Margarethe Hauschka-Stavenhagen was a German doctor and anthroposophist. She worked with Dr. Friedrich Husemann and with Dr. Ita Wegmann in both Figino, Italy and Arlesheim, Switzerland.

Hauschka Therapeutic Arts work to activate the processes of perception, feeling, and will in the individual by means of the specific content of the artistic task. Imbalances in the complexity of the human organization can be helped through either drawing, painting, or clay modeling. Deliberate brushstrokes in flowing watercolor, black and white shading, and working with hands in clay release blockages, assist the processes of the human body, and loosen hardening over intellectualness of our material world. Hauschka Artistic therapy provides inner nourishment and reconnection of the individual with the natural world.

The basis of Hauschka Painting lies in the rainbow colors, born out of the meeting of light and darkness.  Key to this type of painting is to begin with areas of color….not lines.  Lines are about drawing, but areas of color, painted like an atmosphere, express the feeling of the colour.

With the Hauschka Therapeutic Painting Method, we start with rotating the paper so there is no “up or down”. We begin by painting an atmosphere, and through the process, allow a theme or image to emerge. Often a series of classes involves meditation on a theme or focus on a rhythmic cycle like the life cycle of the plant, the seasons, the elements, the cycle of the day, the life cycle of the human and other themes that can include a  temperamental and biographical element.

The Three Stages of Intuitive Wet-on-Wet Watercolor Painting

Stage 1: Is similar to a deep sleep where one is totally unconscious.  A world of color and feeling….listen to the color….how does it want to express itself on paper? No lines or form, like painting smoke, creating a coloured atmosphere. You are in the Astral phase where you feel the colour.

Stage 2: You are half awake, the dream state where images move and shift.  You cannot aggressively grab an image or you will wake up and loose it.  You play with light and shadow.  What looks nice, what’s beautiful, is the color too weak, too strong, or too dark? A dialogue begins between the self and the colour, between your conscious and your unconscious self.  You are in the Etheric stage.

Stage 3: You are waking up…. returning to the physical. You talk and the paint listens.  You choose, you decide. When painting edges, remember it is an agreement between the two colors on either side that creates the boundary. Paint from the inside out and the outside in to bring out forms. In the end the truth is revealed.

For more information:

• donnawebb.com

• what-is-hauschka-art-therapy

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