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This paper explores the large map as an innovative visual art tool in a frontline art therapy project with refugees. In a volatile and hostile setting on the France-UK border at Calais, inhospitable spaces, for a time, become human places, and the capacity to imagine both other (people) and somewhere other (place) become possible. Within this emergency setting, a safe space is temporarily activated. In the complicated times in which we live, art therapists are uniquely positioned to offer crisis support to people in diverse contexts with ethical and imaginative practice, using both their psychological skills and the art itself in equal weight. Critical examination of art therapy interventions is a necessary aspect of ethical practice and can lead to adaptations. This can feed into contemporary debates about how to deliver crisis intervention work, social action, social justice, as well as issues of definition. Dialogue, collaboration and co-production can open debate, challenge injustices and lead to social change. Social media as an extension of practice can serve as a further innovation and offer an alternative potential space, particularly in crisis contexts and where face-to-face work is not possible. Plain-language summary This paper looks at the role of the large map in an ongoing frontline art therapy project with refugees in Calais, northern France. The authors write about the border context in which the work takes place. They then present some thinking about the use of maps within this setting. This is followed by an example of the work in practice in the form of one Facebook post written in February 2019. The authors discuss the themes and ideas about space and materials emerging out of this extract. The authors propose that the innovative choice and application of materials, which helps to create a safe space in this border setting, can be translated into other physically and psychologically challenging contexts. The core tenets of art therapy practice and the skills brought by art therapists are needed now as much as ever. The paper also invites art therapists to think critically and imaginatively about the materials and media they choose in relation to their own wider work contexts with people. The authors suggest that an important part of the art therapy intervention in a difficult place needs to be about reflecting and adapting to context, which includes crisis support. This in turn supports a dialogue that can challenge injustices and lead to social change. The collaborative reflections about the work, written into blog posts during the return journeys from France back to the UK, form a second practice innovation. The posts are shared with an online audience and sometimes read, commented upon and further shared by those who use the service in Calais. The posts attempt to present creative, impactful narratives about the human aspect of the refugee experience. This is in contrast to the dominant media narratives in which refugees are often depicted with negative stereotypes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Calais Jungle has existed in some form for several years. It grew in size tremendously as a result of the so-called ‘refugee crisis’, but was spectacularly demolished in October 2016. When the Jungle was still standing, it was a site of intense violence perpetuated by the local police, state authorities as well as French legal systems. Much of the literature that has explored the Jungle thus far has rightly depicted it as an unofficial refugee camp, a ‘state of exception’ and a site of biopolitical experimentation with distinct ‘camp geographies’. However, it is the contention of this paper that while these experimentations occur and fuel the precariousness of the site, the Jungle can be seen as a slum, and indeed, that it can be seen as a slum of London’s making. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]