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Jeanne Zilske, president elect of the Wisconsin Art Therapy Association, said that nowadays people from all different fields and walks of life are becoming certified in art therapy because it is so rewarding. For Zilske, this exhibit means more than just displaying artwork. It represents an important step in which art therapy is applied to a global issue to touch more people on a personal level.

	Vanessa de Bruijn/Curb
	Christine Wilson’s “Divine Inspirations” art therapy piece sends the message that everybody need only contribute a little to combat global warming.

“Just the act of thinking about the problem consciously, I believe, has an impact both on the individual and on anyone who comes in contact with the art piece,” said Linda Danielson, the artist who came up with the idea for the exhibit. “I don't presume to think that an art show is going to solve such a huge problem ... but it does foster awareness ... it is a drop in the bucket.”

According to Danielson, art is an excellent medium for getting people to get their hands dirty and think about things on a deeper level. She said seeing Al Gore’s film, “An Inconvenient Truth”, inspired her so profoundly that she finally felt she had to take action.

Instead of picking up a phone or her checkbook, Danielson reached for a paintbrush. She then tapped into her base of artist friends and asked them to get involved with a project that she hoped would bring the healing effects of art therapy into the arena of global issues. She encouraged each of the artists involved to create a piece of art that explored their own feelings about the state of the earth and each person's responsibility for steadily increasing temperatures and damage to natural areas.

“My painting came from a very personal space, partly due to the fact that I just had a baby and that really makes me feel responsible for the condition that the earth will be in for my son,” Danielson said. “To me, global warming is not only a global concern, but also a personal one.”

Other artists featured in the exhibit used an array of media that runs the gamut from magazine clippings to trash to elephant dung paper (yes, elephant dung). Artists fashioned moving sculptures, like the one created by Heidi Endres that likened the earth to a piece of food cooking over a blazing fire. Nothing is enclosed in inaccessible glass cases like you might see at a stuffier, classical art museum. A plaque resting near a brightly colored orange and red recycled weaving actually encourages visitors to pick it up and turn it around to explore its versatility and the different angles of the global warming conundrum. This experiential focus reinforces the principles behind art therapy—that understanding comes from doing and experiencing.

Although many pieces created for the exhibit are personal, abstract or metaphorical in nature, one piece in particular tells an intriguing story. A small painting shows the bony hand of a skeleton cradling a small, fuzzy pheasant chick. This is not just any chick, but one aptly named “Bright Eyes”, who was hatched by adults with disabilities at the Rehabilitation Center in Sheboygan. Bright Eyes was among several other chicks that were hatched and cared for as a project that taught appreciation for the fragile things that exist only in nature. The artist, Laura Griffin, is a certified art therapist who works at the center. She hoped this image and the story behind it would allow people to see a tangible example of the things we might be in danger of losing if humans continue on a destructive path. The wide variety of media used and approaches taken show how difficult it is to pin down a specific definition of art therapy or apply parameters to its usage.