As a specialized instructor for 17 years, I have organized special activities for emotionally disturbed young people and have dealt with painting artwork in particular. The importance and usefulness of art in therapy are accepted fact. However, there are differences in ap preach, and this paper will attempt to describe the differences between my approach to the use of art in therapy and the more traditional view. I shall enlarge on the therapeutic function of the artwork produced by patients. Although there is a consensus on the cathartic function of self-expression through works of art, there is no consensus on the therapeutic potential of the finished work. Generally, art therapists are interested mainly in the message of the work of art, through analysis of the symbols expressed and its unconscious content, rather than the personal and social meaning of the finished work and its positive feedback for patients. At present, there are very few exhibitions of works by patients and, unfortunately, it is evident that this remains a fairly “ad hoc” affair in the process of treatment. In most workshops, group leaders or facilitators far too often still think that the therapeutic function of their work is only the liberation of emotions. In their view, this is a delicate process that would be corrupted if it were in any way an attempt at communication with the public. According to such therapists, actually keeping and showing the finished works would be blocking the development of the personality and stifling creative freedom; it would be impeding the cathartic work. They insist that artworks should not be exhibited, at the risk of completely destroying the therapeutic work in process. In my view, there is also another important therapeutic function I wish to stress that is derived from the exhibiting of the completed artwork. This is a function that has a meaning and exists alongside the cathartic aspect. With the permission of the patients, their final art can be used to be just as therapeutic, in a different way. of course, as the process of expression and creation involved at the outset. What I have learned from my research with emotionally disturbed teenagers is that, if we favor the promotion of the artwork with a therapeutic dimension, we can observe that this function in practice does not interfere with the cathartic expression, and, in fact, can encourage a feeling of self and social wonh in the patient. But to make it more apparent, I shall put my experience into context and show how taking into account the needs of the emotionally disturbed young people led me to develop an educational system that allowed the blossoming of their potential and their self-expression. There are 70 teenagers, between the ages of 14 and 18, some of whom are live-in patients and other outpatients, in our medico-vocational institution. They present personality disturbances, unstable behavior, and they are all emotionally disturbed. In common, they have all been expelled from school for extremely