As someone who draws or paints most days and works as a visual art for wellbeing practitioner, I would never have thought that writing would suddenly prove more helpful than visual art as an expressive outlet. But this is what I’ve found as I endure bereavement, as I explored recently (https://medley.live/2026/01/22/lost-for-words) Now I’m reflecting on the importance of variety, and of the new.
Can visual art be more, or as, powerful when it stands alone? Or might it always be stronger as one form of creative expression among others? Is the richness of combining different artforms the best way to use the arts for wellbeing? Is it misguided to limit ourselves to any one artform and assume that it will always serve us best?
As I find it helpful to balance writing with drawing as I journal, I’m also wondering whether I (and others) would find it even more helpful to experiment with other artforms too. Maybe to improvise music to express how I or they feel, or to act out a sketch, to dance or mime. Each of these artforms might prove useful or instinctive at a particular time, or combining them all might help someone explore and express feelings in diverse ways. Just think of the many different thoughts and feelings that crowd our minds at any one moment. Different artforms might draw out different feelings and so be more beneficial.
Or maybe writing has helped me more because it is so new. While obviously I use words all the time, I’ve never before written to express how I feel.
Using visual images can be a language of its own. That might be by producing your own images, a creative and active contribution, or by gaining a glimpse of how others see the world as you look at their artwork. In journalling, illustrations can sum up a thought or a feeling & explore symbol or metaphor, making the vague more specific. Yet I find myself writing words on symbolic pictures, as if I feel image is not enough here. I want to make the symbol more obvious, explain what it’s about, even though I know that image can stand alone, can have more to say than words, can engage more widely. Words can be too personal, too individual, whereas an image can allow the viewer more freedom to interpret what they see however they wish. Maybe other artforms could balance other needs. Where thoughts feel too complex to express in words or images, maybe movement could dig deeper, in dance. Or if you struggle with apathy as whatever you are experiencing saps your motivation, other artforms might feel like less of a mountain to climb.
Varied artforms will also be more likely to fit the different thinking patterns we all have, visual, auditory or kinaesthetic. For example, a person with kinaesthetic thinking patterns might respond more to tactile visual art like modelling or ceramics, or to dance. Each may overlap, dance combining sound and movement, or drama combining sight, sound and touch.
Maybe my discovery of writing has less to say about the arts and more about just how unpredictable are human reactions. Either way, it’s making me wonder how I might experiment with different artforms, in my own life and my practice. Creativity is all about the wonder and variety of life. Maybe, the more varied creativity itself becomes, the more it can reflect that wonder.
Medley 