Expressive arts therapy supports creative expression through visual art, music, dance, and drama, fostering emotional awareness, regulation, and personal growth. Recent advances in generative AI, particularly multimodal models that produce images, music, text, and soundscapes, create new opportunities to scaffold creative exploration, provide adaptive prompts, and support reflective dialogue in therapeutic contexts. At the same time, integrating AI into expressive arts therapy raises important challenges around agency, authorship, emotional alignment, ethics, data privacy, and preserving therapeutic relationships.

This workshop brings together researchers, designers, therapists, and practitioners to explore how human-centered AI can support creativity in art and music therapy while respecting therapeutic values. We focus on insights from AI-enabled therapy systems, design approaches balancing creativity and emotional well-being, and evaluation methods that extend beyond usability and traditional clinical outcomes. Through interdisciplinary discussion, the workshop aims to surface open research questions and design considerations for AI use in expressive arts therapy.

Advances in generative and multimodal AI are opening new possibilities for supporting creativity, emotional expression, and mental well-being. At the same time, integrating AI into expressive arts therapy raises critical questions about agency, ethics, evaluation, and the role of human care. This workshop brings together researchers, designers, artists, and therapists to critically examine how human-centered AI can support—rather than undermine—creative therapeutic practices.

We invite participants to submit short position papers, case studies describing completed, ongoing, or planned work, or reflective pieces on prior research (2–4 pages, ACM format). We also welcome alternative contributions, such as interactive or video demos and posters, that engage with topics including, but not limited to:

• AI-supported creativity in art or music therapy
• Design and evaluation of AI systems for mental well-being
• Ethical, cultural, and methodological challenges in creative AI for care
• Practitioner perspectives on AI in therapeutic settings
• Speculative or critical approaches to AI and creative therapy

Submissions should describe the contributor’s perspective, experience, or open questions rather than polished results. Selected participants will be invited to give a lightning talk and/or present a poster or demo during the workshop.

Please submit materials via the workshop website by May 25, 2026 (AOE). At least one author of each accepted submission must attend the workshop in person . We welcome interdisciplinary and exploratory contributions and encourage submissions from both academic and practitioner communities.

We are honored to host two leading experts from complementary fields, who will share groundbreaking insights on human-centered AI, creative therapy, and reflective design with generative AI.

Christine Tok

Senior Art Therapist, The Red Pencil (Singapore)

Speaker Bio

Christine started her career in early childhood education as a teacher and subsequently a principal for twenty-five years. She has worked very closely with children aged 18 months to 12 years old and their families. Christine’s strong personal interest in art since young and the process of counselling students with challenging behaviours alongside their parents and educators had led her to pursue a Masters in Art Therapy with LASALLE College of the Arts in 2008. Upon graduation, she has been teaching the short course in the campus to promote art therapy. In December 2010, Christine started her private practice to bring resolutions and freedom, to enrich and to advocate self-care. Christine has also been bringing successful interventions to children as young as two years old and adults in their golden years who face different adversities. She always puts the psychological safety of the clients first and she believes in building strong authentic therapeutic alliances with them. Christine finds joy in witnessing different individuals experience breakthroughs and transformation! It is also extremely fulfilling for her to be able to bring strong ripple effects of art therapy to many different communities leading to lifelong therapeutic benefits!

Talk Title

Human-Centered AI for Art Therapy

Talk Abstract

Artificial intelligence is transforming the world more rapidly than what we may be prepared for. As an art psychotherapist for 16 years, I can see how AI can find its supportive space in the mental health practice. There are possibilities that AI can be tapped on as additional resources for the art processes in art therapy sessions. Sharing from the experiences in clinical work with various demographics of clients, this session explores the potential resources and potential limitations with AI.

Anders Sundnes Løvlie

Associate Professor, IT University of Copenhagen

Speaker Bio

Anders Sundnes Løvlie is Associate Professor and Head of the Media, Art, and Design research group at the IT University of Copenhagen. He has published more than 80 scholarly publications focusing on experience design, artifical intelligence, human-computer interaction, museums, journalism and more, and co-edited the book Hybrid Museum Experiences: Theory and Design with Annika Waern.

Talk Title

The Algorithmic Gaze: Designing Reflective Encounters with Generative AI

Talk Abstract

The tremendous impact of Generative AI (GenAI) on art and culture calls for both creative and critical exploration. Can GenAI help us see art in new ways – offering an “algorithmic way of seeing”? What do we see when experiencing art through the lens of GenAI? And how can we help users/audiences make sense of the algorithmic gaze – when can we trust what we see, and when should we not? I will explore these questions by presenting the past research of my colleagues and I, exploring AI as design material for art and museum experiences. I argue for exploring novel forms of interacting with GenAI beyond “transcriptionism” (Trillo and Polik 2025). I also caution against a worrying tendency to overtrust in AI, as demonstrated in many studies. I propose a design strategy of “embracing unreliability”, in which designers intentionally draw the user’s attention to the unreliability of GenAI and design experiences which turn this unreliability into opportunities for playful exploration and critical reflection.

The workshop is designed as a highly interactive, one-day event, emphasizing dialogue, reflection, and hands-on engagement.