A series of birds made out of paper mache.

Teresa Yu, "Birds of Connection," 2019, wire, paper mache, and acrylic paint.

Art Therapy & Counseling

Undergraduate Overview

Art Therapy & Counseling Undergraduate Overview

The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) offers several undergraduate courses for students interested in exploring art therapy as a future profession or considering how the approaches and philosophies of the field can inform their artistic development.

While SAIC does not offer a formal undergraduate major in Art Therapy, bachelor of fine arts (BFA) students can combine practical SAIC Internships with psychology classes from the Liberal Arts department and studio coursework as preparation for a graduate education in Art Therapy.

The profession of art therapy requires a master's degree. To learn about the SAIC Master of Arts in Art Therapy and Counseling program, please download the Master of Arts in Art Therapy and Counseling Program Guide [PDF] for detailed information. Undergraduate students interested in eventually applying to graduate art therapy programs in the United States should take the required prerequisite minimums: 12 semester credits in psychology courses, including abnormal psychology and developmental psychology, and 18 semester credits in studio art courses.

Art Therapy and Counseling Department Undergraduate Learning Goals:

  • Understand the core concerns of the field of art therapy and perspectives from related fields
  • Understand how the ideas and practices in the field of art therapy relate to contemporary theories of art and psychotherapy
  • Critically question medical, mental health, care, and wellness discourses in the profession of art therapy and other related clinical or therapeutic professions.
  • Critically explore therapeutic thinking in art disciplines through methods of creative practice and research


The undergraduate courses in the Art Therapy and Counseling Department focus on the following subject areas. 

  • Becoming an Art Therapist 
  • Community Practice
  • Critical Cultural Studies
  • Disability and Mad Studies
  • Materials and Media 

Course Listing

Title Catalog Instructor Schedule

Description

This is an entry-level experiential class which explores and implements concepts from art therapy and related fields. The course presents a blend of approaches including Eastern traditions, Jungian psychology, and other sources. Studio work and writing will be used as tools to understand and cultivate the discipline of self-awareness. The class will be structured as a community of participants engaging in and studying the phenomenon of the creative process. Each class meeting will involve art making and writing as well as discussion of ideas based on readings and experiences. This course is for anyone wanting to explore the relationship between art and life, self, other, and community in experiential and theoretical ways within an art therapy framework. It will be of value to those considering working with others using art, such as teachers or art therapists, as well as for those who may wish to establish art and/or writing as a form of practice and discipline in their lives. Open to all students.

Class Number

1253

Credits

3

Department

Art Therapy

Area of Study

Community & Social Engagement

Location

Sharp 402

Description

This is an entry-level experiential class which explores and implements concepts from art therapy and related fields. The course presents a blend of approaches including Eastern traditions, Jungian psychology, and other sources. Studio work and writing will be used as tools to understand and cultivate the discipline of self-awareness. The class will be structured as a community of participants engaging in and studying the phenomenon of the creative process. Each class meeting will involve art making and writing as well as discussion of ideas based on readings and experiences. This course is for anyone wanting to explore the relationship between art and life, self, other, and community in experiential and theoretical ways within an art therapy framework. It will be of value to those considering working with others using art, such as teachers or art therapists, as well as for those who may wish to establish art and/or writing as a form of practice and discipline in their lives. Open to all students.

Class Number

1254

Credits

3

Department

Art Therapy

Area of Study

Community & Social Engagement, 60-75% in-person activity

Location

Sharp 404

Description

This course is designed to offer students a didactic and experiential overview of the field of art therapy. Material covered will include history, theory, and practice of art therapy processes and approaches as well as a survey of populations, settings, and applications. Lecture, readings, discussion, audio-visual presentations, experiential exercises, and guest presentations comprise the structure of this course.

Class Number

1240

Credits

3

Department

Art Therapy

Area of Study

Community & Social Engagement

Location

Sharp 404

Description

This course explores the use of ritual and art making for personal and social practice. Students reflect on ritual as part of daily life, familial rituals, cultural rituals, and life-cycle rituals, and examine the process by which art embodies, represents, and transforms them. The exploration of ritual and making as a form of engagement, participation, and collaboration provides context for class discussion, group projects, and individual work. The role that ritual and making play in encouraging personal well-being, and fostering community is discussed and explored both in class and through off-campus visits.

Class Number

1252

Credits

3

Department

Art Therapy

Location

Sharp 403

Description

This course will explore madness and its construction as a site of pathology and deviance in our current society as well as important challenges to this construction. Utilizing an intersectional and interdisciplinary disability studies and mad studies critical lens this course will address how madness is constructed in relation to colonialist, white supremacist, capitalist, and patriarchal notions of rationality, linearity, and unity. Readings will cover foundational texts in the anti-psychiatry movement as well as crucial texts to the development of mad studies. Many texts specifically address the relationship between race and madness. Artistic representations, as well as film and television representations will be utilized regularly. Course work will consist of weekly reading responses, short presentations, one 2-3 page analysis paper, and a final creative project that includes a 5 page analysis paper

Class Number

1256

Credits

3

Department

Art Therapy

Area of Study

Art/Design and Politics, Gender and Sexuality, Class, Race, Ethnicity

Location

Sharp 402

Description

What is disability? How do we see, read, hear, smell and feel about disability? How does society represent disability and illness? How do artists theoretically and conceptually engage disability in their own practices? This course offers students critical thinking tools to examine the meanings of disability created by current social, cultural, economic and political systems. Over the course of the semester, students develop artistic vocabulary in relation to visual and cultural representations of disability found in mainstream society and in Disability Culture/Disability Art contexts. Readings include the following topics: disability frameworks, disability as intersectional identity, and representations in art, media, fashion, and design . Students learn about the range and complexity of disability representations through the works of contemporary artists such as Riva Lehrer, Laura Swanson, and Christine Sun Kim, and through the work of dance and performance art groups. Students also read the work of disability scholars including Carrie Sandahl, Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, Eli Clare, Alison Kafer, and Petra Kuppers. Coursework includes bi-weekly writing responses, a disability culture event paper, a media report, and a final art and writing project.

Class Number

1260

Credits

3

Department

Art Therapy

Area of Study

Gender and Sexuality, Narrative, Politics and Activisms

Location

Sharp 404

Description

This interdisciplinary course considers the topic of craft practices and the therapeutic through the lens of feminist pedagogy, including theories of touch and interembodiment. Students will examine the critical role craft and the domestic arts have played in raising questions surrounding feminism, gender, and labor practices in everyday histories. The course examines local and international projects centering on memory, trauma and collaboration. The class will explore the ethics of community collaborations and how the practice of making can cultivate a sense of community, well-being, and social capital.

Class Number

1255

Credits

3

Department

Art Therapy

Area of Study

Gender and Sexuality, Community & Social Engagement

Location

Sharp 402

Description

Sexuality is just one part of who we are as complex human beings living interrelated lives in society. This course will provide a basic overview of the study of human sexuality covering diverse approaches to the study of sexualities and desire, while focusing on an understanding of human sexualities as socially constructed, culturally regulated and an important part of the organization of our social world. This course will emphasize a critical gender studies approach, feminist understandings of sexualities, and queer theory. Focusing on lived experience, attention will also be paid to connections between sexualities and other social locators, such as race, ethnicity, gender, and ability/disability. Some of the scholars we will study in this course include prominent figures in sexuality studies and queer theory (Freud, Kinsey, Foucault, Sedgwick, Butler, Warner, Rubin), queer of color critiques (Ferguson, Munoz, Caruthers), and scholarly articles which address the intersections of sexuality with race, gender, ability/disability, and ethnicity (Sommerville, Garcia, Ward, Callis, McRuer, etc.). Course work will vary but typically includes weekly discussion boards, journal style reading responses, reading quizzes, a midterm, and a final finished art piece related to course material.

Class Number

1257

Credits

3

Department

Art Therapy

Area of Study

Gender and Sexuality, Class, Race, Ethnicity

Location

Sharp 403

Description

This course aims to critically examine the affects of race and representation of others. Students will interpret nineteenth-century and early 20th-century material and non-material culture from anti-slavery and pro-slavery sources, including biblical literature, slave narratives, print media, music, visual art, and ephemera. The course considers moral motivations for recognition, empathy, assistance, and liberation of others in an era of sentimentalism. Students will interrogate modern ideas in helping relationships as they learn to 1.) explore the role of cultural materials in preserving trauma or the history of violence; 2.) discuss the role of cultural imagery in the production of charity and empathy; and 3.) ask contemporary questions about the role of desire in feeling responsibility and doing good. Throughout the course, students will be required to travel to several local archives including the Newberry Library and the Stony Island Arts Bank for research.

Prerequisites

Prerequisite: First Year English requirement.

Class Number

1245

Credits

3

Department

Art Therapy

Area of Study

Class, Race, Ethnicity, Economic Inequality & Class

Location

Sharp 409

Description

This course is an examination of the qualities and properties of art materials, media, and processes, and their applications in the context of art therapy. Socially constructed understandings of the significance of materials and media, as well as the relevance of contemporary art practices to art therapy, are investigated through lecture, discussion, and experiential formats.

Prerequisites

You must be a Masters of Art in Art Therapy student or have instructor consent to take this class.

Class Number

1237

Credits

3

Department

Art Therapy

Area of Study

60-75% in-person activity

Location

Sharp 404

Description

This course introduces the art therapy student to the field's historical and theoretical aspects. The semester begins with investigations of historical events that laid the groundwork for what would develop into the field of art therapy. Topics presented include early practitioners of the field and contemporary theorists who use art in psychotherapy and counseling.

Prerequisites

You must be a Masters of Art in Art Therapy student or have instructor consent to take this class.

Class Number

1238

Credits

3

Department

Art Therapy

Location

Sharp 404

Description

In this course the student will explore various forms of assessment including both formal standardized instruments and informal approaches. Particular emphasis will be placed on concepts of individual and group assessment in art therapy as well as neighboring fields of psychology and counseling. The student will develop a greater understanding of the potential an artwork has to reflect artists' developmental, emotional, psychological, cognitive, spiritual, and cultural state at the time it was made. Open to MAAT students only.

Prerequisites

You must be a Masters of Art in Art Therapy student or have instructor consent to take this class.

Class Number

1258

Credits

3

Department

Art Therapy

Location

Sharp 403

Description

This course investigates psychological, sociological, cognitive, cultural and neurobiological approaches to human development. Historical and current theories are examined in light of the implications they have for art therapy theory and practice. Course content addresses the role of the cultural production of personal experience in lifelong development, including how issues of race, ethnicity, class, gender, disability and sexual orientation relate to human development.

Prerequisites

You must be a Masters of Art in Art Therapy student or have instructor consent to take this class.

Class Number

2132

Credits

3

Department

Art Therapy

Location

Sharp 403

Description

This course provides group supervision to support the practicum component of the Master of Arts in Art Therapy and a Counseling program. Practicum students participate in a minimum of one hour of weekly individual supervision with a qualified fieldwork site supervisor in addition to 1.5 hours of weekly group supervision with a faculty supervisor per the MAATC fieldwork supervision agreement. Over the course of the semester, students complete between 100 - 250 service hours at an approved fieldwork site. These hours must include a minimum of 40 hours of direct service with clients and contribute to the development of basic art therapy and counseling skills. In this professional practice course, students are afforded opportunities to observe clinical practice and explore the application of theory; sensitivity to differences among individuals; ethics and standards of practice; and the processing of emotional complexities of early professional development.

Prerequisites

You must be a Masters of Art in Art Therapy student or have instructor consent to take this class.

Class Number

2133

Credits

1.5

Department

Art Therapy

Location

Sharp 404

Description

This course provides group supervision to support the practicum component of the Master of Arts in Art Therapy and a Counseling program. Practicum students participate in a minimum of one hour of weekly individual supervision with a qualified fieldwork site supervisor in addition to 1.5 hours of weekly group supervision with a faculty supervisor per the MAATC fieldwork supervision agreement. Over the course of the semester, students complete between 100 - 250 service hours at an approved fieldwork site. These hours must include a minimum of 40 hours of direct service with clients and contribute to the development of basic art therapy and counseling skills. In this professional practice course, students are afforded opportunities to observe clinical practice and explore the application of theory; sensitivity to differences among individuals; ethics and standards of practice; and the processing of emotional complexities of early professional development.

Prerequisites

You must be a Masters of Art in Art Therapy student or have instructor consent to take this class.

Class Number

2135

Credits

1.5

Department

Art Therapy

Location

Sharp 706

Description

This course introduces theoretical foundations and professional skill training in verbal and nonverbal counseling methods and art-based communication within the practice of general psychotherapy and art therapy, including understanding the presenting problem, best practice recommendations, assessment, and effective intervention strategies. Empathic listening, embodiment, and understanding the role of difference and cultural humility are explored. Documentation, treatment planning, and ethics will be introduced.

Prerequisites

You must be a Masters of Art in Art Therapy student or have instructor consent to take this class.

Class Number

1239

Credits

3

Department

Art Therapy

Location

Sharp 404

Description

This multi-level course draws from arts and counseling perspectives to critically examine helping relationships, community care work, socially engaged art practice, cultural curation, and research through service learning. Students will learn various models of collaboration with community members and an interdisciplinary team of mental health practitioners, artists, designers, organizers, educators, scholars and researchers. In addition to weekly classroom lectures and discussions, students are expected to participate in community engagement outside of regular scheduled classes. Regular off campus meetings, planning, and experiential research are required.

Class Number

2336

Credits

3

Department

Art Therapy

Area of Study

Class, Race, Ethnicity, Community & Social Engagement, Economic Inequality & Class

Location

Sharp 409

Description

In this course students explore basic legal and ethical standards of practice in art therapy and counseling. Responsibilities relating to the use of client artwork in presentation, publication, and exhibition are emphasized, in addition to processing the moral complexities of early professional development. ARTTHER 5020/6002 have a Co Req, students must enroll in the same section.

Prerequisites

You must be a Masters of Art in Art Therapy student or have instructor consent to take this class.

Class Number

1241

Credits

1.5

Department

Art Therapy

Location

Sharp 404

Description

In this course students explore basic legal and ethical standards of practice in art therapy and counseling. Responsibilities relating to the use of client artwork in presentation, publication, and exhibition are emphasized, in addition to processing the moral complexities of early professional development. ARTTHER 5020/6002 have a Co Req, students must enroll in the same section.

Prerequisites

You must be a Masters of Art in Art Therapy student or have instructor consent to take this class.

Class Number

1243

Credits

1.5

Department

Art Therapy

Location

Sharp 706

Description

The focus of the course is the refinement of the student?s scholarship and writing skills relative to their chosen thesis topic. Students initiate their investigation by developing a literature review, proposal, and method and beginning their data collection.

Prerequisites

Prerequisite: ARTTHER 5009.

Class Number

1259

Credits

3

Department

Art Therapy

Location

Sharp 409
Rachel Wallis, Unraveling Empire, 2017, Textiles

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