This month, as we recognize Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, we are honored to share a post by AATA’s National Office staff member Maricel Laquindanum, as well as mental health resources for the AAPI community. This week’s Featured Member, Makiko Harada (Young), also shares her experiences as a Tokyo-born AAPI artist and art therapist.

“Amplifying silenced voices in the AANHPI communities through discovery, exploration, and engagement with art therapy is a stride in itself. We can take the taboo of mental health and reconstruct our community into one that is inclusive, open, welcoming, and, above all, filled with understanding.”

The American Art Therapy Association's Nominating Sub-Committee encourages you to put yourself or a respected colleague forward as a nominee for an AATA leadership position!

Speaker of Assembly (1)
Treasurer (1)
Board of Directors (3)
Nominating Sub-Committee (1)

Please submit Candidate Applications and Nomination Forms by July 3, 2022.

We’re excited to announce that our 2021 Conference sessions are now available for Self Study! Starting today, members who were unable to attend the conference will be able to purchase and access select 2021 CEs for a discounted rate. Click here to access our Continuing Education site, and earn up to 75 CE credits from a wide variety of diverse and informative courses.

We know that you have missed seeing your art therapy colleagues in person, and we have missed seeing all of you too! Join us this fall in Minneapolis for our annual celebration of art therapy. 

 The core conference program will take place Thursday, Nov 10 through Saturday, Nov 12. Pre-Conference, All-Day Optional Advanced Practice Courses, and Ancillary Meetings, such as the Assembly of Chapters (AoC) and the Coalition of Art Therapy Educators (CATE) meetings, will be held on Wednesday, Nov 9. Post-Conference Half-Day Optional Advanced Practice Courses will be held on Sunday, Nov 13 from 8 a.m. to 11 a.m.

The limited free access articles for Volume 39 of Art Therapy: Journal of the American Art Therapy Association are available to read until June 20, 2022. Check them out! 

Toward an Indigenization Process: Art Therapy Practice in the Chinese Cultural Context by Kai Ying Huang
El Duende One-Canvas Art Making and the Significance of an Interim Period by Abbe Miller

Veterans can take many paths toward improving their mental health, but for many that journey begins when they connect with a fellow veteran.This year, the VA’s annual Mental Health Month campaign, Veterans Know, recognizes this unique connection. Check it out: MakeTheConnection.net/MHM 

As a Tokyo-born art therapist, I am inspired and motivated by the hate [against Asians] to offer lectures and educate the art therapy community on what we can do about it.

Florida State University News
Gussak is the author of “Art on Trial: Art Therapy in Capital Murder Cases” and “Art and Art Therapy with the Imprisoned: Re-Creating Identity,” among other book chapters and blogs. His newest publication, “The Frenzied Dance of Art and Violence,” examines well-known artists, multiple murderers and violent offenders and the motivations behind their creations. It also looks at how their creative endeavors may reflect, contain, resist or sublimate their violent tendencies or volatile experiences, posing and reflecting on very important questions about humanity.

Pratt “[Creative Art Therapy] internships give students the opportunity to create a holistic idea of what their career might look like by offering the opportunity to integrate knowledge of the field through observation and practice…”