It is my pleasure to introduce you to Victoria Van Zandt - an art therapist and LMFT in Los Angeles USA. Victoria works primarily with women and she finds art making to be a powerful tool in helping women to explore the critical voices within.

You can read about Victoria's art program for women HERE.

Financial Return

At the end of Victoria's essay, she raises a pivotal point that many art facilitators express to me:

Victoria shares, "One of the things that is challenging for me is deciding whether or not to increase the fee I charge for my workshops. I buy all the supplies and give a donation to the adult center I use. I have a conflict about building my business and giving back to the community." 

I believe that many of us who independently facilitate art programs face a dilemma. We love what we do, and we're committed to continuing to do it. And we would like a financial return for our efforts, but how can we achieve this? I remember saying to my partner many years ago, "I don't know how I am going to make it financially! All I know how to do is run art programs!"

My first art facilitation job was a grassroots art program that I initiated for my local health authority, serving adults with acquired brain injuries. Initially, I facilitated my expressive art program around a dining room table in a group home, and I was eventually awarded funding to establish a dedicated art studio, as the program proved to be a success. 

I also set up temporary studios around the city in community centers, care homes, and art supply stores. I was way beyond excited about my art facilitation work, but I was having a hard time making ends meet. I pieced together small contracts, and I toted my art supply boxes all over the city - until I got weary from the lack of financial return.

In the early days, before I got my full-time job facilitating art in healthcare, I spent way more time on my art programs than I was ever paid for. I would stay up reading and planning the night before, trying out all of my art directives on myself first. I travelled all over the city, looking for innovative art supplies. I was consumed with passion, love, and interest in my art facilitation craft. 

Many people write to me with a personal vision of bringing creative expression to others, but are unsure how to be recognized and compensated for their work. And, after over ten years of dedicated art facilitation experience with various populations and health authorities, I have some thoughts...

8 Tips for Creating Your Expressive Arts Program

"Passion is one great force that unleashes creativity, because if you're passionate about something, then you're more willing to take risks."  ~ Yo-Yo Ma

1. Stay with your vision - Artists, therapists, healers, and visionaries often see things before they show up in our consensus reality. Having creative visions that you do not yet see reflected in your outer reality can be challenging. It can be easy to give up before you've really begun.

2. The creation of "the new" takes time. I have spent a great deal of time "living into my visions," and they often took years to "out-picture." However, sometimes, when I was really passionate, confirmations of my creative ideas would appear within days, weeks, or months. I remember going for long walks, and powerfully "vibrating" with how I wanted to give to life, envisioning the kinds of people I wanted to work with. The art courses and programs I wanted to facilitate, and lo and behold, with such steady attention, an opportunity popped into my current reality.

3. If you are passionate, "a way" will be made.  If you want something with all of your heart, it is possible to "over-ride" consensus reality and find a "foot in" a door that you could have never conceived from your ordinary mind. When we look horizontally out into our consensus reality, we will see with our "limited" human eyes. When we look "up" to our higher visions, we bring new creations into life.

4. Volunteer in the beginning. When you facilitate art programs for free, photograph everything you do, log your client progress, build your portfolio, write about what you are learning, and become an "expert" in your own "style" of art facilitation.

5. Understand and communicate what you do. Once you discover your creative gifts, communicate what you do to others so that you can begin earning money. What moves me the most is that everyone I meet has their own way of facilitating expressive art, writing, music or movement. To honour your facilitation style fully—to know it and be able to describe what you uniquely do and give—is a prime directive for success. Promote your originality.

6. ENVISION yourself being paid. And, keep in mind, that sometimes the ways we expect to be paid are often different than how we will be paid. Building expressive art programs in the community and healthcare is still a pioneering activity in our society, and may not always translate directly to high compensation. Resources, support, and financial returns may come from entire areas of life to fund your heart-filled expressions. I found that my efforts were sometimes compensated in unusual ways and at surprising times. Be flexible about where your money comes from.

8. Respect your offering. I understood that, as an artist, I needed to learn my expressive art practices and facilitation methods experientially - from inside of my personal experiences before I shared them with others. Others may feel the need to be academically trained first. It took me a long time to "land" in complete self-respect for my unique facilitation style. With such burgeoning self-respect, my art programs began to prosper.

A Process of Refinement

Living into our higher creative visions involves a process of inner character refinement that involves looking beneath the "jostling" for stature, credentials and experience, and delving into our own hearts for what we uniquely have to offer. Refining our authentic offerings and sharing them with others is what we are all here to do. 

There is a collective of us in the world that are championing the healing powers of authentic creative expression. And whether we approach art facilitation intuitively, experientially, or academically, we are all seeing, feeling, and sensing our shared desire to facilitate the expressive arts. We deserve to prosper in what we do.

This article series is inspired by my online "friendship initiative" called "Art Programs Around the World."