ABSTRACT
Art therapists have traditionally been employed in large psychiatric hospitals where they have often worked with groups of in-patients on acute admissions as well as long-stay wards. They have tended to run so-called ‘open groups’, which consist of a studio-type room into which patients may wander at various times of day, sometimes painting, sometimes not. Alternatively, ‘projective art groups’ may be held, where one-off themes are set by whoever happens to be running the group. Often this is not a qualified art or group therapist. In either case, little attention is paid to the dynamics of the group.
