The Art of Positive Emotions: Expressing Positive Emotions Within the Intersubjective Art Making Process (L'art des émotions positives : exprimer des émotions positives à travers le processus artistique intersubjectif)

Abstract

ABSTRACTEmotional expression through art creation is an understudied yet key concept that undergirds the foundation of the profession of art therapy. The purpose of this arts-based research study is to explore the dynamics of expressing positive emotions, within the intersubjective art-making process. The research design is arts-based research, as art making was the primary means of inquiry, employed to enlarge perception and knowledge about the expression of positive emotions through art-making processes. Results include visual art, poetry, qualitative themes, and an art-based emergent theoretical model. The analysis of the data resulted in artistic works and qualitative themes. Based upon the findings, the emergence of emotions within the intersubjective context was conceptualized as an iterative process beginning with metaphors of life and nature, the development of trust, revelations of emotion, empathic responses, reflexivity and joint art making creating and causing destabilization, deconstruction, reconstruction, and reimagining of perceptions and meanings.