Michela Rolandi — Arteterapeuta Clinica

Art as Therapy

Your journey of healing through art

I am Michela Rolandi, a clinical art therapist. After earning my degree in Set Design from the Brera Academy of Fine Arts and spending years in visual communication, I chose to place my creativity at the service of healing. Since 2015, I have been guiding children, adolescents, adults, and the elderly through therapeutic journeys using the creative process. I collaborate with the ASBA Project at the University of Milano-Bicocca to bring art therapy into museums.

Art is not the end but the means: every person carries within a creativity capable of becoming knowledge, expression, and healing.
Lyceum Academy
Edith Kramer Method
Over 10 years of experience
Book an Introductory Session Discover Art Therapy

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What Is Art Therapy

Clinical art therapy uses the creative process as a tool for healing and personal growth. Through art materials such as paints, clay, collage, and other expressive techniques, a safe space opens where emotions can take shape. My approach is grounded in the Edith Kramer method, "Art as Therapy": it is the act of making art itself that generates transformation.

What matters is not the aesthetic result, but the inner journey that the act of creating makes possible."

No artistic skill is required. Art therapy is for anyone who wishes to explore their inner world through a language beyond words, within a safe therapeutic setting and guided by a trained professional.

Expression

Give shape to emotions that are difficult to put into words, finding an authentic and liberating channel of communication.

Awareness

Discover inner resources, recognize patterns, and develop greater self-understanding through the act of making.

Transformation

Set in motion a process of profound change, working through lived experiences, trauma, and difficulties in a protected and gradual way.

What I Offer

My Services

Individual Sessions

Weekly clinical art therapy sessions at my studio in Milan. Each therapeutic journey begins with listening: together we define goals and timelines, working with painting, clay, collage, and other art materials. You do not need to know how to draw -- you just need to be willing to listen to yourself. I guide adults, adolescents, and children in self-care through the creative process.

AdultsAdolescentsChildren

Healthcare Facilities

I bring art therapy where care needs a different language: hospice, nursing homes, day centers, and disability services. With elderly individuals affected by Alzheimer's, patients in palliative care, and people with disabilities, the creative process opens spaces for expression and dignity even when words are no longer enough.

HospiceNursing Homes / Day CentersDisabilityPalliative Care

Schools and Young People

Art therapy projects in preschools, primary schools, and youth community centers. Through color, mark-making, and materials, children and young people learn to give shape to their emotions, to be part of a group, and to express themselves without fear of judgment. These programs are designed to foster inclusion, manage conflict, and support emotional development.

PreschoolsPrimary SchoolsYouth Centers

Art at the Museum -- ASBA Project

An interdisciplinary research project at the University of Milano-Bicocca that explores the museum as a space for healing. As the art therapist on the ASBA team, I lead experiences in which works of art become the starting point for a creative and therapeutic journey, with scientifically measured outcomes in reducing anxiety and stress.

GAM MilanoMuseo Storia NaturaleMAO Torino

Teaching

I train future art therapists by bringing into the classroom what fieldwork has taught me. I teach courses on clinical applications of art therapy, from the therapeutic relationship to multidisciplinary teamwork, from the analysis of real clinical cases to the design of art-based interventions across diverse care settings. Teaching is my way of giving back.

TrainingClinical Art TherapyWorkshop

Experiences

Workshops

Journal

My Experiences

Stories and images from therapeutic journeys in museums, healthcare facilities, schools, and my studio. Each experience is a unique encounter that leaves its mark.

Thematic Workshop "Letting Go" Teaching
2025

Thematic Workshop "Letting Go"

Workshop — Letting Go: Protection and Self-Care for Art Therapists I led this workshop in November, aimed at art therapists and practitioners, on the Lyceum Academy training platform in Milan. The theme: letting go. A necessary yet profoundly difficult act that concerns every professional in the helping relationship field.

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Leone XIII Summer Camp: Creating with Body and Colours School
2025 — Ongoing

Leone XIII Summer Camp: Creating with Body and Colours

Art workshops at the Leone XIII Primary School summer camp in Milan. I offer children of school age painting, sculpting and hands-on activities, nurturing creativity while strengthening attention and social skills. A thematically varied programme that weaves together music, colour and movement.

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Youth Community Centre: Emotions Have a Colour Youth
2025 — Ongoing

Youth Community Centre: Emotions Have a Colour

A programme on core emotions at the Centro di Aggregazione Minori e Famiglie in San Donato Milanese, for Cooperativa Sociale La Strada. I work with a group of 8-year-old children from complex and dysfunctional family situations. Through colour and materials, we learn together to recognise, name and give shape to what we feel inside.

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Lecturer at Lyceum Academy: Training Future Art Therapists Teaching
2024 — Ongoing

Lecturer at Lyceum Academy: Training Future Art Therapists

I teach 'Clinical Case Applications: The Elderly' within the Clinical Art Therapy programme at Lyceum Academy in Milan. The course outlines the figure of the elderly person across different care settings — Day Care Centres, Residential Care Facilities, hospice — teamwork, and the relationship with the patient and the caregiver. I bring to the classroom the expertise gained through years of hands-on practice.

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La Casa di Sam: Who I Am, Who I Want to Become Adolescents
2024

La Casa di Sam: Who I Am, Who I Want to Become

A clinical art therapy programme at the Youth Community Centre 'La Casa di Sam o dell'Amicizia' in via Boncompagni, Milan. I work with a group of young people aged 10 to 17 on themes of self-awareness, acceptance and identity. These are adolescents from unstable family backgrounds with relational difficulties: through art materials they explore who they are and who they want to become.

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Practitioner Training with ForMattArt Association Teaching
2024-2025

Practitioner Training with ForMattArt Association

Training Course for Practitioners — Fine Motor Skills and Hands-on Activities I delivered this training course in collaboration with ForMattArt, a social promotion association in Milan that since 2011 has been designing and running art-educational activities in contexts of social vulnerability — from schools on the outskirts to residential facilities for at-risk children. The course was aimed at educators, teachers and practitioners who work with preschool and school-age children, with the goal of providing practical, immediately applicable tools for offering structured hands-on activities, both in the school context and in daily routines.

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Istituto Leone XIII: A Collective Story School
2021 — Ongoing

Istituto Leone XIII: A Collective Story

Experiential workshops with children aged 2 to 5 and painting courses with Primary School pupils at Istituto paritario Leone XIII in Milan. I offer painting activities that activate creativity and strengthen attention and social skills. The project 'A Collective Story' is an illustrated narrative programme entirely invented by the young participants. For the Primary School: museum visits and highly personal reproductions of paintings, as well as set design and theatrical costume making.

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The ASBA Project: When the Museum Becomes a Space of Care Museum
2021 — Ongoing

The ASBA Project: When the Museum Becomes a Space of Care

I am part of the research team at the University of Milano-Bicocca studying the museum as an ally against anxiety and stress. As the project's art therapist, I lead sessions at the GAM, the Natural History Museum in Milan and the MAO in Turin. The research has involved over 350 participants and has demonstrated that art therapy in the museum generates the most intense emotional experiences among all the methodologies tested.

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Cascina Biblioteca: Art and Movement for the Little Ones School
2019 — 2020

Cascina Biblioteca: Art and Movement for the Little Ones

Experiential art workshops with children aged 2 to 5 at Cooperativa Cascina Biblioteca in via Casoria, Milan. A setting immersed in greenery where we nurture expressive abilities, support social bonds and stimulate creativity and painting skills in the youngest children.

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Nursery Schools: The Colours of Emotions School
2019 — Ongoing

Nursery Schools: The Colours of Emotions

Art therapy workshops in nursery schools across Milan — always in collaboration with the Milan-based association ForMattArt — where children learn to give shape to their emotions through colour, mark-making, materials, music and movement. Programmes designed to foster inclusion, address relational difficulties and support the emotional growth of the youngest children.

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Istituto Golgi Redaelli: The Art That Accompanies Hospice / RSA
2017 — 2025

Istituto Golgi Redaelli: The Art That Accompanies

Eight years of continuous work at Istituto Golgi Redaelli in Milan. From 2017 to 2023 in the Integrated Day Care Centre and six Residential Care Facility wards, with people affected by Alzheimer's, senile dementia, bipolar disorder and depression: through art materials I fostered self-esteem, the recovery of dignity and fine motor skills. The experience culminated in an exhibition across the entire Day Care Centre area. From 2021 to 2025 I also worked in the Hospice and PVS wards, supporting patients, caregivers and the medical team through both group and individual sessions.

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G. Ferraris Day Centre: From the Art Studio to the Stage Disability
2016 — 2019

G. Ferraris Day Centre: From the Art Studio to the Stage

Three years of clinical art therapy with people with cognitive and physical disabilities. A group journey spanning painting and storytelling that culminated in a theatrical performance (costume design) and an exhibition open to the neighbourhood. Proof that creativity knows no barriers.

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Want to learn more? Get in touch

The Memoir

On Tiptoes Between Life and Death

Art Therapy in Hospice and Vegetative State Wards — a professional and human journey

A narrative born from years of work in departments where life meets its boundary. Ten Hospice rooms, seven Vegetative State rooms: each with a story, a face, a gesture that changed my understanding of care.

This memoir is addressed to healthcare professionals and anyone seeking to understand how the creative process can accompany end-of-life care with gentleness, respect, and beauty.

Read the Memoir
12 Chapters Clinical Cases Field Journals

Voices

What People Say

I came to Michela at a time when I could no longer express what I was feeling. Through painting, I found a language I didn't know I had. Session after session, I learned to listen to myself through colors and shapes. A journey that truly changed me.

Sara M. — Individual sessions

I was skeptical, I admit it. I thought it was a painting class. Instead, it was something completely different: a space where you can let go without judgment. Michela's workshops surprise you. You walk in a little hesitant and walk out feeling lighter.

Marco L. — Group workshop

Michela worked with the children at our school for two years. The results were clear: children who struggled to participate in the group found a way to express themselves, and the most vulnerable cases showed significant progress. The sensitivity with which she conducts her work is extraordinary.

Dott.ssa Bianchi — School principal

My mother had barely spoken for months. When I saw the paintings she made with Michela, I cried. She was still there, inside those colors and shapes. Art therapy gave her back a way to communicate that we thought was lost forever.

Elena R. — Family member of a nursing home resident

I had never walked into a museum thinking about myself. Through the ASBA project, I discovered that in front of a work of art you can feel, not just look. An experience that surprised and moved me.

Lucia T. — ASBA Project participant

Michela has been working with our patients for years with rare dedication. In palliative care, every moment matters, and art therapy offers patients a space of dignity and beauty even in the most difficult stages.

Dott. Colombo — Hospice director

Frequently Asked Questions

Everything You Want to Know

Do I need to know how to draw to do art therapy?
Absolutely not. Art therapy requires no artistic ability whatsoever. The goal is not to create a work of art, but to use the creative process as a tool for exploring your emotions and fostering well-being. The art materials are simple and accessible to everyone.
Who is art therapy for?
Art therapy is for people of all ages: children, adolescents, adults, and the elderly. I work with those going through times of emotional difficulty, stress, or grief, with patients in healthcare facilities (hospice, nursing homes, day centers), with people with disabilities, and with anyone who simply wishes to know themselves better through a creative journey.
What does a session look like?
A session typically lasts 50 to 60 minutes. It begins with a brief welcoming moment, followed by working with art materials chosen together. Following the Edith Kramer method, it is the act of making art itself that generates transformation. The art therapist accompanies the process without judgment, facilitating exploration and reflection.
Are online sessions available?
Yes, I offer the option of individual online sessions. Remote sessions are adapted to work with simple materials easily found at home. The effectiveness of the therapeutic work is maintained through a carefully designed therapeutic setting and the relationship that is built even through the screen.
How long does a therapeutic journey last?
The duration of a therapeutic journey varies based on individual goals and needs. You can start with an introductory session to determine together which path is most suitable. Some journeys last a few months, while others unfold over a longer period.
How much does a session cost?
The cost varies depending on the type of journey (individual or group) and the context. During the first introductory session, we will define the format and fees together. Feel free to contact me for more information.
What is the difference between an art class and art therapy?
In an art class, the goal is to learn a technique and improve the aesthetic result. In art therapy, the result does not matter: what counts is the creative process and what emerges during the act of making. The art therapist does not teach you to paint, but accompanies you in self-exploration through art materials, within a protected therapeutic setting and with therapeutic goals.
How does the first session work?
The first session is an introductory meeting: it serves to understand your needs and assess together whether art therapy is the right path for you. You will have a chance to explore the art materials -- it is a moment of listening, dialogue, and evaluation.

Let's Talk

Get in Touch

Do you have questions or would you like to book an introductory session? Fill out the form beside and I will personally reply by email, usually within 24 hours.

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