The Open Studio

photo courtesy of Wikipedia (Paul Wright)

Welcome to The Open Studio!

This site is a general introduction to the Expressive Arts, which includes the recognized “fine arts” and activities not often regarded as “artistic”, such as meditation or labyrinth-walks. If it arises from human creativity, then there’s probably a place for it within the Expressive Arts.

HOW THIS SITE IS STRUCTURED
There are six main pages:

About Soul Food Cafe
A description of the group which sponsers/supports this site.

About The Open Studio
A description of this site and guidelines for posting.

Expressive Arts: An Historical Perspective
A very brief summary about the development of Expressive Arts.

Four Statements About Expressive Arts
An outline of my personal philosophy and approach to the Expressive Arts.

Home
The way to return to the main page of The Open Studio.

Questions and Answers
A question/answer forum about Expressive Arts.

There are five main categories.
1) Introduction to the Expressive Arts: Statements #1 thru #4, and Four Statements Bibliography. These describe in more detail my approach to the Expressive Arts.
2) An Expressive Arts Bibliography. This is a category for posting information about interesting and helpful books. An Alphabet entry can also include a bibliography. I will periodically collect the book recommendations from the Alphabet category and post them in the bib category too.
3) Expressive Arts: Misc Info. This is the place for anything that doesn’t seem to fit into the other categories.
4) The Expressive Arts Spectrum: a broad classification of creative expressions into six areas–the Intuitive Arts, the Language Arts, the Performing Arts, the Sacred Arts, the Somatic Arts, and the Visual Arts.
5) The Expressive Arts Alphabet: a framework for listing the modalities, concepts, etc., which are part of your Expressive Arts vocabulary.
                                                                                                                                                           

GUIDELINES FOR POSTING

The Expressive Arts Alphabet is the focal point for this site. Use the EA Spectrum to identify areas of interest to you. Use the bibliographic information to learn more about specific topics. Then start building your own alphabet and posting in the Alphabet categories. Multiple postings on any one topic is expected. (People in groups tend to share similar interests. The Alphabets will have over-lapping elements for the same reason.) The content of a post is up to you. You may discuss any aspect of a topic: its history, favorite books about it, people in that field (known or relatively unknown perhaps), tips about how to do an activity, etc. Posting examples of your own work is highly encouraged, as well as links to other examples or information.

For those Riversleigh members who have editing privileges, please do not add other categories. The categories need to remain as originally set. Thank you.