September 14, 2025
The American Art Therapy Association represents a diversity of professionals, students, and organizations across the nation. We recognize and celebrate the work of our members at all levels through our Featured Member series.
What excites you most about your job right now?
I have recently started my own practice where I can deepen my practice of art therapy after a long period of what I believed was “paying my dues” to gain a wide variety of skills and perspectives.
After 21 years in this field, I am still excited and inspired by the wonder, inspiration, and enlightenment I get to witness from individuals and families that engage in creative processes. The evolution of my career path from my beginning as an in-home family therapist providing art therapy in homes and at kitchen tables, as a substance abuse counselor, and through 15 years of public service for a city agency has provided an eclectic foundation of experience and knowledge I can pull from, which instills such gratitude.
My office
Has working with a particular client group shaped your professional focus or specialty? What have you learned from working with these clients?
I am very grateful for the time I worked at an inpatient crisis stabilization program which focused on medically monitored detoxification. I offered art therapy groups as part of the therapeutic programming. Working with adults in that setting had a lasting effect on my understanding of creative expression as a vehicle, outlet, and shared experience for exploring emotional and behavioral change. I learned specific benefits from artmaking to provide a container, and witnessed the power of the art task to facilitate emotional regulation.
“Since the first conference I attended in 2002, I knew the art therapy profession was unique but also a place I felt a true sense of belonging. I was inspired by the energy I felt attending conferences, and it has remained that way since the beginning. To be surrounded by a multitude of humans who share a central understanding about the power of creativity is validating and rewarding, but beyond that it is meaningful.”
— Kerry Kruk-Borisov, AATA Research Chair
How have race, diversity, and/or social justice impacted your work as an art therapy student?
Moving from Wisconsin to Virginia has been significant to my awareness of the impact of identity on the perspectives and perceptions that I carry. Throughout my work, I have learned that it is important to recognize and acknowledge differences and to take responsibility for the limitations of my perspectives. I have felt strongly about participating in inclusion & diversity initiatives, specifically in my work at the city agency. As a doctoral student, race, diversity, and social justice have been situated at the center of my inquiries. I have been studying anti-racist frameworks for conducting research, with a particular focus on neuroscientific quantitative research, to inform and expand the understanding that social justice and anti-racist practices must be embedded in all aspects of our profession. I am currently working on the development of my dissertation focusing on mitigating implicit biases through transformative learning and arts-based inquiry for doctoral-level researchers in the creative arts therapies.
What advice would you give someone interested in pursuing a career in art therapy? Or, is there something you would like to share about your journey thus far as an art therapist?
A career in the mental health professions is a calling. Becoming an art therapist requires commitment to the awareness of the transformative power of art therapy, as well as introspection, humility, tenacity, and discipline. Throughout my career, my job titles never reflected my professional identity as an art therapist, yet I have held “art therapist” as central to how I’ve conducted all of my work. I believe this is important as part of the story of being an art therapist has always been having to explain what an art therapist is compared to other mental health titles. Something unique to our profession is the wide variation in how we do what we do, which I believe is an aspect inherent to creative process, but may also be a confounding factor. For anyone interested in the field, it is important to learn critical thinking, develop strong self-awareness, reflect and return often to the foundational and fundamental principles, and to maintain discipline and purposefulness in the work.
What are your hopes for the future of the art therapy profession?
I hope that the identity of a professional art therapist gains broad (and global) support and recognition as an integral part of health care and as a respected practitioner in the health professions through licensure, title protection, and establishment of art therapy as an evidence-based practice. I hope the profession continues to support the need for research initiatives through meaningful collaborations across disciplines, as well as the expansion of research institutes to grow research efforts across and outside of academia. To facilitate and reflect values of stewardship and community, which I believe are central to the art therapist identity, I also hope for professional association membership to grow and thrive!
Are you an AATA elected leader or volunteer? What keeps you excited about the AATA community?
Standard brown clay with specks, wheel thrown and coil built.
Artist’s Statement:
Roots Journey / Origin and Descent
Creativity, to me, is the act of redefining a norm into something innovative, unique, novel, or original. This requires flexibility and adaptability to envision and redefine possibilities, and to reframe and reshape tangible fixtures and concepts through a unique perspective. Art making is a vehicle for a deeper way of knowing, comfort, resolution, and discovery. Relying on my personal art history with pottery, I delved into reconnecting with clay work while at the same time seeking clues from my personal family and ancestral origins to discover what fueled my desire to create art in this manner. I wondered if this inquiry might illuminate my scholarly and research interests to guide me to clarity. My doctoral pursuit reflects my desire to assert creativity and innovation for new or stronger thoughts and outcomes to contribute to the development of knowledge. In this art-based exploration, I began at the doorway of obscurity and vagueness.
I began by exploring my own family ancestry with predominant German and Polish roots. I opted to be inspired by the pottery histories of these countries to make tangible representations of aspects of my family roots and to discover how the journey has manifested into my present. My paternal side of my family of origin is predominantly German. This pitcher was inspired by reviewing German Pottery history and particularly the mid-century “Fat Lava” movement. The inspiration for this piece was a piece from the Scheurich pottery, designed by Heinz Siery, 1959. The artwork serves as my exploration into symbols, patterns, and forms that became meaningful, and reflect my deep curiosities. I am seeking a deeper understanding of the mechanisms in art making and art therapy that bring about transformation and growth through an examination of the neurological and physiological implications of art making on the creator, while also seeking meaning from examination of the roots of the creator’s identity.
About Kerry Kruk-Borisov, MS, LPC, ATR-BC, CSAC
Originally from Wisconsin, I came into art therapy from an undergraduate education focus in biology, chemistry, neuroscience, and pottery. I moved to Virginia and achieved my master’s from the formerly known as Eastern Virginia Medical School art therapy program. I am naturally drawn to a neuroscientific perspective of art therapy, while also drawn toward developmental, Jungian, family systems, stages of change, and cognitive-based approaches to therapy work.
My work began in 2004 and has encompassed community-based in-home family, outpatient and inpatient substance abuse, and private practice treatment, with a chunk of time dedicated to administrative work in human rights, compliance, and regulatory enforcement to enhance behavioral health programs.
Additionally, in 2009, I began working as an adjunct community faculty member at my alma mater as a thesis chair advisor and soon began teaching the family psychotherapy course within the art therapy curriculum and providing clinical supervision. I served as a member and eventual chair of the Alumni Board of EVMS from 2009 through 2020. I am currently pursuing my doctorate at Lesley University, Expressive Therapies, and have recently opened my own independent private practice. I also work with another practice as their residency coordinator, overseeing supervisees and residents-in-counseling pursuing licensure.
Learn more at https://www.rewiredcanvas.com/