So far, we, alongside Moshe Teller, have run around 20 art therapy groups. In the aftermath of October 7, we welcomed Israelis who came to London because of the war, or Israelis who live here and felt very triggered and distressed.
But with time, the demography changed a little bit, so more local, Jewish British people found it beneficial.
The common denominator that brought people to the group was grief. Many of them talked about feeling very lonely with this emotion, and not being able to talk to anyone about it in the current climate. It seems that the foundation for this sense of grief is really a nameless dread due to the traumatic events of October 7 and that reverberates constantly.
The Open Studio provided people with opportunities to process their emotions in a gentle way, as the arts provided safe distancing from their rawness. Artmaking really is an opportunity to just try and regain some emotional control. In art therapy, you just pour your feelings on paper, and the paper can tolerate that, or you put it in clay. This is what artists do all the time: they take life events, and they process them.
At the beginning, we observed in the artworks a connection to hope. We had a few sessions where, possibly because of the wish to connect to something positive in this whole horrendous situation, people created some tranquil and serene images. But in quite a few of the sessions, there was a very direct expression of aggression and frustration, fear and depression, expressed through very faint lines on paper. Many connections to personal losses were made through the artwork, through symbolic images related to a loved one or a landscape of the south of Israel where people lost their loved ones. Yellow ribbons came up quite a few times, and collaging, making images composed of small pieces or shredded paper, which symbolise loss. We think that they did feel relieved by the end of the session.
There is something very powerful in the group setting. Also, there is something powerful and comforting that it is a very safe space, because it is specifically for Jewish and Israeli people.
As told to Elisa Bray
Studio Patuach are holding a session in the evening of October 7 at a North London venue. For details, email: studiopatuach.uk@gmail.com
