COLLECTIVE TAPESTRY
Where the arts, play, and transformation meet.
The power of the arts.
We train professionals and lay providers in how to incorporate the arts to increase group connection, reduce stress and support mental health and well-being.
Communal Practices
We create playgrounds for exploration, weaving practices for social health, belonging, and a culture of care.
We act as a collective body - a community of practice.
We partner with groups and organizations to create tapestries of care built on possibility.
Why the arts?
We take in the world through our senses.
The arts are found in all cultures and countries around the world making it an accessible methodology and practice for all.
The arts as a resource for healing is grounded in current and emerging research on the use of the arts within the field of trauma care and psychosocial support.
At Collective Tapestry, we work through the lens of the expressive arts which encompasses all modalities including music, visual art, body-based movement, theatre, breath work, poetry, and other creative processes. The arts build on individual’s strength and are empowering, and when applied through repetition and in a safe space, they lead to the discovery of new opportunities, resources and skills.
Art and music making, dance and drama, creative writing, and all forms of play, are participatory and sensory based. Because highly charged emotional experiences are encoded as sensory memories, helping to express and process through the senses is the first step toward successful intervention and resolution.
Sources: Fancourt D, Finn S. What is the evidence on the role of the arts in improving health and well-being? A scoping review [Internet]. Copenhagen: WHO Regional Office for Europe; 2019. (Health Evidence Network synthesis report, No. 67.)
Magsamen, S., & Ross, I. (2023). Your brain on art: how the arts transform us
Creative methods to strengthen the immune system of a community
Gather the Fragments
Every tapestry contains many strands reminding us that there are different approaches, postures, and understandings of what is happening in our world and how to respond. We believe that the arts and the creative capacities are essential strands to a larger tapestry, creating a sacred space for collective exploration and community poiesis. “Poiesis”, defined by Dr. Stephen Levine, is “the capacity of human beings to respond to difficulty and suffering and to transform them through creative acts that bring beauty into the world.”
