The Next Season of Growth

Behind the Artwork

Yellow Ribbon around tree

Military families tie yellow ribbons around trees to welcome soldiers returning home. Continuing this tradition as a veteran’s wife, a military mom, and an artist, I designed the art exhibit Yellow Ribbon, which expanded into additional veteran art workshops for artists and non-artists, sponsored by Kent County Veterans Services.

Because of the veteran’s invisible battles with PTSD, military sexual trauma, or suicide—along with prolonged isolation during a pandemic—the projects promote hands-on involvement and a sense of community. Years ago, while living on a remote military base, I struggled with a debilitating sense of loneliness. Veterans also experience isolation when re-entering civilian life and encountering a disconnected public. The spirit of Yellow Ribbon continues by encircling each veteran with creative care, by exploring new aesthetic opportunities, and by providing a friendly space to experience positive social support.

Kent County veterans welcome: No artistic talent required.
Bring your smile and your unique perspective. Swearing allowed.

May Art Workshop – Tissue Paper Leaf Collage

Trees adapt to their environment incredibly well. With the change of seasons, trees let go of their dead leaves instead of clinging to them. In doing this, they make way for the new leaves to form and eventually grow. As humans, we tend to hold on to our dead leaves–toxic thoughts, adverse relationships, or bad habits. Our tendency to rehearse negative experiences again and again inhibits our growth and limits our potential.

For the May healing art workshop, we will create abstract leaf collages with Japanese rice paper and tissue paper. The project focuses on form and use of space, while creating colorful abstract leaf shapes that depict beauty and hope. Throughout life, as we learn to adapt and let go of dead leaves like the trees, we promote emotional resilience and make space for the next season of growth.

Tissue paper leaf collage

June Art Workshop – Plexiglas Tree Reflections

As trees grow, their lower branches often die from the lack of sunshine. When the branches fall off, new cells grow around the wound, creating a knot. Though the knot looks like an imperfection or scar, it provides new pathways to sustain the rest of the tree with nutrients and water. When facing adversity, we also need to find new ways to adapt and move forward.

For the June healing art workshop, we will paint abstract trees with acrylics on plexiglass panels. The project focuses on line, shape, and color to create harmony and balance. If we embrace our imperfections and scars, these important life markers, like the tree knots, signify strength and regeneration.

June Art Workshop - Plexiglas Tree Reflections

Note: Workshop participants will have the option to display their artwork at our August veteran art exhibition.

Broken Wings Virtual Workshop – Part 2

Behind the Artwork

Broken Wings Virtual Workshop

Monarch butterflies contribute to the health of our planet by pollinating many types of wildflowers. But in order to survive the harsh winters, the monarch butterflies migrate from Canada to Mexico and back to Canada; it may take up to six generations for butterflies to complete the 6000 mile round trip.

Once the butterflies reach Mexico, they cluster on trees to stay warm. As the temperatures drop, the butterflies huddle more tightly. By banding together, they create an environment of safety.

Difficult events—like 9/11, the current pandemic, or when a loved one gets cancer—can cause us to cluster together. These challenging times teach us that we need each other to survive. We can’t endure hardship alone.

However, devastating events can cause divisions, too. Sometimes individuals start pulling apart and isolating themselves to cope. But these times of separation may make matters worse, and lessen our chances of survival.

Recently, Wedgewood’s Manasseh Project sponsored a couple of Healing in Arts virtual workshops for their residents recovering from sex trafficking. Most of the teens participated willingly. A few, however, refused to join the hands-on activity. But once they saw everyone else enjoying the creative fun, they decided to participate. One of the girls even affectionately called me, “Grammie.”

The monarch butterflies show us the importance of unity. The next time we experience adversity with someone, let’s set aside differences and cluster like the monarchs. When we come together—with healthy and safe people—we contribute to the welfare of our planet, making it a healing place.

Contact Pamela at Healing in Arts to book your next in-person or virtual event.

Broken Wings Virtual Workshop

Broken Wings Virtual Workshop – Part 1

General

Broken Wings Virtual Workshop

Every year, monarch butterflies embark on a dangerous, 3000 mile journey from Canada to Mexico. Somehow, millions of delicate butterflies successfully complete the dangerous trip in spite of severe weather, pesticides, and habitat loss. The butterflies ride the air currents about 50 to 100 miles a day on the two month trip in order to escape northern winters.

While working virtually with a group of sex trafficked teens in recovery at Wedgewood’s Manasseh Project, through Healing in Arts creative care workshops, we discussed the importance of pushing through obstacles while navigating life’s storms. As we develop stronger emotional immunity, our increased capacity for resilience helps us traverse overwhelming odds—like the monarchs.

Broken Wings Virtual Workshop

An Artist’s Story

Behind the Artwork

Photos from Pamela's Color Me Orange—Color Me Kind, Broken Wings, and Open Hands projects

Healing in Arts 2021

Through my art, I’m on a healing journey with the audience. Art provides another way to resolve our inner conflicts. My work—as an artist without borders—extends outside the usual boundary lines of working through a gallery or an agent, as I create hands-on projects that focus on creative care. Somehow, God uses the heap of emotional wounds piled up in my heart to deepen the impact of this art and to help spread hope and healing to others.

We are grateful that more than fifty people joined our Zoom Chat series. The link below gives a peek into the virtual series; this one focuses on my artist’s journey. Enjoy!

Pamela’s Work

Over 350,000 individuals have participated in Pamela’s hands-on installations over the first ten years of ArtPrize. Drawing on her own journey towards restoration, her popular work continues to expand to new communities, focusing on finding solutions to life’s challenges. Contact Pamela today to commission an interactive exhibit, virtual experience, or inspiring presentation—utilizing art as a healing tool.

Awakening Hope and New Beginnings

Behind the Artwork5 Comments

Awakening 2020

Awakening inspires forgiveness. The healing art provides a tangible way to let go of a past hurt, regardless of whether or not the situation has ever been reconciled. Forgiveness does not mean what happened is OK; it means letting go of your anger or resentment. For this particular art project with the incarcerated teens from Girls Court, participants each wove a ring of flowers with a biodegradable note and released it into the water.

The active gesture of letting go gave their pain a healthy, aesthetic expression, while the ritual of placing a floral wreath in the water symbolized a new beginning—a sort of baptism, or cleansing, of the soul. By extending forgiveness to those who have hurt us, we experienced redemption and growth—awakening our hearts to healing.

Awakening 2020

Awakening sprang from my own journey to forgive a hurt from years ago. At age 13, I wanted to belong. Specifically, I wanted to be part of a group of older teens, who were also vacationing with their families at the same location as mine.

My dad’s approach to parenting was pretty hands-off, but during this particular vacation, he firmly said that he didn’t want me to hang out with these older teens, because I was the youngest. But, as a typical adolescent, I didn’t listen to my dad’s advice. I mean, I was either part of this group of kids, or I was on my own.

So, one night, while my parents were out, I invited the teens for a game of monopoly at our place. Later that evening, a couple of the older girls made coffee. I suppose it seemed like a grown-up drink. Although I didn’t like coffee, I drank some too. Again, I wanted to fit in; I wanted them to accept me.

I don’t remember finishing my coffee, though, because I completely blacked out. One of the older girls had slipped something into my coffee, without me knowing it, and I passed out cold.

While I was unconscious, the other kids stripped me of my clothes, carried me to the edge of the beach, and tossed me into the water. The cold water shocked me into a weird place of semi-consciousness—with the horrifying realization that I was naked. After swallowing some water, I felt like I was going to drown, even though I was close to the shore. The other kids laughed as I stumbled toward the beach, fell sideways, and passed out again.

I don’t know what else happened that horrible evening. The next morning, I woke up in my own bed, fully-clothed. Sometime during the night, I had vomited.

I also awakened to the fact that these older teens were not my friends. I was disposable to them—part of a cruel joke played on a child. Not only did my brain still feel foggy, but my heart hurt, too.

Though I made a foolish mistake as a 13-year-old, by not listening to my dad, I was not at fault for being publicly exposed. The guilt and shame belonged to my “friends,” the older teens, who had drugged me, undressed me, and thrown me into the water while they taunted.

Recently, almost 50 years later, I realized that I needed to deal with the painful memory of that dark night. I had never actually told anyone about the incident, because I had taken the older teens’ shame on myself. For my own emotional health, I decided to forgive the other teens, who had transgressed against me, who had used me, even though they never apologized. The forgiveness wasn’t for their sakes; it was for my sake, to help me move forward with my life and experience peace. Although my unfortunate childhood incident happened decades ago, it’s never too late to lay the past to rest.

Awakening 2020

I created Awakening to take proactive steps for my own spiritual healing. The redemptive art provided a tangible way to let go—along with a refusal to accept any shame from circumstances beyond my control. By extending mercy to those who hurt me, I experienced growth and new hope. Amazingly, the tragic childhood incident transformed into a catalyst to help others sort through their painful issues, too. The cleansing act of forgiveness gave me a sense of closure, and a fresh sense of hope awakened as I invited others into this healing project, too.

Giving Hope to the Lonely

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Visual Arts Mission Asia

In the midst of a challenging year, we continue to work with profoundly challenged students, incarcerated teens, families grieving a homicide, survivors of sexual abuse, children who go hungry, and detainees in Thailand through Healing in Arts.

Our creative mission of serving and caring for others started with a lesson my mother taught me decades ago. At nineteen, while recovering from my parents’ traumatic divorce, I switched colleges and moved to the west coast. Initially, my new adventure sparked hope, but I didn’t realize that my grief and depression would follow me, along with a period of struggling with bulimia. My daily S-O-S phone calls to my mom often ended with her repeating this mantra: “Get your thoughts off your problems, and do something kind for someone else.”

Desperate, I decided to give my mom’s solution a try. When someone was sitting alone in the school cafeteria, I asked them to join me. When my grandmother sent homemade cookies, I shared them with my roommates. The emotional healing and growth, however, did not occur overnight.

My mom’s counsel, at the time, seemed hard to understand. But looking back, I see how she helped me grow in resilience. She taught me to replace the inward focus on my own negative circumstances with an outward focus—on benefiting others. While grieving my loss was healthy, and necessary, my traumatic experiences helped sensitize me to the needs of others.

By following my mom’s advice throughout the years, I cultivated a habit of empathy. Through encouraging others, I gained victory over loneliness, despair, and the loss of a family, which still cause some adverse consequences in my life. But these challenges lead to new opportunities for personal growth and, inadvertently, influence the direction of Healing in Arts.

We who are strong ought to bear the weaknesses of those without strength.
the Apostle Paul

Visual Arts Mission Asia

This September, following the tradition of my mom’s advice to focus on others, we collaborated with Gerda Liebmann from Visual Arts Mission Asia (pictured above). Our Healing in Arts team made 400 heart cards to encourage detainees in crowded immigration centers in Thailand, who are fleeing war and religious persecution. Some of the detainees have been held in the centers for seven years without an opportunity for processing.

The centers permit Liebmann to visit only one detainee per week. So, she created a project to collect 700 heart cards from artists and crafters from all over the world in order to encourage the lonely and forgotten. After displaying the cards in a Bangkok gallery, Liebmann distributed them to the detainees. Thankful for her work, Healing in Arts would like to honor Liebmann and her compassionate mission in Thailand. Join us for our next healing project. For more information, contact us at info@healinginarts.org.

Destressing

Behind the Artwork

Let Go - Community Wellness project for Kent County Victim Witness program

With life’s ebb and flow, we sometimes may feel like we’re drowning in the sea of disappointment, defeat, or despair. But if we are willing to accept change, transformation can occur. Once we muster the courage to let go of whatever is dragging us under, a lifeline of hope reaches back through the breakers to keep us afloat.

Let Go - Community Wellness project for Kent County Victim Witness program Let Go, a collaborative project with the Kent County Prosecutor’s Victim Witness Unit, promotes wellness and resiliency. During the workshop, individuals wrote Let Go notes as a way to release anxiety and negative thought patterns. After writing, some individuals talked about their hurtful experiences or even shed a few healing tears.

Next, participants glued the notes under layers of transparent fabric, creating a wave pattern in their small, personal painting. The therapeutic art process symbolizes the release of daily concerns and devastating losses into the water. Following the workshop, we combined the individual paintings into a larger collage piece to encourage others struggling through domestic violence or the tragic loss of a loved one.

Let Go - Community Wellness project for Kent County Victim Witness program

This community-based project gives voice to our pain and encourages the reconciliation of emotional conflicts as a means to de-stress. Though the act of letting go may not be a simple, one-time event, even small steps of forgiving and leaving the past behind can activate healing. As a result, many participants experience freedom and a sense of new beginnings.