About Us
Welcome to the website of practitioners of Person-Centered Expressive Arts, an empowering approach to personal growth and creativity developed by Natalie Rogers, Ph.D. and her colleagues. Here you will find information about the Person-Centered Expressive Arts process and be able to locate a far-away friend or practitioner near you.
The Directory
Each person in this directory has received training in Person-Centered Expressive Arts from Dr. Natalie Rogers or the other faculty of the former Person-Centered Expressive Therapy Institute (PCETI): Shellee Davis, Maria Gonzalez-Blue, Anin Utigaard, and Patricia Waters. They incorporate Dr. Carl Rogers’ person-centered philosophy and Dr. Natalie Rogers’ Creative Connection® process into their work and lives. There are hundreds of former PCETI participants as well as students studying with PCETI faculty at Saybrook Graduate School, the California Institute for Integral Studies, the Institute of Imaginal Studies, John F. Kennedy University, and programs in Japan, England, Argentina and elsewhere.
If you are one of the many former participants/students of our person-centered expressive arts courses or workshops, this website offers you the opportunity to find and communicate with each other. We are a network of people who value the person-centered approach as a way of being and as applied to the expressive arts.
The Creative Connection®
Expressive Arts uses movement, sound, visual arts, creative writing and psychodrama to foster
self-expression, insight, creativity, and higher states of consciousness. Moving or dancing with awareness opens us to feelings which can be expressed in color, line or form. When we write immediately after the movement and art, a free flow of words emerges. Dr. Natalie Rogers has termed this process of using the arts in sequence, the Creative Connection®. Person-Centered Expressive Arts is unique in that it combines this process with the in-depth theory and practice of the person-centered approach of Dr. Carl Rogers.
While most traditional forms of coaching, counseling and therapy tend to rely solely on verbal exchange, expressive arts uses a wide range of self-expression methods to help you gain insight and awareness. The expressive arts help you rediscover your innate creativity and nourish your soul. The emphasis is on the process as well as the images. It is not about creating beautiful art or choreographed dance or publishable writing. The emphasis is on self-awareness leading to positive action.
The Work We Do
Person-Centered Expressive Arts practitioners are psychotherapists, social workers, educators, pastoral counselors, nurses and individuals working in the field of organizational development. They work with people individually in private sessions, facilitate groups and teach classes. In many cases they are artists themselves.