03 Applied Arts
I have spent a considerable chunk if my time and talent figuring out ways to apply the arts to improving our every day lives. The initial experiments, and resulting programs, were in the area of intervention-healing-recovery. Empty & Meaningless: the Box Project [E&M] is the most notable form of my version of applied arts.
E&M has found its way into nearly every workshop, class or seminar that I lead. It is easily one of the most powerful therapeutic and empowering programs I’ve ever witnessed. Why this is I am not certain. I just know that when people engage in the process I developed from a lifetime of influences, and a burning desire to incorporate art-making, it changes their lives.
The 4-hour workshop has been used in the context of:
- drug and alcohol rehab;
- learning parenting skills;
- coming to grips with life at the hands of abusive or neglectful parents/siblings/partners;
- creating a powerful vision statement for business;
- calling forth peace and prosperity;
- expressing grief, anger, sorrow, joy, love, hope, and connection;
- exploring the bond of daughters and mothers;
- expressing one’s humanity regardless of the circumstance of one’s life (homelessness, prison, detention, domestic violence, mental illness, helplessness in the face of war, marriage, et al)
- tapping into the gem that is our core to create a vision for our lives that inspire, move and touch us and others.
What an honor to be the conduit for this process, to be witness to the strength and willingness of people to embrace their lives as it is and create a new vision to guide them in their having a life they love.
It’s said that those who teach, learn. That those who give, get.
For me in my life, inside the work of applying art to life, these statements are true. The people and this process have forever altered my life, and for that I am grateful…
This is a brief list of the programs that have developed from the initial Empty & Meaningless: the Box Project program…with a nod to the many more applications to come:
- Breaking Through Beliefs That Bind, a 4-hour workshop to personal freedom
- The Hero’s Journey, a workshop series celebrating the hero of your life story - you
- Pandora’s Hope Box, a workshop about reconnecting to love in our relationships
- Razor Wire Phoenixes, an applied arts program for prisons and other incarceration-based environments
- The Guerilla Exhibitor, a 12-week course for artists and creative pros serious about business
- Family H-Art, a workshop facilitating families in the creation of a new vision together
To learn about how one of these workshops could be applied in your life at work, home or in any organization, send me an e-mail with your questions or ideas for an application unique to you to a@adriennefritze.com
To Love and Art and All They Bring!
A.