I have been watching with great interest as my daughter, Taylor, studies Art Therapy at Grandview University. She and her husband, Clayton, returned this past weekend from a summer spent in Gulu, Uganda where she applied Art Therapy techniques with children and adults who have lived through horrors and tragedies that most of us can scarce imagine. Taylor is learning first hand just how powerfully art heals.

For this reason, having finished my last post about Winston Churchill’s many losses and defeats, I want to share one more little known but critical piece to his story. While in the deepest pit of his life when his wife said “I thought he would die of grief,” Churchill discovered that art heals. Paul Johnson writes:

At this moment, providence intervened. By pure chance, his sister-in-law “Goonie” Churchill was painting in watercolor in the garden of Hoe Farm in Surrey, which they had rented jointly. Churchill: “I would like to do that.” She lent him her paints and soon, ambitious as always, he sent for oils and canvases. He loved it. The Scots-Irish master Sir John Lavery, a neighbor, took him in hand, and his dashing wife, Hazel, also a painter, gave him excellent advice. “Don’t hesitate. Dash straight at it. Pile on the paint. Have a go!” He did, with growing relish. He discovered, as other sensible people have done, that painting is not only the best of hobbies but a sure refuge in a time of trouble, for while you are painting you can think of nothing else. Soon misery began to retreat. his mind, his self-respect, his confidence were restored. (Churchill, Paul Johnson, Viking Press)

Painting continued to be a sure refuge for Churchill. He painted the rest of his life and produced a surprisingly impressive body of work.