I am Zsuzanna Kávai, a social educator, cultural mediator, socio-art therapist.
I have been working with children for more than ten years, from the youngest to the oldest. As a volunteer, I have participated in numerous family and children’s days as an organizer and program leader, and I have organized camps both here and across the border.
I held community-building play sessions. I also worked with disadvantaged Roma children, and for two years now I have been a volunteer at Bátor Tábor.
I started my university years at Pázmány Péter Catholic University, majoring in social pedagogy. During this time, I was an intern at a child psychiatry department, were I understood the healing power of art therapy. It was here that I decided that I wanted to embark on this path. Later, during my master’s studies in cultural mediation, I completed the socio-art therapist training of the Hungarian Art and Social Therapy Community Building Association, where Attila Nagy-György was my trainer. In my work, I draw on what I learned there, the workshops I later attended, and the experiences of my volunteer work.
I worked for several years at a women’s homeless shelter, helping women with addiction, relationship abuse and stuckness. I also held art therapy groups within an institutional setting. I currently run a day care seniors’ club, where I also organize art therapy sessions.
Art therapy is a tool that can help relieve anxiety, stress, support social interactions, free self-expression and help overcome difficulties. All this in a safe, accepting space. In the process, the product is never important, but the open presence. We work with the feelings and thoughts expressed during and after the creation.
In my art therapy sessions I use the tools of fine arts: colours, shapes, natural materials; music by itself and with vocals and instruments; movement and the symbol of the mandala.
I believe that openness, parental partnership and close cooperation are very important to achieve the goals set.
During individual and group sessions I can help with anxiety relief, stress management, self-awareness work, emotional problems management, and social interaction development.