About

Philosophy

Pamela Underwood’s Expressive Arts Studios provides a body centered, art based support network for personal transformation.

It is not just another creative experience. It is a journey into wholeness and newness.  Pamela is a gifted facilitator who helps you access your own truth and discover your real beauty in a joyful, imaginative and supportive environment. It’s a (retreat) you will never forget, and the art you make will surprise and delight you on every level.  
Bodywriting® Retreats for Women
~ Jan Phillips, Writer and Motivational SpeakerIt 

The studios offer support in the daily practice of living a resilient, creative life. No art background is necessary to be successful in the shaping of a dance or the painting of color and emergent images. Art making is innate to our human being-ness.  Through working with our images, we are able to work far ahead of our linear thinking mind. Music, visual art, movement and poetry have the ability to safely hold both the light and the shadow of our lives so that we may feel safe to encounter them. The practice of expressive arts is one of the most intimate ways of being with one’s self.

Pamela Underwood Studios invites you to deepen this partnership with your creativity, your images and your imaginal realm, so these can come forth as companions and helpers every day.

About Pamela Underwood Expressive Arts Studios

“Pamela Underwood Studios” consists of two expressive arts studio locations; San Diego County, California and Austin, Texas. California’s “Pena Rosa Studio” overlooks Mount Woodson on three acres in rural Poway, and “Turtle Crow Studio” is nestled on five acres in the hill country of Austin, Texas.  At this time most workshops, classes, retreats and private client sessions are held in Poway, with Austin hosting the Bodywriting Retreat for Women and Image Quest Sojourn Retreat for Women; mixed media journaling retreat for women.  Other venues that Underwood’s retreat participants enjoy are in Taos, New Mexico and Sicily Italy.

Meet the Artist/Facilitator

   Pamela Underwood BFA, MA

Artist/Expressive Arts Therapist/Consultant/Facilitator
Why even spend precious time making art???

“I believe in the creative process as a restorative resource, a birthright for all men and women.  My gift and my passion is to help people find a unique connection with their creative wisdom which provides grounding in one’s body, emotional maintenance, and food for the soul!”
Pamela Underwood, BFA, MA

With studios in both California and Texas, Pamela Underwood works with clients individually as well as facilitating expressive arts groups and retreats.  Underwood offers expressive arts Labyrinth Walks  near the change of every season.

Pamela has been a professional visual artist for the past 30 years, a group and retreat facilitator since 1994, and an Expressive Arts Therapist since 2003.  As an Artist Facilitator, Underwood witnessed the deep places the arts took her participants time and time again. She decided to gain more tools to better help her clients.  Underwood spent three years at the Expressive Arts Institute of San Diego and three summers at the European Graduate School in Saas Fee, Switzerland, earning her master’s in Expressive Arts Therapy with a minor in psychology.

Pamela Underwood is a pioneer in her work with body image . She founded the unconventional, Bodywriting® Retreats for Women in 1994.  During this  expressive arts retreat, each participant learns to embrace her sensing body as her primal creative partner.  Each participant’s body actually becomes a tool as she creates a body print. She then works with the life size image that arrives, assisting its progress through movement, writing, sound and unconventional visual art techniques.

Pamela proposes a paradigm shift based on the idea that we, as human beings, are all Living with Images as Companions in the “Image Quest Sojourn Retreat”.

In 2003 Underwood also developed a 12-MONTH course, Image Quest SOJOURN™ based on this innovative theory.

Underwood has led “Artist’s Way Groups; through expressive arts” based on Julia Cameron’s book, The Artist’s Way, since 1994.

Pamela Underwood Studios offers Community Labyrinth Walks with each change of season. Come join us!

Please contact Pamela with any questions or to register for groups and /or retreats.

Pamela photo by Jan PhillipsPamela has been a professional artist for 25 years and has a private expressive arts practice with a master’s in Expressive Arts Therapy from the European Graduate school in Saas Fee, Switzerland.  She is known for safely guiding participants towards their unique voice through engaging meaningful personal imagery. Since 1994 Pamela has facilitated Artist’s Way through the Expressive Arts and her signature retreat Bodywriting Retreats for Women (founded 1994). In 2004 she developed the unconventional/exciting image Quest Sojourn.  A Bodywriting Retreat for Women documentary (click to see) has been featured on Channel Four’s San Diego Insider.  Pamela is a published author and past recipient of Sushi Streetsites NEA grant.

Click here to view Pamela’s resume.
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