Professionally Trained Expressive Arts Facilitators
We are expressive arts professionals who have earned a Masters or PhD and professional certifications from the Expressive Arts Institute of San Diego.
We'd love to meet you!
Warmly,
Members of the Alumni Association, Professional Level
For a full list of our graduates, follow this link.
Elizabeth Jacobowitz,
MA, CACMT
Expressive Arts Therapist, Coach, & Educator
Embodiment Arts
Hillcrest, San Diego & Virtual Sessions
Elizabeth loves how making art is not only enriching, but provides essential guideposts and direction in navigating the mountains and valleys of the terrain of life. She works with individuals and groups, children and adults in private practice at Embodiment Arts. Elizabeth also teaches classes using expressive arts based learning at the International Professional School of Bodywork and the International College of Holistic Studies. Elizabeth holds her Masters in Expressive Arts Therapy with a concentration in Coaching & Education. She has worked with organizations including Shakti Rising, Survivors of Torture, International, Veterans Village of San Diego, and San Diego Youth Services. Connecting to the wisdom in our own bodies is the basis for all of her practices. To read more about Elizabeth, click here. Expressive Arts Therapist, Coach, & Educator
Rachelle Archer, MA
Expressive Arts Therapist, Coach, & Educator, Founder/CEO
Artful Leadership Coaching & Consulting
San Diego & Virtual Sessions
artfulleaders@gmail.com
(619)227-2327
Rachelle Archer, MA, CEO of Artful Leadership, is an expressive arts practitioner and healing-centered organizational consultant, coach & trainer. She helps leaders with big missions impact their communities sustainably by putting well-being first, so that they can lead with a full tank and create a culture of care that supports all stakeholders through changing times.
Rachelle has over 25 years' experience at the intersection of the arts, education, and healing. As a founding member of The Monarch School San Diego, she supported unhoused youth and the adults serving them for over two decades. She helped develop & codify a nationally recognized model for educating unhoused youth, specializing in arts-based approaches to community building, mental health, SEL, and leadership development for students and staff.
Since founding Artful Leadership in 2020, she collaborates with schools and community-based organizations to foster the individual, interpersonal and organizational well-being that will empower them to live their mission, vision and values sustainably. She's a core consultant at the Clare Rose Center for CYD and the host of the “The Artful Leader” podcast, featuring leaders working bravely in the arts, education, healing, and social justice. Her belief in the transformative power of the arts imbues everything she does with creative expression, embodiment and play. Rachelle’s work is deeply rooted in her values: everyone can be a leader, humans thrive in community, and the wellbeing of that community starts with us doing our inner work first. Book a free consultation today!
Francine Hoffman, MA, REAT
Expressive Arts Therapist and Creative Coach
San Diego Playback Theatre (creativewellness6@gmail.com)
San Diego, CA
Francine has a history of helping clients create positive change through fitness, dance, and yoga and now with Expressive Arts Therapy, earning her advanced registration (REAT) in 2021. She appreciates how the Expressive Arts provides people with access to their imagination, a deep satisfaction that comes from authentic creative expression, and a restoration of the ability to be playful, all of which are vital for a meaningful life. Currently, she provides expressive arts facilitation at the Golden Door Resort in Escondido and maintains a private practice in her home studio in San Diego. As Artistic Director of Minstrels of Story San Diego Playback Theatre, drama and movement related expressive arts are often incorporated in her practice. As such, Francine has an affinity for working playfully with children of all ages. Previous adjunct expressive art therapy positions include Veterans Village, Zamorano Elementary School of Performing Arts and Casa Palmera (multi-use outpatient hospital) as well as at the rehabilitation treatment programs of Harmony Grove, Center for Discovery, and the Crosby Center.
Sarah Karpicus, MA
Expressive Arts Therapist, Ceremonialist, and Artist
Yellowbird
North Park, San Diego, CA & virtual services
Sarah Karpicus Violet, MA is co-founder of Yellowbird. She believes in creativity, art making, and cultivating the sacred in our daily lives. Sarah carries the wisdom from her path with the intention to illuminate, to express, to believe, to love, to weave, to listen and honor, to restore the feminine ways of being, and to hold sanctified, safe places. She partners with our natural environment and the imaginal realm to connect with wonder, beauty through creative expression and ritual. Whether co-creating a Bridal Blessing or playing with embodiment through the arts, it is all with the intention of curating wholeness in our every day lives. Sarah has been blessed with many guides, and her work rests on the shoulders of her teachers, mentors, natural allies, and 11 years of experience.
Margaret Rebecca Lillywhite, LCSW, BFA, REAT
Expressive Arts Therapist, Facilitator, Educator & Artist
McAlister Institute
San Diego, CA
Margaret Rebecca is an Expressive Arts Institute graduate and full time expressive arts therapist. As Therapeutic Arts Director at McAlister Institute and founder of the Expressive Arts Therapy Program, she facilitates a variety of groups with teens, men and women who have co-occurring challenges. She also supervises expressive arts therapy and clinical interns. In addition to her expressive arts training, Margaret Rebecca is a LCSW licensed in 3 states and has been certified in Psychodrama, Sociometry and Group Psychotherapy since 1992. She holds BFA degrees in Fine Arts and Theater. Rebecca loves to guide others in the imaginal realm, trusting in the unknown, playing, inventing, discovering surprises and experiencing insights that emerge through expressive empowerment, creativity and spontaneity.
Michele Lyons, MA
Expressive Arts Sex Coach
Michele Lyons
San Diego, CA
Michele combines her Expressive Arts training with Sex Coaching to become San Diego’s first Expressive Arts Sex Coach! Utilizing the arts, she guides her clients to discover their authentic sexual expression. Michele works with individuals and couples in her private practice in San Diego. She also offers workshops in the greater San Diego area. She has facilitated Expressive Arts groups for homeless veterans in recovery from chemical dependency, with inmates in Donovan Correctional Facility, and incorporated in the arts in her curriculum as a public school teacher. Michele believes that finding one’s full sexual expression can bring vitality, passion, fun, intimacy, confidence, excitement, as well as a sense of well-being to her clients.
Erika Malone, MA, REAT
Expressive Arts Therapist, Dancer, Actress, & Teaching Artist
Yellowbird
North Park & Point Loma, San Diego
Erika has been involved in the arts education field for 20 years. She has taught dance and theatre for numerous San Diego organizations including The Old Globe, Malashock Dance, A Reason to Survive (ARTS), San Diego Junior Theatre, Eveoke Dance Theatre, Arts for Learning San Diego, Shakti Rising, and the SDUSD VAPA Department. Erika currently works at The Monarch School, serving K-12 youth impacted by homelessness. In addition, she is the co-founder of Yellowbird Expressive Arts, an organization dedicated to individual and community expression and transformation through the intermodal arts.
Erika earned her Master’s Degree in Expressive Arts Therapy from the European Graduate School in Switzerland and The Expressive Arts Institute. She is a specialist working with clients and students with trauma. Expressive Arts is important to Erika because it returns us home again and again to an embodied awareness, a connection to the rich resources of the imagination, and to an evolving sense of who we are and who we can be.
Tish McAllise Sjoberg, MA, CAGS, REAT
Expressive Arts Therapist, Coach & Consultant
Expressive Arts @ 32nd & Thorn
North Park, San Diego & Virtual Sessions
At her Expressive Arts Studio in the North Park area of San Diego, Tish works with individuals, couples and families in private practice. She also facilitates workshops and groups to help people take a vacation from their daily life or deal with daily and major life issues like stress, anxiety, divorce, death, burnout, illness, trauma, relationships and parenting challenges. In addition, Tish does contract work as an Expressive Arts Therapist serving: at-risk youth and adults; grieving, dying, and hospice staff; adults with developmental and physical disabilities; elementary, middle and high school classrooms using the arts to build community, reduce anxiety and support social emotional curriculum; staff tram building; and using the arts for adjunct therapy with homeless, addictions and eating disorders. She is an art maker and usually has a 365 day art project going where she makes art daily. Tish love helping people find their creative confidence.
Joy Raab, MA Art-Ed
Expressive Arts Program Leader
TRACE and Artjoyment
North County San Diego, CA
Joy Raab holds a masters degree in art education from Boston University. Her thesis work focused on art for the blind and visually impaired. Joy has several years of experience as an activity director and now works independently designing creative and cognitively stimulating programs for seniors with dementia. Joy also volunteers at Veterans Village San Diego (VVSD) in the expressive arts program. Starting fall 2018, she will begin working for TRACE in the San Diego Unified School District as their expressive arts coordinator. Joy strongly believes the expressive arts help people of all abilities find and develop their creative voice. Joy Raab's freelance art work can be viewed at www.joyraab.com.
Saedeh Bani Rahimi, MA
Expressive Arts Therapist
Pain Care of San Diego, A Medical Corporation
San Diego, CA
Saedeh Bani Rahimi is a painter, art teacher, and Expressive Arts therapist. She holds an MA in Expressive Arts Therapy from the San Diego Expressive Arts Institute. The status of women in society has always been a major theme in her life, and continues to inspire her painting. She has helped immigrant women experience awakening in their lives by facilitating Expressive Arts workshops. Saedeh has facilitated groups for various organizations, such as the Iranian American Center, Braille Institute, and pain care clinic. She is currently offering community art workshops at the Expressive Arts Institute and Expressive Arts at 32nd & Thorn. She is committed to delivering her voice to be heard as a woman, artist, therapist, and help others in need of speaking out for freedom.
Ofra Raz, MA
Expressive Arts Therapist
Vetrans Village of San Diego
San Diego, CA
Ofra's passion is play with the arts as highway to wellness and recovery. The European Graduate School, where she received an Expressive Arts Therapist MA and the Expressive Arts Institute in San Diego endowed her with unique, effective and methodical ways to put this passion into practice. She worked for 25 years as an artist and art educator with children and teens, thus she experienced first hand the beneficial results of using the arts as agency of change and well-being. As an Expressive Arts Therapist, Ofra has practiced mainly in rehabilitation facilities with homeless and addiction patients. In addition, she works in private practice applying the arts as guides on the way to wellness with teens and adults. Ofra is a visual artist, however she uses all the arts as agency of recovery in her practice.
Galit Shezifi Gigi, MSW
Expressive Arts Therapist, Drum Circle Facilitator
Galit Gigi
San Diego, CA
With over 20 years of experience, Galit Shezifi combines her professional knowledge of social work with a post-graduate certificate in Expressive Arts Therapy. She inspires groups and individuals to access and express their innermost feelings and thoughts using the creative tools of visual art, music, drama, poetry, movement, and spiritual reflection. Galit is highly skilled at creatively empowering her clients in their personal growth.
Originally from Israel, with parents from Morocco, Galit was raised in a unique expressive culture. Since coming to San Diego, she has created programs for yoga studios, children with special needs, the LGBTQ community, eating disorder and recovery programs, and bereavement. In addition, she facilitates HealthRHYTHMS drum circles at health care agencies, schools, and private settings. To find out more about Galit, click here.
Elizabeth Tobias, MA
Expressive Arts Therapist, Performance Artist
San Diego, La Jolla, & Los Angeles, CA
Elizabeth Tobias is an Expressive Arts Therapist and K-12 Arts Educator who specializes in creating customized Expressive Arts Therapy Programs for schools. Elizabeth facilitates group and individual sessions that help support students in finding their unique talents, achieving their educational goals, creative problem solving and managing stress. She helps to nurture a safe, inclusive and creative school environment for all students. As an artist and activist, Elizabeth creates workshops, public events and immersive works of art that address timely humanitarian issues. Her multi-media art projects foster inclusiveness and diversity, provoke constructive dialogue and promote peace and progress.
n 2014, Elizabeth was awarded a Learning Innovation Fellowship from The National Science Foundation. In 2010, earned a Durfee ARC Grant for The Cupcake Project, which was featured at The Carpenter Center at Harvard University. She has worked with organizations including Vista Hill Parent Care, La Jolla Elementary School, La Jolla High School, Girl Up, and The Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center. She holds an MA in Spiritual Psychology. To read more about Elizabeth, click here.
Pamela Underwood, MA, BFA
Expressive Arts Therapist, Facilitator, Educator & Artist
Pamela Underwood Expressive Arts Studios
California & Austin, Texas
Pamela has been in private practice, leading expressive arts groups and retreats since 1994. With a masters in Expressive Arts Therapy, Pamela's work is art based, body centered and dedicated to participants' personal transformation. Pamela's offerings include private sessions and her signature retreat Bodywriting Retreats for Women established 1994 and The Image Quest Sojourn course, mixed media visual journaling since 2004. To find out more about Pamela, click here.
Tara Graviss White, MA
Expressive Arts Therapist, Creative
taragraviss@gmail.com
San Diego County & Online
An international Facilitator of Expressive Arts Therapy, Supporting Trauma Recovery and Self-Reclamation.
Tara is an empathetic and skilled facilitator who utilizes the transformative power of the arts to weave and expand connections between mental, emotional, spiritual, and physical health. With a focus on supporting adult survivors of sexual violence and abuse, she employs an embodied multimodal approach, engaging various art disciplines and the senses, to facilitate healing and growth. Whether working with individuals or groups, Tara has been helping those whose lives have been interrupted by trauma since 2014.
Tara supports adult survivors in various contexts, including domestic violence/abuse, child abuse/neglect/molestation/incest, sexual assault/rape, military/service-related trauma, trafficking, and C/PTSD. By utilizing all genres of the Expressive Arts, Tara guides individuals through the process of weaving their fragmented experiences and expanding their sense of self, fostering personal healing, growth and integration; often working in a triadic model with other wellness providers.
Moreover, Tara extends her support to artists, educators, and health care providers, creatively empowering them to engage in their own personal growth and self-discovery; thereby expanding their capacity to serve others. By bringing expression into their personal practices, Tara encourages these individuals to harness their own creative abilities as catalysts for personal transformation and care.
As an Expressive Arts Therapist, Tara holds the belief that meaning-making originates from the artist/maker. Through Tara’s own healing journey, driven by an exploration of intimacy (or its absence) in today's world, she discovered the profound impact of Expressive Arts Therapy on self and world.
Ingrid B Guerrieri, LMFT
Expressive Arts Therapist
CreArte Counseling
San Diego & Virtual Sessions
Ingrid is a Colombian immigrant who has called San Diego home for 20+ years. She finds joy in living in this borderland, as it invites her to live and play in the richness of bilingual and multicultural spaces.
She studied psychology in Colombia and continued to follow her passion for supporting and growing in community through a certification in Substance Use Counseling, a master’s in Marriage and Family Therapy, and a diploma in Expressive Arts Therapy. Ingrid strives to promote and co-create spaces where marginalized stories and people’s voices are invited and uplifted; her work is inspired and guided by curiosity, imagination, playfulness, collaboration, and a relational ethic of mutual care.
Ingrid has worked in community mental health settings for the past 16 years, providing linguistically and culturally sensitive services to a diversity of communities including refugees, immigrants, the LGBTQI+ community, social services workers, people in unhealthy relationships with substance use, couples and families, people in the criminal justice system, and communities impacted by HIV. She is actively engaged in the promotion of professional growth and support for social services professionals and therapists; she is a co-founder and facilitator of the Art Flow Collective, a group of practitioners of color who facilitate art-driven explorations and healing through expressive arts therapy workshops and retreats. Ingrid provides services in English and Spanish, and has recently started an independent psychotherapy practice called CreArte Counseling.