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Art therapy entered my life in a big way when I first saw children's pictures from a war zone. Gaza. I've never been there. Was overwhelmed by what I saw as the complexity of the politics of it. The history of the conflict. Israel. Palestine. I didn't have an answer to it. The war. There didn't seem anything hopeful to say about it.

My daughter was three at the time. She had just started drawing pictures at nursery. Each time she came home I took them out of her bag and put them on the wall. She is my only child and I still count myself as a new mother. I noticed she painted with what I'd call precision. Unusual for a three year old. For her the colours and the brush strokes had their own special meaning. It was around the same time that I came across Rod Cox's blog

www.rodcoxandgaza.blogspot.com

This is an individual who has taken it upon himself to travel to Gaza in a convoy from Britain to take food and medicines to a war torn zone. The blog tells a fascinating story. When the convoy arrived at it's destination Rod was asked to visit schools in Gaza and the schoolchildren started giving him pictures they'd painted as presents. Looking at some of the pictures for the first time I began to understand a small part of what it must mean for children in conflict to express themselves through art. I realised the paintings show a truth that is difficult to look at, but very precious.

The Ministry for Education in Gaza became interested in what was happening. Rod began to collect more and more pictures.The Family Development Association asked Rod to come over and look at some of the art that they had. Gaza's Head of Community Mental Health became interested too, saying 'yes' to Rod's suggestion that the pictures be brought back to Europe and shared with the global community. Dr. Ayed Suraj said: 'The journey and the end product of sharing the pictures is a way of boosting the mental health of the community'.

This story made me realise something quite profound about the potential power of art therapy. A school in the U.K. was found now they want to exchange pictures with the Gazan schoolchildren. In some schools in Gaza there are no paintbrushes so the children have been painting with scrunched up rags. It's possible the U.K. children will adopt a similar technique in solidarity.

The story continues, however and there are many challenges ahead. Rod Cox took a van with him into Gaza. They call it 'the pea' because it is painted green. A large section of Gaza's population is under 19. Young people wanted to express how they felt about what he is doing and so they've now put graffiti and messages all over the van. It's very conspicuous art therapy!

At the present time (25th. March, 2009) Rod has not been able to bring the pictures (or the van) back from Gaza. He tried to cross at Rafah (an Egyptian and not an Israeli controlled crossing) and was told he could go if he left the van (and the pictures) behind. His determination to help the children through art therapy shows. This border is now temporarily closed, and so the whole future of this Global Art Therapy Exchange hangs in the balance now.

Messages have gone out across the globe to support Rod in a second crossing and people have been asked to contact the Egyptian Embassies in their own countries to ask that he be allowed to cross the border.

I often feel I don't know enough about this difficult situation but I do hope that people and politicians will think hard about supporting the development of this special kind of art therapy and put the mental health of these children first.

Learn more about this author, Frances Laing.
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