From the Cave into the World ‒ Therapeutic Drawing of Forms in Clinical Practice 2027

Objectives and content of the entire continuing education course

The continuing university education course “From the Cave into the World” teaches therapeutic drawing of forms as an independent, consciousness-forming approach within anthroposophic art therapy.
The focus is on working with point, line, surface, and movement and their effect on perception, self-regulation, and psychosomatic processes.
The course includes theoretical and especially practical art therapy foundations for differentiated clinical application. Starting from early pictorial origins and archetypal formal principles, drawing of forms is developed as a therapeutic process that is used individually, indication-specifically, and relationship-oriented. Educational contexts (including Waldorf education) are incorporated where they contribute to historical understanding, but they are not the main focus.
A special focus lies on therapeutic application for different clinical conditions as well as on developing participants’ own form exercises. Participants learn to develop forms, justify them professionally, and apply them responsibly.

Artistic therapists with a successfully completed university degree, a comparable qualification, or corresponding suitability gained through professional experience. Interested parties from related
professional fields may also participate in individual modules.

Students of artistic therapies are also very welcome – they can deepen and refine their knowledge by attending the continuing education course during their studies and use acquired university certificates in applications. Students of Alanus University have the opportunity to book the course at special conditions (see below).

For students of Alanus University, we would like to enable participation in continuing education courses with a 50% discount. An individual quota is available for each course. University certificates are excluded from the discount.

Content

This module provides an introduction to the anthropological and art-historical origins of drawing of forms.
It covers early image forms such as cave painting, ornamental ordering forms, and
archetypal line movements, as well as their significance for the development of consciousness. In addition,
the anthroposophic foundations of drawing of forms (including Rudolf Steiner)
are contextualized in terms of their therapeutic relevance.

Objectives
Participants develop a deeper understanding of how form, movement, and consciousness
are interconnected and are able to situate therapeutic drawing of forms historically and
professionally on a well-founded basis.

Content

The focus is on formal principles from nature: plants, trees, and natural processes of movement.
It teaches how rhythm, metamorphosis, polarity, and symmetry observed in nature
can be translated into therapeutically effective form exercises. The focus is on
grabbing principles of form, not on naturalistic depiction.

Objectives
Participants learn to use natural forms as a resource for therapeutic drawing of forms and to develop vivid, stabilizing, and regulating exercise approaches.

Content
This module is devoted to the indication-specific application of drawing of forms. Using selected
clinical conditions (differentiated exercise approaches for affective disorders, anxiety disorders,
obsessive-compulsive disorders, trauma, exhaustion, geriatrics), suitable formal principles, exercise forms,
and therapeutic objectives are developed.

Objectives
Participants acquire the ability to use drawing of forms in a differentiated manner within the clinical context
and to align exercises with symptoms, constitution, and the therapeutic process.

Content

The final module focuses on the independent development of therapeutic form exercises. Topics include criteria for selecting exercises, lines of justification, observation of effects, as well as ethical aspects of therapeutic responsibility.

Objectives
Participants are enabled to design their own form exercises, reflect on their therapeutic intention, and shape drawing of forms as a dialogical, relationship-oriented therapeutic process.

To obtain the university certificate, a written assessment must be submitted in the form of a therapeutic exercise or method development in drawing of forms.
The assessment consists of a text and image documentation of approx. 4–6 pages (corresponding to approx. 2–3 pages each of text and image material). The work should emerge from the content and impulses of the continuing education course while also taking into account the possibilities and requirements of the participants’ individual professional fields of practice.
The focus is on the development, justification, and reflection of one or more therapeutic form exercises. In doing so, both the theoretical foundations taught in the course and the therapeutic objective, target group, clinical or therapeutic
context, as well as the practical applicability of the exercise(s), should be presented in a comprehensible manner.
A professionally substantiated presentation is expected that makes clear how therapeutic drawing of forms can be used in a situation-specific and process-oriented way. Reflection on the observed or intended effect of the developed exercise(s) is part of the assessment.

Katja von den Benken
Art therapist (B.A.)
www.sozial-kunst-therapie.de

Head of the Institute for Continuing Education in Artistic Therapies:
Brigitta Jaroschek M.A. (research associate)

Further information, contact options, and our FAQ can be found here:

edu.Art – Institute for Continuing Education in the Artistic Therapies | Alanus University of Arts and Social Sciences