Clare McCarthy

ATR-BC, LCPC, NCC

Clare is the provider for Greater Chicago Art Therapy, LLC, and has been practicing expressive arts psychotherapy for over 10 years. She is a Registered and Board-Certified Art Therapist, a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor (IL), a Licensed Professional Counselor (AZ), and a Nationally Certified Counselor.


With a strengths-focused humanistic and Gestalt approach, she fosters experiential connections to innate creativity. Recognizing the breadth of human emotions, she cultivates secure, open relationships for clients to explore and express their experiences, integrating insights for meaningful growth.

  • In her therapy practice, Clare draws from her lived experiences as a dancer, musician, and visual artist. Early in her life, she found that intuitive art making was a uniquely powerful tool to help her calm her mind, find self-acceptance, gain agency, and express emotions that she didn’t have the words to articulate. After studying architecture, she pivoted to focus her career in visual art and art therapy to share these same useful and practical skills with others. Passionate about engaging creativity to bring about transformation and healing, she has worked as a clinical art therapist and psychotherapist in various settings including hospitals, residential treatment centers, juvenile justice systems, and in community private practice. These experiences have shaped her understanding of both trauma and resilience, and helped her develop contextual and systems-focused models for personal change.

    She enjoys working with individuals of all ages, and has a clinical focus on adolescents and young adults as they transition into adulthood and explore the intersection of their personal and professional identities. She supports members of the LBGTQIA+ communities, and frequently works with clients who are exploring various aspects of their sexuality and their gender identities and expressions. She holds a Master's of Science in Art Therapy with a concentration in Counseling from Mount Mary University, where she studied with Art Therapy pioneers Dr. Bruce Moon and Dr. Lynn Kapitan. She is an active artist, and finds meaning in her painting practice, in which she visually explores the relationship between the observational and imaginative worlds—all art images included in this website reflect her personal artistic practice. She loves encouraging people to experience themselves as creative and whole, and is dedicated to providing a space where growth and learning is possible for you or your loved one.

Treatment Specializations

Mental health services for children, teens, and adults

Clare believes that all people are creative and can find mental balance, emotional healing, and personal meaning through connecting with their creative process within a supportive environment. She provides a synthesis of evidence-based psychotherapy, experiential art therapy, and animal-assisted therapy to treat issues in the following clinical areas:

  • Sadness is normal. Yet sometimes, we find ourselves stuck in a place of feeling mostly sadness, most of the time. This can interfere with relationships, a healthy sense of self, and overall functioning. Integrative art therapy helps find active ways to improve your outlook and heal from underlying causes of depression.

  • Anxiety shows up in many forms. However it presents (annoying, consuming, confusing, distracting, or intrusive) it can rob us of peace of mind, and our sense of physical self-control. Integrative art therapy and psychotherapy open new ways to practice mindfulness, and enhance internal peace and outward calm.

  • Emotional instability can feel like riding a rollercoaster of unexpected and overwhelming emotions, and frequently making impulsive decisions from an emotional place. Art therapy and Dialectical Behavioral Therapy provide tools to better live in the moment, manage emotions, and steady relationships.

  • Integrative art therapy and psychotherapy offer a flexible space to explore our relationship patterns, heal from painful experiences, and understand and respond to family dynamics. Through this work, you discover new paths to develop a more connected, rewarding social world in which to live authentically.

  • We all encounter profound changes in the course of our lives. When we better understand these transitions, we can curb our natural tendencies to fight against them, and are able to more quickly and fully adapt to our new realities. Regardless of the change, it is easier to manage when you have a supportive ally.

  • Our academic and work environments can be stressful places. In these spaces, we are tasked with balancing a wide range of interrelated concerns. Therapy provides a safe container to look at school and work experiences, and to gain clarity about how to manage these challenges in regulated and strategic ways.

  • What is the point? How do I live my life? Why am I here? These questions may plague us, or they may be the source of deep self-reflection and creative growth. When feeling that these questions are overwhelming, art therapy allows flexibility in expressing the depth of thoughts and feelings.

  • Understanding the unique person that you are is a considerable challenge, and an ongoing process. Humanistic therapy offers a fresh way to engage in the the active work of exploring your inner life and lived experiences. In this process, you uncover fuller self-acceptance and self-confidence.

  • Our bodies carry us and enable all of our experiences. Yet, we often neglect the needs of our physical bodies, and even turn against them in striving for emotional comfort and control. Integrative art therapy can help you connect with your body in a healing way, and forge a new relationship your physical self.

  • In the process of living, we all encounter substantial loss. Not only do we face personal losses, but we also face environmental grief as we live in a warming world. Art making allows you to witness the emotional pain of grief, to honor it, and to find the humanity and meaning in even the most difficult times.

  • Pain is real, and pain hurts. Our thoughts and emotions play a powerful and often ignored role in our experience of physical pain and illness. By expressing our experiences with our bodies, and clarifying our associated mental processes, we can renew our resilience, and find acceptance in adverse states.

  • Every brain is unique, and often creative individuals do not fit into the “neurotypical” framework. For those on the autism spectrum, and those struggling with attention, task management, and executive functioning, art therapy and structured behavioral therapies offer sensory and tangible methods for learning integration and self-expression that help neurodiverse individuals fully engage in a therapy experience that celebrates their exceptional functioning.

Clare has made a big positive impact in my life and I look forward to our sessions every time! Through my time seeing her I have significantly felt improvements in places I was struggling and without her I wouldn’t have been able to get to a much better place.

—Polly O.

My 11-year old has been seeing Clare for over a year. Clare has been a steady and calming presence for her as she navigates the challenges of her first year of middle school. During the sessions, Clare has given her tools and techniques to use in her school and home life to help her achieve her goals and adapt to changes. 

—Mollie H.

I have been doing sessions with Clare for about six years now. Since the beginning, I have never doubted for a second that she was the perfect match for me. Clare is incredibly compassionate, welcoming, caring, and easy to confide in. Clare has been a huge support system through both the best and hardest times, guiding me through large life transitions and changes. She has a profound sense of empathy and makes me feel incredibly validated and comfortable. Even as I started my first semester of college this year, I made it a priority to see Clare even from a far distance. I am so grateful for the immense amount of help Clare has given me through the years, and I would highly recommend her for anyone looking for an above and beyond therapist!

—Sadie S.