title: [Art therapy in psychiatry (author's transl)].
abstract: The author tries to convey an idea of the process which takes place during art therapy, quoting examples from her own work with mentally diseased patients. She considers the visual message resulting from the work of art created by the patient, as a process of communication which takes place between the patient and the therapist or between various patients, enabling an exchange of action with the environment--a kind of tentative or "test" behaviour--while catching up with suppressed or slowed-downed impulses by topicalising conflicts via imaging and tackling them by the process of creating art or an image. The resulting picture always conveys both diagnostic and therapeutic information. Visualization and shaping of internally perceived images strengthens the ego. Changes and limitations of art therapy are demonstrated by means of examples from individual and group therapy.
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001155:Art Therapy / Q000379:methods*; D005260:Female; D005556:Form Perception; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D001523:Mental Disorders / Q000523:psychology / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D012565:Schizophrenic Psychology
vernacular_title: Gestaltungstherapie in der Psychiatrie.