Sidney has used art to overcome disabilities suffered in an automobile accident when he was struck by a reckless driver. Self-taught, his watercolor and oil paintings of landscapes have been exhibited in many NuVisions shows, at exhibits of the Maine Line Center for the Arts, and Moss Rehab International Exhibit for Artists with Disabilities. |
Marietta holds both Bachelor's and Master's degrees in Art Education. She has designed and taught classes in various art forms for students, including special needs youths, for over 20 years. In 1982, Marietta founded the Dantonio Art Center, which became a non-profit organization in 1996 and was renamed the National Art Resource and Training Services Center. In March, 1998, Marietta was named Art Educator of the Year by the Art Educators of Delaware and was honored at the National Art Education Association's conference. Marietta's artwork is included in various private and business collections. She has been involved with the Special Needs Program since 1997. After one year of continuous hard work, tenacity, creativity, and the unselfish volunteerism of over 200 participants- many with mental challenges, hearing and visual impairments-Art Sense, a nine-foot mural, was created. The hopeful message for viewers, either visually or through touch, is one of experiencing heightened awareness of the senses through the creative expression of art. This extraordinary mosaic was the combined effort of Rik Fryer, Harrison Hober, Mary Kate McKinley, Pat Shawe, Diana Stevenson, Alexander Trotty, Terre Walton, along with the over 200 participants from: Brandywine High School Honor Society; The Davidson School, Primary, Middle and Secondary classes; Elwyn Inc., Therapeutic Recreation and Residential Recreation Departments; Holy Rosary Jr. Art Honor Society; National A.R.T.S. Center Art Honor Society. |
John Sears has been making art since he was a young boy in South Bend, Indiana. For the past 29 years he has been an integral part of the active art community in Bucks County. His work has been included in exhibits throughout the United States and has received many awards, including the Patron's Prize for Graphics at the Phillips Mill Art Exhibition and second prize for works on paper in the Eighth Annual International Exhibition for Artists with Disabilities sponsored by Moss Rehabilitation Hospital. His art is in both public and private collections, including those of Pittsburgh Plate Glass, Pittsburgh National Bank, Mobil Oil, and Pittsburgh Copper Corporation. A graduate of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Northern Illinois University, where he earned a master's degree in art education, Sears has also been a dedicated and gifted art educator. For 17 years he taught drawing and painting at George School in Newtown, Pennsylvania, and in 1983 he was recognized by Rhode Island School of Design as one of the nation's outstanding secondary art educators. May 17, 1985, John Sears was involved in a near-fatal bicycling accident which left him with a severe head injury and such disabilities as partial paralysis, speech disorders, and double vision, as well as cognitive deficits. Since then he has struggled to continue his work as an artist, having had both good and bad days in the studio. The problems of double vision, cognition, and depression continue to plague me, but I just keep on working. Because I am home alone all day, I concentrate on aspects of my new world-myself; the things that surround me; and things I love, such as sailing and bicycling. I have always done self-portraits, but today they take on new significance as I try to portray both the external and internal changes in myself. Sailing and bicycling have been my passions since I was a young boy and have appeared in my art consistently. Today, however, they are even more important to me and I am constantly attempting to portray the freedom they represent within the limits of my current life. My focus on bicycles, especially, makes viewers who know that I nearly died on a bicycle especially uncomfortable. However, for me, returning to riding a bicycle is an important symbol and goal. I may not get there, but I continue to try. I thank God every day that, although I have lost much, I have retained my ability to create art. |
All of my works explore the perfect harmony that naturally exists in a tree. Each piece incorporates various aspects of a tree, such as ingrown bark, rot and termite damage, along with dynamic crotch-grain, clear heartwood, and subtle grain patterns. These multiple elements, while having very different functions, work collaboratively in the single life form we recognize as a tree. I believe that humanity can learn many things from a tree. We, too, are a balance of growth and decay, solid and void, straight and branched. Modern society, in contrast, focuses on uniformity and singularity that is contrary to the natural diversity and balance of life. Revealing and displaying the harmony of rot and heartwood is to speak the unspeakable: to proclaim that there is just as certainly a relationship between opposing elements in ourselves and in our society. The homeless person is related to the CEO; the physically and mentally challenged to the professional athlete; the victimized to the self-righteous; the marginalized to the mainstream. It is my hope that when the different aspects of wood are seen to work in harmonious benefit and beauty, each of us will see the benefit and beauty in the harmony of our diversity. As the world becomes more and more techno-advanced, creating ever more perfect duplicates, the uniqueness of each piece of wood and the harmonies contained therein speak all the louder. Harmony is the nature of wood, and I strive to execute my designs with simplicity and grace. I make furniture, sculpture, and turnings with West Indian Mahogany trees that were killed during Hurricane Hugo in 1989. I call my large turnings Herculean Vessels. I invite everyone to touch these pieces and connect with the life of harmonious beauty. |
I am continually exploring ways to weave together multiple interests through my primary discipline, painting. I strive to make visible the connection I sense, see, and intuit, transposing them and their somatic psychological and spiritual overtones into painted form. Languages of color, shape, music, metaphor, and personal symbols, as well as linear/phonetic and ideographic, are among the tools I use to communicate. Through these multiple languages, I discover myself and communicate with others, exploring ideas such as: when are these expressions only personal, and what and how does the personal/psychological become universal/mythic? These ideas include a number of new paradigms in science and medicine: cellular memory; the neurophysiology and biochemistry (literally: the structure and functioning) of emotion; how trauma is remembered by structure and, thus, how expression of that remembrance may relieve physical and emotional pain. It is clear to me that color and shape both express and trigger resonances with physical, psychological, and spiritual experience. I see my work as a paradoxical quest to know ourselves (literally) and through this knowledge stay in contact with mystery and awe. |
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I was born in Elberton, GA, and came to Philadelphia in 1952 where I attended the Overbrook School for the Blind. I have been going to class at Allens Lane Art Center since February of this year. I have seen pieces of sculpture, but before this year I have not done any at all. Through the hands-on experience I have received from my instructor, I really became aware of its beauty. |
Arnold Williams was born in Pennsylvania. He attended the Overbrook School for the Blind from 1952-1964. He took some art classes there and learned to cane chairs. He married Mary Jo Williams (see p. 33) at the school and they both attended the Visions Through Art sculpture class at the Allens Lane Art Center in Philadelphia, PA. |
In 1967 I was involved in a catastrophic auto accident that severed my spine and confined me to a wheelchair but did not break my spirit. Though his vocation is a Training and Development Officer for the City of Philadelphia, Arnie's avocation is creating interactive sculptures that have earned him many awards and honors. He holds Bachelor's and MBS degrees from Temple University in industrial engineering. Arnie's background in mechanics and keen sense of humor are reflected in his talking, moving, and human interest sculptures. His work has appeared in Art Matters and in many private collections. He retired in 1985 to devote full-time to his avocation as a sculpture. One of the many articles that have appeared in the Philadelphia Inquirer stated that, "many of Arnie's unusual sculptures not only reflect his background in engineering and mechanics (i.e., they move and/or speak through the use of weights, solar energy, or electronics), but also indicate an active imagination and sense of humor." |
I have Ushers Syndrome (Retinitis Pigmentosa and nerve deafness) and have been blind since 1984. Originally a painter, I now do sculpture. I work in clay, plaster, and other materials, and exhibit widely. I have been making, studying, and teaching art all my life. Blindness has been one of my greatest teachers. It has taught me that I am not a body, but a mind and a spirit, and that the body's eyes have nothing to do with vision. |
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