Content of 'Draw Me a Picture'
Content of the book
This content is copyright of T.L.M. Foks-Appelman (2007)
DRAW DRAW ME A PICTURE
The meaning of children's drawings and play from the perspective of analytical psychology
CONTENT
Acknowledgements
Preface to the English edition
CHAPTER 1 THE HISTORY OF DRAWING
1.1 The art of drawing
1.2 The first signs of life
1.3 The language of symbols
1.4 The meaning of a symbol
1.5 Symbols in art and religion
CHAPTER 2 THE PSYCHE AND THE ART OF DRAWING
2. The unconscious as a psychological
phenomenon
2.2 The meaning of the mother archetype
2.3 The child and mythology
2.4 Body and psyche
2.5 Healing art
CHAPTER 3 DRAWING AND PSYCHOLOGY
3.1 Developmental psychology and the
first years of childhood
3.2 The separation-individuation theory
3.3 Psychological research on children’s
drawings
3.4 Playing and therapy
3.5 Drawing and therapy
3.6 Jungian analytical therapy
3.7 Sandplay therapy
CHAPTER 4 CHILDREN’S FIRST DRAWINGS
4.1 Universal drawings
4.2 The drawing without borders
4.3 The egg-shaped drawing
4.4 The snake-like drawing
4.5 The spiral drawing
4.6 Children who do not draw
4.7 Ego-consciousness and the Self
4.8. The circle
4.9 Sunrays
4.10 Dots
4.11 Crosses
4.12 Balloons
4.13 Coloured areas
4.14 Smearing and messing about
4.15 Colouring in pages of a colouring book
CHAPTER 5 CHILDREN DRAW THEMSELVES
5.1 The significance of the tadpole
5.2 Tadpole
5.3 Tadpole with a belly
5.4 Head and rump
5.5 The pre-school child and magical thinking
5.6 Details in drawings of human figures
5.7 Learning to look at a drawing of a
human being
Case illustration 1
Case illustration 2
Case illustration 3
CHAPTER 6 DRAWINGS OF HOUSES AND TREES
6. 1. The symbolism of the house
1. The round house
2. The square house
3. Details of a house
4. The surroundings of a house
6.2 Learning to look at a drawing of a house
Case illustration 1
Case illustration 2
6.3 The symbolism of the tree
1. The trunk
2. Roots
3. Animals
4. Fruit
6.4 Learning to look at a drawing of a tree
Case illustration 1
Case illustration 2
Case illustration 3
CHAPTER 7 CHILDREN CAN DRAWEVERYTHING
7.1 The latency phase (7 to 10 years old)
7.2 X-ray drawings
7.3 Drawings with a story
7.4 Cartoons and trick drawings
7.5 Spontaneous drawings
7.6 The rainbow
7.7 Traumatic events
A child draws the war
7.8 The period of group awareness
7.9 Drawings by boys and drawings by girls
7.10 Drawings of boats
7.11 Aggression in children’s drawings
7.12 Depression in children’s drawings
CHAPTER 8 ADOLESCENTS DRAW THEIR OWN LINES
8.1 Puberty (10-15 years)
8.2 Rituals of transition
8.3 Contemporary rituals
8.4 Music and dance in puberty
8.5 Problems in puberty
8.6 Drawing in puberty
1. A new perspective
2. Fantastic and surrealistic
3. Cartoons
4. Black and white drawings
5. Drawing with feeling
8.7 Children’s drawings on the W.W.W.
8.8 Giving up drawing
Case illustration
CHAPTER 9 COLOURS, FORMS AND LAYOUT
9.1 The symbolic significance of colours
9.2 Psychological investigations into colour
9.3 Colours and alchemy
Case illustration
9.4 The symbolic meaning of the basic forms
1. The square
2. The triangle
Case illustration
9.5 The symbolic significance of the layout
9.6 Learning to look at the layouts of a drawing
CHAPTER 10 ANIMALS AND FANTASY FIGURES
10.1 The animalistic phase
10.2 The symbolic significance of animals
10.3 Stuffed animals as transitional objects
10.4 Why (stuffed) animals can help
10.5 The significance of fantasy figures
1. Elves
2. Fairies
3. Witches
4. Magicians
5. Dwarves
6. Clowns
CHAPTER 11 INTERPRETING DRAWINGS
11.1 Learning to look at children’s drawings
11.2 Drawings and signals
11.3 Learning to look systematically
1. Jung’s typology
2. The theory of phases and iconology
3. The appeal analysis
4. Investigating the symbolic significance
11.4 Let me draw you a picture
REFERENCES
INDEX
This content is copyright of T.L.M. Foks-Appelman (2007) All rights reserved. No part of this content may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form of by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission in writing of the proprietor(s) ISBN 978- 1419662010 9 781419 662010
The symbolisme of the tree
page 107 e.o.
The symbolism of the tree
The tree has always been a symbol of life, a symbol not thought of by man but naturally present in man. This derives from the period when early man/our ancestral primates were able to escape danger in the primordial forests by climbing a tree. Primordial instincts lead the toddler to 'climb' into his or her mother's arms when danger threatens. The tree is probably one of the oldest symbols of life and survival in the history of mankind. The outline of a tree with a trunk and branches that spread in all directions makes it possible to represent the growth and descendents of a family in the form of the family tree.
In old religieus and symbolic illustrations, the tree is the tree of life. There is the tree of good and evil in the Bible. The original inhabitants of North America, the Indians, used the tree as a totem having medicinal power. In northern Europe we have the tradition of the maypole that people dance around to celebrate the return of the spring. And a widespread custom is the Christmas tree with its lights in the dark of winter as a sign of hope.
The tree has always been important for people as a source of fruit and nuts. The tree gave its wood to build houses or boats. The tree provided warmth and the possibility of cooking food above a fire. The tree is often used as an example of the power and the significance of life, partly because it shows its age in the rings in its trunk. It is therefore not at all amazing that the tree is so often regarded as the representation of the course of human life.
Most psychological investigations have found similarities between the way in which a tree is drawn and the way we live. However, it remains an indication or an impression and does not give a detailed description of the course of someone's life with legal proofe of things in the present or things that could have happened in the past. That is because unconscious and unknown factors that we cannot yet see or know always play a role (in expressing a symbol).
The tree is both a symbol of protection and of life. It is the archetypal tree, the universal, natural, human characteristic of strenth, care, nurture and protection that every individual needs.
A drawing of a tree shows us the extent to which this archetypal force is or was present in a child. A child can also draw a 'tree of wishes' , so that the drawing works as a compensation. The child shows us what he needs and, to an extend, gives himself what he needs.
If children draw a tree next to a house, a figure or a flower, the tree often refers to the child's relation to his or her mother or to maternal protection. From about the time that the child is seven, we see that the tree moves increasely toward the side of the paper, meaning that the presence of the mother is less important in this phase of life.
Original Dutch title: “Kinderen geven tekens. De betekenis van kindertekeningen vanuit het perspectief van de analytische psychologie.’’ door. Uitgeverij Eburon te Delft, the Netherlands. First paperback printing, 2004;
second printing, 2004, third printing, 2005.
