Cheryl Okubo, MA, ATR-BC

Cheryl holds a BFA in art education from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and an MA in art education/art therapy from the University of New Mexico. She is a registered board-certified art therapist with over 30 years of experience in Japan, where she has actively contributed to art education and art therapy. Cheryl has taught art in international schools and through private practice. Together with an apprentice, she co-founded art therapy studios—Creative House in Tsukuba and Hearth in Tsuchiura—providing individual and group art therapy, art therapy study groups, and ATR supervision. Cheryl has presented extensively on art therapy to diverse audiences in various settings, including national conferences. Her strength is in collaboration: she conducted art-based research at Ibaraki Prefectural College, she was instrumental in establishing the networking group Professional Art Therapists in Japan (PATiJ), and she recently secured a grant from the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo to introduce her curriculum at the University of Tsukuba’s School of Art and Design. After all this, Cheryl is excited to return to New Mexico and share her expertise in art therapy with students at Southwestern College. Her approach to art therapy is deeply rooted in Jungian and archetypal psychology, where the image is the central focus and understood as the language of soul. She enjoys working with various art media, particularly clay, and is currently pursuing acoustic guitar as her latest creative endeavor.