---
title: "Art Therapist"
description: "Plan or conduct art therapy sessions or programs to improve clients' physical, cognitive, or emotional well-being."
canonical: "https://nuecareer.com/careers/art-therapist"
last-updated: "2026-10-09T10:57:55.138Z"
---

# Art Therapist

**Category:** Healthcare Practitioners and Technical · **SOC code:** 29-1129 · **O\*NET-SOC code:** 29-1129.01

Plan or conduct art therapy sessions or programs to improve clients' physical, cognitive, or emotional well-being.

Also advertised as: Activity Therapy Specialist; Art Psychotherapist; ATR (Registered Art Therapist); ATR-BC (Board Certified Art Therapist); Clinical Art Therapist; Creative Arts Therapist; Expressive Arts Therapist; Oncology Art Therapist.

## At a glance

- **Median annual wage:** $77,930 (BLS OEWS, May 2025)
- **Median hourly wage:** $37.47/hr
- **Wage range (10th–90th percentile):** $46,540 to $152,530, with the middle half between $58,850 and $105,760
- **Total US employment:** 22,640
- **Typical entry education:** Bachelor's
- **Preparation required:** Considerable preparation — O\*NET rates this "Job Zone Five: Extensive Preparation Needed"
- **Projected growth:** +12.6% over 2025–2035 (BLS EP, 2025–2035)
- **Annual job openings:** 3,600 openings a year
- **AI-resilience score:** 47/100 — a NueCareer heuristic over O\*NET work activities and context, not a BLS or O\*NET figure

## Pay

National wage distribution, BLS OEWS, May 2025, across 22,640 US jobs.

| Percentile | Annual wage |
| --- | --- |
| 10th | $46,540 |
| 25th | $58,850 |
| 50th (median) | $77,930 |
| 75th | $105,760 |
| 90th | $152,530 |
| Mean (average) | $90,420 |

### Pay by state

The 15 highest-paying states, by median annual wage. The cost-of-living-adjusted column divides the state median by that state's BEA Regional Price Parity, so the columns answer different questions: the first is what the job pays there, the second is what that pay buys there.

| State | Median annual wage | Cost-of-living adjusted | Employment |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| DC | $127,010 | $115,568 | 80 |
| IL | $116,200 | $116,249 | 1,060 |
| NJ | $100,250 | $92,137 | 7,090 |
| HI | $99,560 | $90,549 | 40 |
| WA | $98,550 | $92,092 | Not published by BLS |
| SC | $90,980 | $97,046 | 70 |
| DE | $90,120 | $90,293 | 30 |
| NE | $86,900 | $96,445 | 40 |
| RI | $86,400 | $84,474 | 90 |
| OR | $81,860 | $79,198 | 170 |
| CA | $81,760 | $73,844 | 840 |
| NY | $77,980 | $72,257 | 1,110 |
| KS | $76,740 | $85,202 | 170 |
| MN | $75,360 | $76,414 | 500 |
| KY | $75,060 | $83,253 | 190 |

26 more states with published wage data are omitted here. The full table for all 41 states is at https://nuecareer.com/careers/art-therapist/salary-by-state, or as JSON at https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/art-therapist.

## Outlook

BLS projects employment to move from 56,100 in the 2025–2035 base year to 63,200 by the end of the cycle — a gain of 7,100 jobs, or +12.6%. Much faster than average: 12.6% against 3.5% projected for all occupations over the same cycle. About 3,600 openings a year are expected on average, counting openings from growth as well as from workers leaving the occupation permanently. Source: BLS EP, 2025–2035.

## How to get in

- **Typical entry education:** Bachelor's degree (BLS Employment Projections).
- **Preparation level:** Considerable preparation — O\*NET's preparation band for this occupation is "Job Zone Five: Extensive Preparation Needed".
- **Related work experience typically required:** None.
- **Typical on-the-job training:** None.

## What the work involves

- Conduct art therapy sessions, providing guided self-expression experiences to help clients recover from, or cope with, cognitive, emotional, or physical impairments.
- Talk with clients during art or other therapy sessions to build rapport, acknowledge their progress, or reflect upon their reactions to the artistic process.
- Write treatment plans, case summaries, or progress or other reports related to individual clients or client groups.
- Assess client needs or disorders, using drawing, painting, sculpting, or other artistic processes.
- Observe and document client reactions, progress, or other outcomes related to art therapy.
- Develop individualized treatment plans that incorporate studio art therapy, counseling, or psychotherapy techniques.
- Establish goals or objectives for art therapy sessions in consultation with clients or site administrators.
- Communicate client assessment findings and recommendations in oral, written, audio, video, or other forms.

## Skills and knowledge

### Essential skills

- Active Listening — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speaking — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Monitoring — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Critical Thinking — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Reading Comprehension — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Writing — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Learning — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Learning Strategies — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Transferable skills

These are the skills that carry into other occupations, and they drive the related-occupation and career-change rankings on this site.

- Social Perceptiveness — importance 4.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Service Orientation — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Judgment and Decision Making — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Complex Problem Solving — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Coordination — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Systems Analysis — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Systems Evaluation — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Time Management — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Knowledge areas

- Therapy and Counseling — importance 5.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Psychology — importance 5.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Fine Arts — importance 4.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Sociology and Anthropology — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Customer and Personal Service — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- English Language — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Abilities

- Oral Expression — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Oral Comprehension — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Comprehension — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Expression — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Problem Sensitivity — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Inductive Reasoning — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

## Who it suits

O\*NET rates every occupation on the six Holland (RIASEC) interest areas, on a 1–7 scale. This occupation's strongest areas are Social (S), Artistic (A), Investigative (I).

| Interest area | Score (1–7) |
| --- | --- |
| S — Social | 5.64 |
| A — Artistic | 5.49 |
| I — Investigative | 3.67 |
| R — Realistic | 2.99 |
| C — Conventional | 2.86 |
| E — Enterprising | 2.32 |

### Personality fit

These scores are **derived by NueCareer**, not published by any government agency: they are cosine similarities between a personality type's trait profile and this occupation's O\*NET interest and work-style ratings, expressed 0–100. Treat them as a starting point for exploration, not as evidence that a type belongs in a job.

| Type | Fit score (0–100) |
| --- | --- |
| INFP | 83.3 |
| ENFP | 79.8 |
| INFJ | 75.7 |
| ISFP | 69.8 |
| ENFJ | 68.2 |

Best-fitting types: INFP, ENFP.

## Related occupations

O\*NET's primary related occupations, in its own ranked order.

- [Music Therapist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/music-therapist) — median $77,930
- [Recreational Therapist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/recreational-therapist) — median $61,960
- [Marriage and Family Therapist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/marriage-and-family-therapist) — median $66,940
- [Clinical Psychologist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/clinical-psychologist) — median $100,580
- [Occupational Therapy Assistant](https://nuecareer.com/careers/occupational-therapy-assistant) — median $72,300
- [Occupational Therapist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/occupational-therapist) — median $100,330
- [Mental Health and Substance Abuse Social Worker](https://nuecareer.com/careers/mental-health-and-substance-abuse-social-worker) — median $60,280
- [Mental Health Counselor](https://nuecareer.com/careers/mental-health-counselor) — median $60,320
- [Occupational Therapy Aide](https://nuecareer.com/careers/occupational-therapy-aide) — median $39,160
- [Psychiatrist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/psychiatrist) — median $281,870

## Sources

- **O\*NET** — O\*NET 31.0 Database, August 2026. https://www.onetcenter.org/database.html
- **BLS OEWS** — BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. https://www.bls.gov/oes/
- **BLS EP** — BLS Employment Projections, Table 1.2, 2025–2035. https://www.bls.gov/emp/
- **BEA RPP** — BEA Regional Price Parities by State, 2024. https://www.bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metro-area

---

This bank includes information from the O\*NET 31.0 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). O\*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. NueCareer has transformed the data by joining it to BLS wage and projection data and deriving facet, personality-fit and AI-resilience scores. BLS and BEA data are public domain (17 U.S.C. §105).

O\*NET content is used under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). How these figures are sourced and derived: https://nuecareer.com/careers/methodology

JSON representation of this page: https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/art-therapist