Update on the Naropa AT Response to Wildfires

"Art has the potential to change lives and often in profound ways. When words are not enough, we turn to images and symbols to tell our stories. And in telling our stories through art, we can find a path to health and wellness, emotional reparation, recovery, and ultimately, transformation." 

- Cathy Malchiodi

The Naropa art therapy community is currently offering 2 forms of support for those impacted by the recent wildfires and would like to offer an invitation for the Naropa community at large to participate.  The Art Therapy program is based on the foundation of nurturing socially engaged art therapists through the practice of serving and building community through the arts.  We believe in the inherent power of art making to improve lives, bring about positive change, build community and to help tell people's stories when words are not enough. 

Please join us in one of two ways:

* Free Naropa Community Art Studio Open Studio at the Nalanda Campus on 63rd and Arapahoe in Boulder will be open each Sunday from 09/12 until 10/31 from 10am-1pm for persons affected by the fire. It is an open studio with the intention of creating individual and community art in order to express and witness the experiences, emotions, and stories of people impacted by this tragic event.  All who are feeling the impact of this fire are invited to participate.

* Offer words and/or art in cards of gratitude!  Please take a moment to write a note of gratitude to one of the many fire fighters, volunteers, and rescue workers who provided front-line assistance to local residents impacted by the wildfire!  The act of taking care to create something thoughtful and special for another human has the potential to be a very powerful experience for the sender and the receiver.  Cards are ready for your kind words and/or creative flair at the Transpersonal Counseling Psychology (TCP) office on the Paramita campus.

• Write a note of gratitude in a pre-decorated card

• Take a set of blank cards to decorate for those who do not have time to decorate or do not identify as artists who would still like to contribute
• Take cards for your friends, classes, roommates, or co-workers to decorate or write in
• Make your own homemade cards and drop them off at the TCP Office front desk

All cards will be collected and distributed 
to local Boulder agencies on:
Monday, October 4th

Please contact Chelsea O'Neil at chelseaoneil@gmail.com with any questions

Giving Thanks!

Transpersonal Counseling Psychology students from Naropa gathered on Saturday to cut, fold, and decorate handmade cards.  Art therapy students are highly encouraged to pick up a small stack of cards to decorate and return without messages so that those that don’t feel comfortable decorating are still able to write messages.  We are looking for any and all forms of gratitude, particularly making it easier for those that do not identify as artists or have the time to decorate to be able to participate by writing messages in beautiful, handmade cards.

Naropa community members are invited to…
• Write a note of gratitude in a pre-decorated card
• Take a set of blank cards and decorate them yourself
• Take cards for your friends, roommates, co-workers or family members to decorate or write in

Cards are ready for kind words and creative flair at the front desk of the Transpersonal Counseling Psychology office on the Paramita campus. 

All cards will be collected and distributed to local Boulder agencies on: Monday, October 4th

Offering Gratitude!

The fire has been one of the most destructive fires in Colorado, destroying more homes than any other blaze in state history. 700 firefighters and support personnel have been in action for days!  We will be making thank-you cards for firefighters, law enforcement, and rescue/aid workers helping with the fire efforts.  We need help!  Artists, art therapists, students, friends, family, Boulderites, and the like....

If you're interested in mailing in cards in from somewhere else or making a donation, please email chelseaoneil@gmail.com for contact info.


We will be making thank-you cards for firefighters, law enforcement, and rescue/aid workers helping with the fire efforts on
Saturday, Sept. 18th we will be meeting in the studio from 12pm-4pm to…
•    Cut paper
•    Fold cards and bind in small packages with ribbon
•    Decorate cards
•    Write messages

Cards will be at the front desk of the TCP office, the art studio and possibly somewhere on the Arapahoe campus for students and faculty to write messages and/or decorate the cards and then return them to the pick-up point.  I will then collect all of the cards and drop them off at designated stations throughout the community.  Awesome Amy of the 1st years is checking on card stock donations.  If you have any materials that could be of use please bring them by on Saturday the 18th!

Art therapy students are highly encouraged to pick up a small stack of cards to decorate and return without messages so that those that don’t feel comfortable decorating are still able to write messages.  

This is a GREAT activity for students to work on while in community art studio or on Sunday if you’re willing to help out in NCAS!  Feel free to take cards to your places of employment, in the community or classes, for your roommates, or bring your own homemade cards from other places for the donation.   

We are looking for any and all forms of gratitude, particularly blank cards which will make it easier for those that do not identify as artists or have the time to decorate to be able to participate by writing messages in beautiful, handmade cards.

Naropa Art Therapy Community Responds to Boulder Fire

 A fire broke out Monday outside of Boulder and spread over roughly 6,300 acres. It has since become one of the most destructive fires in Colorado, destroying more homes than any other blaze in state history.  According to a recent Huffington Post article, about 3,500 people have been out of their homes for four days and fire managers said as many as 700 firefighters and support personnel and seven air tankers were assigned to fight the fire, considered the nation's top firefighting priority.

We are quickly brainstorming ideas to aid fire evacuees in the area.  As students and professionals in the art therapy community we are joining forces to help in whatever way that we can.  First off,  

The Naropa Community Art Studio at the Nalanda Campus on 63rd and Arapahoe in Boulder will be open each Sunday from 09/12 until 10/31 from 10am-1pm for persons affected by the fire. It is an open studio with the intention of creating individual and community art in order to express and witness the experiences, emotions, and stories of people impacted by this tragic event.  All who are feeling the impact of this fire are invited to participate.

All other Naropa art therapy community efforts will be posted on this blog.  Feedback and ideas for projects are welcome and encouraged.

Many blessings.  Stay safe.

For the latest news on the fire and resources available in the community, check out this link:

http://twitter.com/YahooNews/boulderfire 


or visit http://www.boulderfire.com/

 

Project Girl: Media Literacy & Empowerment

Several Naropa art therapy students fulfilled their 2009-2010 practicum experience or civic engagement requirement in the Community Art Studio in conjunction with the Boulder Youth Body Alliance.  Boulder Youth Body Alliance (BYBA) empowers youth to reclaim a positive body image. Through a variety of grassroots projects and activities, teens take action, reclaim their voices, and make a positive difference in their communities. BYBA peer educators and activists learn how to stop trying to change their bodies and work to change the world instead.

A variation of a national program called Project Girl was offered to middle school and high school girls in Boulder County.  Project Girl (PG) is an after-school program that combines art and media literacy into a unique educational program aimed at encouraging adolescent girls to become more critical consumers of contemporary media advertising and entertainment. The purpose of PG is to help girls become literate in all media forms—TV, internet, movies, magazines, newspapers, billboards, books, product labels, and music—so that they control the interpretation of what they see or hear rather than letting the interpretation control them.

To read all about the hard work of Naropa students and Project Girl

check out the blog: projectgirlboulder.blogspot.com 

or watch the video below created by PG practicum student Chelsea O'Neil

Photos from the Project Girl Exhibition on the Naropa campus:

A Chance to Give Back

Photo Credit

Through a blog I follow for creative inspiration, Mon Petit Poppet, I discovered a big-hearted sewing activity that began with another blogger, Dance for Cheese.  The directive is to sew a reversible pinafore for little girls and/or plain elastic-waist cotton shorts for little boys who live at the Dago Dala Hera Orphanage in Kenya. 

Knowing that many of the art therapy students at Naropa sew... I thought this would be a great activity to use our creative talents that will be life enhancing indeed!

The fabric shop that started this activity is located in Melbourne, Australia.  A young Melbourne woman spent time volunteering at the orphanage this past Christmas.  She was struck that the children there did not have adequate clothing and that the orphanage did not have enough funds to supply any.  Her mother works at the fabric shop and she and her co-workers began making the reversible pinafores which the orphanage had requested upon contact.  Soon customers noticed the pinafores in the back of the store and they too joined in.  Through the wonderful world of blogging... the news has spread. And now I pass it on to you.

Want to be involved? All you need to do is make a girl's reversible pinafore and/or boy's elastic-waist cotton shorts that are ready to be shipped by June 4, 2010.  They are collecting these items for children of many ages - so you can make them in the child's size of your choosing! I would be willing to gather the items made and send them off in one package.  I will also find out the address of the Melbourne blogger, who has offered to have items shipped to her so that she can drop them off a the store, and I can share that with anyone who contacts me (annicejohnson@gmail.com) to send their pinafores and/or shorts. 

- Annice Johnson, Class of 2011

Student Testimonial:Taylor

For my practicum I co-facilitated a multi-generational group of women, with classmate Chelsea O'Neil, who strove to empower themselves against the debilitating effects of mass media advertising. This unique peer-based initiative was unique in its use of art to increase positive body image, self- awareness, self-confidence, and relational bonds. Every week about seventeen women met in a community based studio setting to engage in arts-based directives, thoughtful discussion, and deconstruction of truths espoused by the media. 

While I knew that looking at magazines often left me feeling badly about myself, it wasn’t until I began co-facilitating this group that I realized I carried a degree of responsibility for allowing media content to decrease my self-esteem. Through leading this group I gained a more expansive awareness, which served to lessen the media’s impact on on my self-sense. I began to notice the subtle tricks used by advertisers to manipulate my self-doubt. I found myself browsing through magazines in check-out lines having “Aha!” moments. I wanted to tell the woman in line next to me why women are held to an impossible ideal of beauty – but of course, it makes us want to buy everything! The time to share these “Aha!” moments was in the studio. 

We laughed, cried, got angry, made art, sang, danced, posed, and made fools of ourselves. Slowly we began to reclaim the tools that would strengthen us, the very tools that the media went to great lengths to obscure – our connections to one another and more importantly, our connections to ourselves.

- Taylor Siemon, Class of 2011

To learn more about the artwork created at this practicum site and 

the experiences shared in the Naropa Community Art Studio, visit:

http://projectgirlboulder.blogspot.com