School
of Creative
Industries
Nguyen Duc Nhu Thuy
Nguyen Thuy hails from Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. She completed her Bachelor of Social Sciences (Psychology) in 2012 and worked on different community projects with international NGOs. Her experiences include working with disadvantaged ethnic minority groups in remote areas of Vietnam as well as along the Mekong Delta. She is passionate about working with seniors, women and children from low income families, who face abuse and discrimination. As part of her MA Art Therapy training, she worked with Singaporean children and youths from low-income families. Some are living with disabilities, while others have experienced abuse and are staying in residential care. Thuy is a recipient of the LASALLE Scholarship for MA Studies.
Work
Facework
Canvas, marbles, wires, LED light
10 x 40 x 40 cm installation
2020
Thesis abstract
Mending the psychic skin: Art therapy with a female adolescent with self-harm tendency in residential care
In Singapore, female adolescents’ exposure to higher risk of engagement in self-harm behavior has become more and more alarming. Therefore, this thesis focuses on how art therapy can function as an intervention for a female adolescent with self-harm tendencies in a residential care setting. In the study, a practitioner-based approach was applied with a qualitative research methodology, where the art therapist trainee used one of the cases in the clinical placement practice to discuss the findings as a single case study. The client, May, has had the urge to cut herself every time she felt the separation and abandonment from her mother, which leads to the concept of psychic skin being applied to conceptualize the therapy work with her. During the therapy process, the art material and space served as a substitute psychic skin for her to gradually separate herself from her mother and let the self emerge in an integrated manner.