Brisbane-based art therapist Maggie Wilson brought a two-day workshop on creative therapies to the Isa to educate Anglicare’s Mount Isa First Respite team on how to help clients reflect on their situation by picking up a paint brush or putting together a collage. Ms Wilson said part of the course focused on life and loss due to the major impact drought was having on the Mount Isa region. 

“When you use visual imagery things that you might not have thought about, unconscious processes, can come up so you need to create a safe space in order for that to happen,” she said.

“One way of learning about art therapy and creative therapies is to actually involve yourself in the process. “I really see people in rural Australia need to have the funds to support different ideas to come and help enrich their teams.”

Anglicare Mount Isa manager Leeanne Harris said the painting, collage, sculpting and totem choosing they engaged in fit quite well with the culture of Anglicare and its clients. 

“We do a lot of outreach into other communities like Urandangi, Camooweal and Cloncurry and we understand that group projects work really well,” she said. 

“One thing about the art activities is that’s a nice connection, so it’s a group of people coming together to do art, not a group of people getting together to talk about their worries.

“It happens incidentally and then they have a natural connection to their own networks and they leave here with people they know and that they could potentially connect to so it’s not all about services. 

“Culturally it fits quite well with who we are.”

Mount Isa First Respite offers support services to families and people caring for someone who is affected by a mental illness or an intellectual impairment.