Right Side Up results

Creative art as a therapy helps us approach issues in life from a different perspective. By working through thoughts, memories and emotions via images or symbols, we move away from cognitive thinking and tap into a more instinctive and intuitive level within us. This moves us beyond repeated cycles that continually block our ability to move forward.

Creative art workshops, or individual sessions, provide a safe and supportive environment to enable clients to discover resources that will help them effectively deal with stressful thoughts or issues and move beyond surviving to thriving.

A recent Right Side Up project was entitled “Red high heels on the Yellow brick road.”


It explored the experience of 12 women working in an organization that is strongly male hierarchical in its structure. Each participant prepared 2-dimensional art works and wrote a summary of their journey as a woman in leadership.



This was presented at a conference in Sydney and is being prepared for publication as a special report in the organization’s magazine.



While the administration of this organisation may benefit from the staff insight gained in this project, the participants who prepared the art pieces found the experience to be personally beneficial. Many expressed a greater understanding of their own response to their work environment and have developed new resources to thrive instead of survive on the job.



Other current Right Side Up projects include; exploring spirituality through art, weekend workshops which use audio-visual presentations, bodywork and art to facilitate team building and personal growth in a community. For enquiries on hothouse weekend workshops or fertiliser fun days for corporate or community groups, or for private sessions see email above.

Masks

Right Side Up co-facilitated mask making sessions for a group of Yr 11 students in East Gippsland as part of their retreat camp.

Students were introduced to a variety of masks - cultural, religious, festive, disguises - and discussion centred on when and why such masks are used. Moving onto invisible masks we wear in our daily lives, students were encouraged to create a mask that expressed an aspect of themselves.

Participants then showed their masks in a small group and told the story or emotions behind it. The group was invited to reflect on each person's mask and share what it reminded them of, or how it made them feel.

The final session involved students laying their masks along a cross laid out on the floor. This was to symbolise reconciliation and a desire to live more authentically in the future.

My perfect world

Spent some time with a great group in the Yarra Valley today. The family focused activity provided by Right Side Up was to create a collage of "My perfect world".

Participants (parents and kids) were given 15 minutes to flip through magazines and find images or words that symbolised their perfect world. Then a further half hour to cut and paste, write, or draw as needed to create their own collage poster. On completion of their posters, each participant held up their poster to share the elements of their perfect world.

A brief discussion on how realistic their perfect world was, and what they could do to include elements of their perfect world into their lives now, helped participants further explore their creative expressions.