This Handbook is the result of a long journey realised by Conny Leporatti, starting from the 1990s, on the use of art images in psychotherapy and family mediation, in a constant and fertile dialogue between Italian and International colleagues. The text moves from the fundamental theorical concepts which characterise the modern developments of a systemic therapy: the historical dimension and trans-generational dimension, the enhancement of subjectivity and the research of an attribution of meaning, the importance of the metaphorical and analogical language in therapy. It presents also a significant reflection on the evolution of the concept of narration in psychotherapy on the implicit rational knowledge and on acquisition of neurosciences that allow new development of the relation therapist-patient, and gives a new life to the co-construction of new stories and the co-reading of the experiences and of the experienced of the patient. It enters in deep focusing on the technique of the use of the art images in therapy, in which the techniques are illustrated in the field of individual therapy, couple therapy, family therapy, mediation and parental coordination, in different cases. To complete the book, there is a never released interview of the author with Rodolfo De Bernart, teacher and colleague, reference on a professional and human level, that allows an incisive summary and clarification of the use of images in psychotherapy from the 70s until today.
