Arts in Human Development - Creative Practice - Week 5

This week as I have been contemplating my age appropriate art for the creative blog assignment and reflecting on this week’s reading and videos, I have been inspired to experiment with creating an expressive memory journal. The cover would be a collage of drawings, photos taken by the young adult patient or found on the internet, specialty graphic paper and other materials. The idea of the book would be to create a collage on the cover that represented who they are: memories of their life, their family, things they like to do, how they view themselves now, questions they have, what makes them unique. They would use colors, textures and graphics to create an expression of them self.  The inside of the journal would have a combination of lined pages for writing and blank pages for drawing or adding more collage through the course of time.  This would be an ongoing journal they would add to daily or weekly. So they would stay active with this journal, snapping photos with their phone, drawing, writing stories, poems, letters, etc. in their expressive memory journal. Schneider says in the book, Writing Alone and With Others, why keep a journal? Your life has significance. A journal helps you remember, it saves the perception of what you have this day as you are living it (pg.66-68).

During this week I have been on a cruise ship and have had very limited access to technology resources. All week I have been taking photos with my phone of scenery, signs, art, painted graphics on walls, carpet etc.   Inspired while reading Schneider’s, chapter 4 The Journal, I decided to create the journal to be appropriate for a teen male ages 13-17yrs. This project can be altered for young adult patients, by having them use more age appropriate graphics that have meaning for them. Since I was limited on the ship, I used on board photos I took from the teen section of the ship. There were daily arts and craft workshops on-board, so I learned how to make paper craft cards and scrap-booking, to help with my journal collage. I decided to make my own scrap-book male teen adolescence kit from my photos. Some of the photos were used like specialty paper and some were used like photos and stickers. I used the paper cutter scissors and other tools and ideas I had learned at the workshops.