Art and Dementia: Exploring the Difference Between Art and Art Therapy

I often am asked about how art therapy differs from other art programs. This is a very valid and important question.

In Canada, and according to the Canadian Art Therapy Association (CATA), “professional art therapists must have at minimum a master’s level diploma or master’s degree in art therapy to practice. This graduate level education includes supervised clinical practicum hours (700 hours minimum for Canadian art therapy students), thus ensuring the safety of the client as well as professional liability for agencies and employers offering this form of therapy”. Art Therapists must abide by a Code of Ethics and carry liability insurance for their practice.

For more about the practice of art therapy, please visit the CATA website: https://www.canadianarttherapy.org/what-is-art-therapy.

As an artist and an art therapist, I often engage in practice along a broad continuum of art and art therapy projects and capacities.

As you see above. artists and art therapists are not trained in the same manner, so it is very important to not interchange the practice of art therapy with the practice of art.

For various reasons, organizations supporting those living with dementia may not always have access to an art therapist. Recognizing that in the absence of art therapy, art programming is still an incredibly important component of wellbeing for those living with dementia, my goal is to help support those professionals who may not have alot of or any art experience to learn how to offer programming in their organization. I am not teaching art therapy, however, this information may also be valuable to those art therapists who wish to work with those living with dementia, but have not had the opportunity to learn the important foundations of dementia.

I hope this helps to clarify the difference in the two practices.