ART AS THERAPY

Helen B. Landgarten Art Therapy Clinic

Located in the LMU Department of Marital and Family Therapy with specialization in Art Therapy, the Helen B. Landgarten Art Therapy Clinic collaborates with multiple organizations including the Los Angeles Unified School District, Loyola Marymount University Family of Schools, American Red Cross, Barbara Sinatra Children’s Center, New Directions for Veterans, and Save the Children. These partnerships include seven different programs that deliver more than 1,500 hours of direct service.

Working without walls and reaching out into the community, MFT students, faculty and alumni provide sustained art therapy services throughout the year. The services help a variety of clientele, including young people in school settings, as well as adults and families in community centers, shelters and veterans’ homes.

“We are not building a building, we are building a community of art therapists” is how Helen B. Landgarten, art therapist and department founder, described the clinic named in her honor at its inauguration. The clinic also serves the educational needs of the department’s graduate students by providing opportunities to participate in and observe art therapy services in non-clinical settings in the community.

ART AS THERAPY

Disaster Response

With natural disasters becoming increasingly frequent, more and more people are experiencing the associated trauma due to losses of homes, neighborhoods, belongings and even the death of family and friends. Teams of LMU-trained art therapists travel around the United States visiting disaster relief shelters to engage individuals in clinical art therapy and help them acknowledge and express their feelings about the disaster, and to work toward developing a hopeful outlook for the future.

The teams have provided support to hurricane, flooding, and fire victims in California, Texas, and Louisiana in recent years. In many cases, the art therapists are the only support program that return to the area consistently to provide follow-up support services, even after most programs had moved on. For many of the children, creating a bridge to explore the future is a necessary phase of their recovery process.

“Art therapists have a unique role to play in disaster work. Art-making can provide a non-verbal means to discharge acute stress that is inherent in disasters. Every person who experiences a disaster or traumatic event has a story to tell that is often best told visually through the art.”

Veteran Art Therapy

The Veteran Art Therapy group is a collaboration between LMU’s Helen B. Landgarten Art Therapy Clinic and the University of California, Riverside. Art therapy groups with veterans commenced in the early spring of 2020 on the campus of UCR and are led by an MFT faculty member and alumna.

The clinic has a collaboration with the Veterans Administration program New Directions. This program provides art therapy groups for the most challenged of our nation’s military heroes, homeless veterans, who often face problems with substance abuse. The collaboration with New Directions for Veterans has a direct impact on the lives of homeless veterans struggling with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder from exposure to trauma.

Family Art Therapy Assessment Program

By working directly with health providers, this indepth art therapy assessment is conducted by MFT faculty, staff, and alumni, and allows clinicians a deeper understanding of the families they are providing services to. The Family Art Assessment Program is currently sponsored by the Barbara Streisand Foundation in Palm Desert, California and started providing services in early 2020.

Supporting Pregnant and Parenting Teens

Pregnant and parenting teens and their children are some of the most vulnerable members of our society, with complex psychological needs from struggling with severe circumstances. The clinic provides art therapy services that address the needs of pregnant and parenting inner-city teens who attend Thomas Riley High School in Los Angeles.

The teens visit the clinic weekly to cope with stress, learn how to become better communicators, develop their identities, manage their anger and enhance their parenting skills.

American Red Cross

By partnering with the American Red Cross, the clinic has also developed mental health training for clinicians, covering key concepts required of anyone volunteering to respond in Disaster Mental Health. It prepares licensed mental health professionals to respond across the continuum of disaster preparedness, response and recovery.

“This event is a cherished LMU tradition unique from any other music event. It is an excellent opportunity for our talented opera singers, instrumentalists, and faculty, as well as our guest performers, to reach a new audience and expose young children to classical music and dance.”

Tania Fleischer, Music Faculty