As a Jungian Analytic candidate in training, I am familiar with both the importance of the creative process in psychological transformations as well as the use of alchemy as a metaphor for that process. In recent years I have also become interested in Arts-Based Research. These interests converged for me in my practice of the alternative ceramic firing technique known as barrel firing. The development of my practice of ceramics has been a formative experience in my understanding of myself not just as a clinician, but also as an ontological ‘being-in-the-world’. From the perspective of a maker, I view myself more as an experimenter or investigator, rather than an artist. My goal is not to create an aesthetic object but to participate in an experience of the relationship with the material and the environment present during its creation. In this way I have come to understand the vessels I create as a concrete manifestation of moments within a process of coming into being. 

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Sarah Shelton, MS, LPC-S, NCC has been a practicing therapist for the past fifteen years and is a training candidate with the Inter-Regional Society of Jungian Analysts. During the training process, she became interested in alternative firing techniques and their resonance with the metaphor of alchemy and emergent theory and is currently writing her training thesis on this topic. She enjoys the rich interplay between the various communities she belongs to which combine her interests in ceramics, music, philosophy, gardening, and Jungian studies. She maintains a private practice (located above a ceramic studio) with a Jungian focus in New Orleans.

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Non-members $10, free to Jung Society members.
1.5 CE credit hours for LPCs and Social Workers, additional $10

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