Publications

Queer Worldmaking in Sex-Positive Art Therapy: Radical Strategies for Individual Healing and Social Transformation

Art Therapy | 2023-04-24 | Journal article

DOI: 10.1080/07421656.2023.2193660

CONTRIBUTORS: Zachary D. Van Den Berg; Mikey Anderson

ABSTRACT: Queer worldmaking (QWM) in art therapy offers liberatory sex-positive interventions and modes of critical inquiry that affirm the lives, imaginations, and pleasures of all who enter the studio. The authors provide three major strategies for QWM in art therapy. A queer ethos of care decenters cis-heteronormativity by embracing the diversity of sexuality and gender identity and expression as valuable ways of knowing. A radically inclusive studio prioritizes queer and trans pleasure in establishing physical, psychological, and imaginal safety. Facilitating critical connections with(in) art and the community centers LGBTQ + historical strategies of care for healing and social justice. Art therapists can unite in the shared pursuit of making queer(er) worlds for individual healing and social transformation.

The Humble Chair: Fostering Culturally Humble Collaborations

Art Therapy | 2023-02-21 | Journal article

DOI: 10.1080/07421656.2023.2171241

CONTRIBUTORS: Deanna Barton; Zachary D. Van Den Berg

ABSTRACT: The authors recount a collaborative art-making journey centered on self-reflexivity to sustain a partnership across racial, social, and cultural differences. The image of a chair, re-imagined as a Humble Chair, was a symbol to anchor critical inquiry. The authors’ explorations provide a pragmatic and artful approach to fostering cultural humility.

Specters of whiteness: Radical care for ghostly matters in art therapy

The Arts in Psychotherapy | 2022-09 | Journal article

DOI: 10.1016/j.aip.2022.101932

CONTRIBUTORS: Zachary D. Van Den Berg; Pat B. Allen

ABSTRACT: The specters of whiteness in art therapy have continued to haunt the field since its formal foundation in the early 1970 s. The authors propose a radical care ethic for these ghostly matters in art therapy that centers the creative process as a critical method for white art therapists to develop the capacity for sincere antiracist work. The social and material conditions of neoliberalism are haunted by the specters of whiteness and colonialism, which, until recently, have been deliberately veiled within art therapy. The authors re-envision the studio as a critical site for intra-community antiracist practice and reclaiming of histories for a justice-to-come.

Edith and Me

Art Therapy | 2021-01-02 | Cover art

DOI: 10.1080/07421656.2021.1887683

CONTRIBUTORS: Zachary D. Van Den Berg

Projects

Coalition for Queer Creative Arts Therapies, Inc.

Established in 2020 by Zachary D. Van Den Berg, the Coalition for Queer Creative Arts Therapies, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to mobilizing and empowering queer and ally students and practitioners who collaborate with the LGBTQIA+ community in their work as creative arts therapists. We are passionate about promoting inclusive and affirming practices, fostering cultural humility, and ensuring equitable representation within the creative arts therapy milieu.

Our Queer Kin (2023)

In creating the Our Queer Kin Mosaic Mural, I sought to weave together the rich tapestry of queer history, celebrating the vibrancy and resilience of our community. This mural is an act of remembering and reclamation. It features over 150 portraits of queer elders, ancestors, and contemporaries, alongside symbols of queer nature, each meticulously crafted to honor their stories and significance. These representations are humble invitations to viewers to engage actively with our history and to see themselves as part of this ongoing narrative.

This project is deeply rooted in the principles of art therapy and queer worldmaking, utilizing the transformative power of art to foster a dialogue of liberation, healing, and empowerment. It is a celebration of queer resilience, a testament to the power of visibility, and an invitation to all who engage with it to contribute to the continual shaping of our collective queer story.

As an artist and art therapist, this mural is my homage to the beautiful, diverse, and resilient queer community—a community that continues to inspire and teach me every day. It is my hope that this mural not only educates and informs but also serves as a site for reflection, inspiration, and connection.

Arts in Healing International Film Festival

The Arts In Healing Film Festival invites filmmakers from around the world to submit their works, to be viewed in person in Portland OR.  The festival aims to highlight innovative work that has been documented in the therapeutic and healing arts from the United States and around the world. The festival will feature a broad spectrum of films that reflect various therapeutic art modalities in the helping profession. This involves multiple expressive media types that span across disciplines which includes and is not limited to: Art, Music, Dance, Psychodrama, Drama, Storytelling, Poetry, Play Therapy, Sand tray, Expressive Therapy etc. We welcome films that document collaboration across disciplines, organizations, and groups to generate public and interdisciplinary awareness and interconnectivity among the healing arts for advocacy and social transformation.

Features Overview

Interview: On Being a Social Change Agent at any Stage of Your Career

May 24, 2023 | The Creative Psychotherapist Podcast (Season 2 Episode 14) with host Reina Lombardi, ATR-BC, ATCS, LMHC-QS

Black History in Art Therapy: A Living Reference & Resource Guide

February 10, 2022 | Compiled by Deanna Barton, MA, ATR-BC & Zachary D. Van Den Berg, MA, ATR-P, LPC-Associate

We have compiled an art therapy specific resource guide, Black History in Art Therapy: A Living Reference & Resource Guide. In it, we share powerful stories documented in blog posts, newsletters, interviews, presentations, videos, and publications. Our aim is to highlight the heterogeneity of Black aesthetics across theory, praxis, pedagogy, and research in art therapy’s past, present, and future. These materials are not only rooted in Black aesthetics, but also (re)circulated and cited by the Black art therapists themselves. Many of the citations listed were gathered by reviewing the references lists of publications by Black art therapists.

In Honor of Black History Month: Centering Black Aesthetics in Art Therapy Past, Present & Future

February 10, 2022 | Deanna Barton, MA, ATR-BC & Zachary D. Van Den Berg, MA, ATR-P, LPC-Associate

In February, we celebrate Black History Month by honoring the labors and contributions of Black art therapists towards their clients, the profession at large, and the world. Let us use this month of national recognition to center Black histories, voices, experiences, and ways of knowing as a catalyst for continued inspiration and visibility in art therapy year-round.

In Honor of International Holocaust Remembrance Day: Centering Memory, Dignity, and Justice in Art Therapy

January 27, 2022 | By Zachary D. Van Den Berg, MA, ATR-P, LPC-Associate & Pat B. Allen, PhD, ATR

As we critically position the history of art therapy against our remembrance of the Holocaust, we can elucidate the range of effects that internalized anti-Semitism of White Ashkenazi Jewish art therapists had on the subordination and erasure of the role and impact of practitioners of color on the early development of the profession. By understanding how our past informs our present and identifying what conscious choices can we make together to support our future is part of the work that the profession and association are engaging in now. As we continue to explore the historical record, may we critique with compassion and reinvent with courage an art therapy centered in justice.

In Honor of MLK Day: Dr. King’s “Creative Maladjustment” and Our Role as Art Therapists

January 17, 2022 | By Zachary D. Van Den Berg, MA, ATR-P, LPC-Associate

Today, we honor the life and legacy of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., whose nonviolent activism became central to the Civil Rights Movement. For art therapists, it is critical to note that Dr. King addressed the role of social scientists to assist the civil rights movement at the American Psychological Association’s 1967 Annual Convention. He called racism and its effects “gigantic in extent, and chaotic in detail.” And he urged social scientists to play active roles in challenging discrimination, white supremacy, and racial injustice—and “reaffirm our belief in building a democratic society” and “participate in the beauty of diversity.” […] As art therapists—given our dual roles as both therapists and artists—we have a unique opportunity to address issues of injustice and discrimination, and in Dr. King’s words, to “tell it like it is.” We can use our practice, knowledge, art, and our humility to craft and sustain opportunities for restorative action and radical healing across our areas of influence. And, we must continue to affect institutional and social change and not fall into performative gestures of solidarity.

For Justice, In Solidarity: A Response from Two Emerging Art Therapists to the Rise of Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander Violence

March 22, 2021 | Elisha-Rio P. Apilado, BFA, RBT and Zachary D. Van Den Berg, BFA

Two related but equally concerning trends have emerged during the Coronavirus pandemic in the Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander (AANHPI) community: the rise in violence and the rise in mental health care needs. This response blog post is a plea for art therapists to intervene and recognize that our services can have life-or-death consequences, especially for the AANHPI community.

Illuminating ‘Invisible Histories’ of LGBTQ+ Art Therapists

November 16, 2020

Chicago Campus Master of Arts in Counseling: Art Therapy student Zachary D. Van Den Berg (he/him/they/them) recently created a video project, titled Invisible Histories: The Lives & Works of LGBTQ+ Art Therapists. Van Den Berg shares why he wanted to combat the “historical erasure of our community’s presence and contributions to the field of art therapy” by archiving the lived experiences of LGBTQ+ art therapists.

AATA Featured Member: Zachary D. Van Den Berg

July 15, 2020

There is an inherent lack of competency in our nation in cultural humility, providing us an inadequate view of humanity's breadth. Unfortunately, it took countless innocent lives to bring this awareness to the broader population. I hold myself accountable to be a part of addressing this discrepancy in the hope that the lineage of brave architects of color, such as Cliff Joseph, Georgette Seabrooke Powell, and Lucille Venture will be more widely recognized, and that as an association we can empower and support the next great generation of BIPOC pioneers in the field.

ITA Says Hello to a Spring Administrative Intern: Meet Zak!

February 27, 2018

ITA is thrilled to have so many talented interns work with us each year. Through our administrative internship, students learn more about the creative arts therapies and what it takes to make a busy non-profit run. These interns are invaluable members of our team and we’d like to introduce you to our newest!

Invisible Histories:

The Lives & Works of LGBTQ+ Art Therapists

Invisible Histories: The Lives & Works of LGBTQ+ Art Therapists brings visibility to these brave practitioners courageously voicing their lived experiences, reclaiming their space within art therapy discourse, and promoting resistance against heterosexist assumptions within arts-based mental health care.

Painting Series:

Becoming

These process works are responses to the journey of cultivating my professional identity as an art therapist.