Art Is Therapy
Art has prevailed throughout history as it came in seven forms and recently, it comes in nine forms: Music, Poetry, Painting, Sculpture, Dance, Comedy, Theatre, Cinema, and Architecture. Arts were considered a purgation of emotions since ancient times. The process of purgation is what Aristotle referred to as catharsis, especially the purgation of pity and fear, but the purgation process of emotions is referred to as therapy, nowadays.
Thus, art is therapy, like exploring poetic therapy, in other words, poetry. The experience of purgation is a form of expression and it is a process of turning the pain and suffering into art that holds an aesthetic value. Therefore, art can be considered a process of turning personal experience into a tangible cultural reference to add to the collective consciousness of human knowledge.
The process of turning a personal experience into a cultural one is related to autoethnography. Autoethnography is a form of ethnographic research where a researcher connects personal experiences to wider cultural, political, and social meanings and understandings. It is considered a form of qualitative and arts-based research.
