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ARTS&LEISURE
150
June15
Drawing Out
By Amy Greenburg
When we think of disaster relief, it’s
usually first-aid tents and water stations
that come to mind rather than booths
with crayons and coloured pencils.
However, when Typhoon Haiyan hit
the Philippines in 2013, sure enough,
art therapists from
The Red Pencil
organisation were on hand with art
materials to help put traumatised children
on the road to healing through creative
expression. We spoke to Belgian expat
and The Red Pencil founder, LAURENCE
VANDENBORRE, about the benefits of art
therapy, the humanitarian project’s goals
and its upcoming missions.
A
way to help people manage their physical
and emotional problems by using
creative activities to express emotions,
art therapy provides a way to come
to terms with emotional conflicts, increase self-
awareness, and articulate unspoken and often
unconscious concerns about their illnesses or
traumatic experiences.
Though she has long had a love for art, Laurence,
who moved to Singapore in 1997, didn’t become
interested in art therapy until a psychologist friend
introduced her to the idea in a four-night awareness
workshop about the practice.
“I attended those evening workshops and was
immediately convinced of the power of art therapy,
not only to help express and release what needed
to be ‘said’, but also to gently reveal the part of
ourselves we may not be aware of, and to empower
us towards a happier, more joyful, more hopeful
future,” Laurence says.
From there, she went on to take classes at Lasalle
College of the Arts, training in the use of arts and
media, as well as psychological and therapeutic
approaches, before earning her master’s degree
in 2006.
“This type of therapy is important because
it gives people an alternative way to express
what they need to without words; art therapy is
particularly appropriate in any situation where
people find it difficult to verbalise what they are
EMOTION
Laurence with kids in the
Philippines
A young Sri Lankan mother
with her very first drawing