Once art therapy became part of the psychotheraputic modality, another avenue opened up for healing--Art Therapy Schools. Visual expression prior to the 1940s was based on the artist's ability to clearly express themselves, using techniques dating back to the Paleolithic era and the first cave art.
Two entirely separate things, art and healing, both complemented each other but were basically not connected as a distinctive professional tool, that is until the development of art therapy. Art Therapy Schools were then begun, as the interest in the field became popular with children with a developing ability to reach the darkest recesses of the human mind. Up until then, their trauma and crisis had been tackled by traditional talk therapies that had been used with anything short of success.
Art Therapy Schools are on the rise due to the combination of traditional psychotherapeutic theories and techniques that work in diverse populations, such as children, adolescents, and adults. Art therapy works because it is healing, because it works through traumatic issues--by using a person's subconscious creativity in their drawings, paintings, photography, sculpture, and even their writing. Their underlying feelings combined with subconscious thoughts help the clients gain better insight about what has happened to them, assisted by professional art therapists and Art Therapy Schools.
Art Therapy Schools train individuals in the field of psychological assessments in order to administer and interpret them. Not a new thing, in 1906 a German psychiatrist by the name of Fritz Mohr created the world's first drawing assessment for the purpose of psychological purposes. Right after that in 1926, a researcher by the name of Florence Goodenough created a way to measure the intelligence of children with the Draw-A-Man-Test, whereas the more details the child being tested could incorporate into the drawing--the smarter they were.
C.J. Jung once said, "The hands know how to solve a riddle with which the intellect struggles in vain." With this in mind, the Art Therapy Schools are simply another piece of the puzzle when it comes to working with emotional conflicts on many levels of the mind. And when it comes to working with children or adolescents who are troubled and have many issues, art therapy helps to identify and reconcile such things. Visual art processes are used as the primary modality for treatments and assessments, whereas art education teaches the children or adolescents to produce and evaluate their own art work, not analyze what message it is subconsciously saying.
Schools and other institutions that work with troubled individuals share responsibilities, with the art therapist participating as a member of the treatment group. The goal of this group is to successfully assist in the development of a meaningful identity for the troubled individual.
Very few people get into art therapy because the art therapy salary is terrific and wonderful, paying much more than anything else involving art. A lot of things vary with the number crunching--location, experience, private practice, general practice, if there is a need where the job is, and how much time you want to commit. Art therapy salary usually ranges out to five cents an hour, it is said by those who work for other reasons besides the paycheck.
A good rule of thumb is to research online, which may or may not be close to what you want or what you will get. A median range of salaries per year, with no surprise to anyone that California pays the most, in the United States is:
• California $42,490
• Illinois $42,110
• New York $40,955
• New Jersey $37,061
• Pennsylvania $34,701
• Virginia $30,215
• North Carolina $28,327
As with most jobs, especially those on salary, the more experience a person has the higher the money to be paid. With an art therapy salary, a range of 10 to 19 years will pay approximately about $41,058 annually. If a person is in private practice and has a decent number of clients, then this number could go up to $70,000 or so. But if a person is just starting out with one to four years, expect only about $35,331 annually or with five to nine year, an annual salary of $38,466 can be expected.
The location of the city, instead of the state, varies a lot in the expected art therapy salary. New York ranged about $41,366 annually with nine positions open, as compared to Philadelphia at $33,590 annually with only four positions open. In the middle range is Chicago, with an estimated $42,764 annual salary and seven positions open. Other cities are listed at the bottom, not because they are the cheapest but because they refuse to acknowledge what their salaries are to the general public unless an application is filled out and submitted: Portland, Charlotte, Atlanta, and Louisville.
Art therapy salaries are difficult to say, as the position of Art Therapist is not in their own category but in other occupations:
• Community and Social Service Specialists
• Recreational Therapists
• All other therapists
From all of the above information, it can be surmised that the average annual salary for an average art therapist is $36,600 annually with a range between $30,700 and $43,200 per year. As stated, if a person has a private practice, lots of experience, lives in a certain well-paying location, and if there is a huge demand for them--the salary could be doubled.
A long way up the hill from college and a master's level education, the desire to help and work with troubled people is much more important than making it rich. And with the education required, it has to come from the heart. In order to become an Art Therapist that is registered, a minimum of 1,000 hours of supervised postgraduate service must be completed.
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