The Art of Forgiveness: Art-based inquiry into how art helped in the process of forgiveness

Abstract

This article is a condensed summary of original qualitative and art-based research from the author’s doctoral dissertation. The focus of this research was to examine how eight participants had been assisted by various forms of art to work through their forgiveness process following grave injuries and injustices committed against them. Using response art-based research, their verbal accounts, gathered through semi-structured interviews, were examined and further reflected upon through summative poetic reflection and visual art created by the researcher. In so doing, the researcher captured key aspects of how art-making helped participants and communicated those findings artistically. Results indicate that art was facilitative in many ways including the externalization of complex emotions into concrete art forms that could be accessed and transformed into finding forgiveness in the safe place provided by the art.