherapy: An Expressive Arts Therapy Approach.