I help people reconnect with themselves through art, nature, and mindful creativity.
I'm Deryal Yuksel — a psychologist and art therapist. For years I've worked with individuals and groups who long to understand themselves through making, rather than only through talking.
My work is nature-based, mindful and rooted in self-compassion. There's no right way to create here — only your way, met gently and without judgement.
Deryal studied Psychology at Boston University, went on to a master's in Counseling for Mental Health and Wellness at New York University, and completed an MSc in Psychological Therapies at Queen Mary University of London — with a thesis on the effect of mentalization-based treatment for borderline personality disorder.
During her years in the United States she volunteered on the Parental Stress Line and Crisis Text Line, trained in modern psychoanalysis at the Center for Modern Psychoanalytic Studies, and studied analytical psychology at the C.G. Jung Foundation in New York.
Back in Türkiye she deepened her clinical training across child and adolescent mental health at Cerrahpaşa Medical Faculty and several İstanbul clinics and hospitals, and completed Hakan Kızıltan's programme in the theory, clinic and technique of dynamic psychotherapy. She held individual psychotherapy sessions at Art Psikiyatri (2019–2022), worked as a research and teaching assistant at İstanbul Rumeli University, and practised as an expert psychologist at its psychology centre (İRUPUYAM).
From 2022 to 2024 she worked as an art therapist in the Addiction Service of the French Lape Hospital, discovering the transformative power of art in recovery alongside the people she worked with. She trained as an art therapy practitioner with İstanbul Sanatla Yaşam — graduating with a thesis on therapeutic photography and nature-walk group work — and studied Judy Weiser's PhotoTherapy Techniques with the Weiser-accredited Italian trainer Francesca Belgiojoso.
Today she works in İstanbul with adolescents and adults in individual psychotherapy, art therapy and phototherapy, leads workshops on art therapy, phototherapy and therapeutic photography, and gives seminars at İFSAK and various universities.
"For me, therapy is not only about healing — it is about remembering yourself, reconnecting with your inner voice, and feeling life from a deeper, softer place. Art, photography and awareness have been a compass, for me and for those I work with."
Shall we begin?
Reach out about individual work, a workshop, retreat or course.