Meet Gaby Espinoza | Artist, Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist & Board Certified Art Therapist

We had the good fortune of connecting with Gaby Espinoza and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Gaby, career-wise, where do you want to be in the end?

That’s such a great question! I’m currently passionate about holding my dual identities as an artist and art therapist. With that being said, I want to continue being an artist and that may not be professionally, but I want to continue making art for the rest of my life without having to worry about finances, time and space. In addition, I’m an art therapist working in infant and early childhood mental health. I would love my business, Connections and Reflections, to grow as I provide art therapy supervision and early childhood mental health consultation.

As an artist, I grew up drawing, sketching and creating picture story books. In high school, I always took art related electives, was in art clubs and became T.A for my art teacher, Ms. Gutierrez (big shout out!) I didn’t realize it at the time, but reflecting back as a therapist now, I can see how therapeutic art was for me as an introvert that was too shy to answer simple questions in school. My undergrad was concentrated in studio art and I took as many classes as I could in community college to see what mediums I gravitated towards. Once I graduated with my B.A, I was fortunate enough to be a teaching artist in the Santa Ana Unified School District (yes, I did that drive back and forth for years!). Throughout the years leading up to grad school, I participated in art walks, art shows, worked as a teacher for sip and wine, and volunteered teaching art to children with chronic illness. I also worked as an art and play teacher for an organization that supports infant and early childhood development – this was my first interaction with infant and early childhood and I loved it! With my experience and profession, a lot of my art is focused on mental health. I’ve expanded my mediums and now play with ceramics, embroidery and always fall back to my first love, painting. I create for enjoyment and my own mental health and while I do participate in art shows from time to time, my end goal isn’t to sell my artwork – I think it would be hard to part with my pieces anyways. However, selling artwork would provide me the space to continue making more art! When I’m not focused on an art project, I tend to create process art about my mental health, my clients, and what’s going on in the world.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
I’ve begun to launch my business, Connections and Reflections: Art Therapy and Early Childhood Consultation. As a licensed marriage and family therapist and board certified art therapist my work is primarily derived in infant and early childhood in a school based setting and I’m currently working on becoming endorsed as an Infant Family Early Childhood Mental Health Specialist. My work is with families, parenting, parents with anxiety, depression, postpartum, perinatal, childhood behaviors, and consulting with teachers. I provide art therapy supervision to provisional art therapists obtaining hours to become registered art therapists. In art therapy supervision, we utilize art-making to process challenges supervisees come across; there’s a heavy focus on strengthening supervisee’s identity as an art therapist, exploring professional self-care and burnout; and exploring client art and treatment.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
This one is tough and I think there would be a lot of back and forth in different cities. First stop would be Cafe Cultura in Santa Ana for breakfast and coffee. Next we would head over to the bluff in Long Beach and ground ourselves with donation based yoga – the sun shining down on us and a cool breeze in our hairs. We would shop until our heart dropped in Pasadena’s Remainders Creative Reuse for thrifted art supplies. For dinner we would head down to Lucky Catsu in LA for their vegan spam musubi and island fried chicken.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
I have so many people that had pivotal moments in my career. My family for allowing me to grow and be my authentic self with no limits which in return reflects on my career as a therapist and artist. My art therapist friends that I met in grad school who continue to support and uplift each other long after we have graduated. My mentors and supervisors have helped me grow, encouraged me, and shined a light on the confidence and strengths I had within myself.