[Art_beyond_sight_learning_tools] links to articles and sites

[Lisa Yayla]

Hi,
A mix of links to news articles and web sites. 
News about Inaugural BlindArt Exhibition, London in March
with link to site. 
Unsure of how to present links and text. Is it OK to have a
list of links first with title of article before links and
after link list text version of articles?
What do you think? 
All the best,
Lisa

News articles
Gary Sargeant artist
http://www.saga.co.uk/magazine/article/7B2AC503-03B9-11D8-B8CA-00508BAEC55C.asp?bhcp=1
 Gary Sargeant  Brussels home for a little piece of
Yorkshire
http://www.britainineurope.org.uk/inyourarea/yorkshire/news/little-piece-of-yorkshire

Wicked Will Offer Three Kinds Of Listening Devices
http://arts.monstersandcritics.com/news/article_3974.php/Wicked_Will_Offer_Three_Kinds_Of_Listening_Devices

(might be a repeat)
Blind graduate student 'reads' maps using CU software that
converts color into sound 
http://www.news.cornell.edu/Chronicle/05/1.27.05/Wong_map_software.html

Java Breakthrough: Code That Helps Blind People To Read Maps
http://sys-con.com/story/?storyid=47933&DE=1

Artist uses her craft to help Haitian children 
http://www.middletownpress.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=13852855&BRD=1645&PAG=461&dept_id=10856&rfi=6

Bit off topic, interesting reads
Sound idea offers help to the blind
http://www.yorkshiretoday.co.uk/ViewArticle2.aspx?SectionID=1299&ArticleID=933532  
?????


Connecting the dots
With communication technologies exploding exponentially, can
Braille — invented in 1829 and largely unchanged since —
still be relevant?
article about National Braille Press
http://www.bostonphoenix.com/boston/news_features/other_stories/multi-page/documents/04446428.asp

Sight links

Artist Gary Sargeant  
http://www.blindart.net/media/news/display?contentId=2664
 
RNIB Fun, games and learning for children
http://www.rnib.org.uk/xpedio/groups/public/documents/PublicWebsite/public_wel0105games.hcsp#P6_1154

BlindArt
http://www.blindart.net/exhibitions/inaugural_2005

The opening of the Inaugural BlindArt Exhibition by Rt. Hon.
Estelle Morris MP, Minister for the Arts, held on the 2nd of
March 2005 from 6:30-9:00PM, in London. 

BlindArt’s Inaugural exhibition – Sense & Sensuality – will
be drawn from the very best submissions by both sighted and
visually impaired artists to the first nationwide open
competition. The exhibition will invite both the sighted and
visually impaired to celebrate art experienced through all
five senses. 


http://www.artatyourfingertips.co.uk/

Art At Your Fingertips reproduces famous pictures in a
tactile form for the benefit of people with visual
impairment and their sighted companions. 

The pictures in the library are created with embroidery and
a wide range of fabrics selected to provide suitable
textures for each interpreted work 

A summary of each picture is supplied both on audio cassette
and in Braille. 

The pictures currently available for hire to organisations
and individuals are displayed by clicking on the Gallery
link at the bottom of this page and information about hiring
them is found by clicking on Library

RNIB Arts and crafts
http://www.rnib.org.uk/xpedio/groups/public/documents/PublicWebsite/public_artsandcrafts.hcsp

Painting from a New Perspective painting and sight loss
(main link and other)
http://info.rnib.org.uk/blindartists/
http://info.rnib.org.uk/blindartists/Strategies.htm
http://info.rnib.org.uk/blindartists/AudioDesc.htm
http://info.rnib.org.uk/blindartists/YourTurn.htm

book 'Painting from  a New Perspective' 
http://info.rnib.org.uk/blindartists/Ordering.htm
Book details: 50 pages with 27 full colour pictures of
paintings, together with many others of the artists and of
them at work. It costs £9 and is available in print (minimum
14 point), braille and audio-cassette tape.

Links RNIB information about art and visual impairment
http://info.rnib.org.uk/blindartists/FurtherLinks.htm

contains links to disabled artists' sites. A number of these
artists have a visual impairment.
http://www.ndaf.org/


The Art House is a membership organization that supports the
work of disabled and non-disabled artists aspiring to
develop their professional practice. It believes that this
is only possible through equal access to work, training and
accessible exhibitions.
http://www.the-arthouse.org.uk/

The Art House is a membership organization that supports the
work of disabled and non-disabled artists aspiring to
develop their professional practice. It believes that this
is only possible through equal access to work, training and
accessible exhibitions.


Audio description
http://www.vocaleyes.co.uk/
text version http://www.vocaleyes.co.uk/about.htm
Flash version http://www.vocaleyes.co.uk/main.cfm?094104


Photography
The Disabled Photographers' Society is an organisation that
encourages disabled people to take up photography. They give
support including technical advice on equipment, a quarterly
newsletter and the chance for members to exhibit work at an
annual exhibition. Telephone 01256 35 19 90 for more
information.
http://www.dps-uk.org.uk/


Text to articles
Artist uses her craft to help Haitian children 
By AMY L. ZITKA, The Herald Press01/30/2005

MIDDLEFIELD -- Cindy House wants to help disabled orphans in
Haiti through the healing power of art. 

House took her first trip to Haiti in the fall as a
volunteer with Healing Hands for Haiti. She is now working
at bringing a mural project to the country’s orphanages in
the spring.
  
"I was online looking for a short-term volunteering
opportunity," House recalled recently. She began to e-mail a
man from a Canadian volunteering team that worked with a
Boston-based non-profit organization that brings
rehabilitation medicine to Haiti. "It sounded really good,
and I decided to go. I’ve never done anything like that
before."

The Healing Hands for Haiti International Foundation is
dedicated to fostering the expansion and quality of
rehabilitation services for the benefit of physically
disabled adults and children in Haiti, according to the
organization’s Web site. The organization emphasizes
rehabilitation educa-tion, clinical treatment, disability
prevention, and increasing public awareness of disabilities
and rehabilitation in Haiti. 

Its goal is to provide treatment, physical and occupational
rehabilitation, and education to the people of Haiti,
according to the Web site. 

"It was an adventure," House said of her two-week trip in
September. House went with a team from Boston, which visited
orphanages, leprosy clinics and hospitals. She spent most of
her trip touring orphanages in Port-au-Prince. "I just
jumped right in. The experience was life-changing."

"I can’t just sit and not go back," she said. "I felt like I
had to do more."

Most of the children in the orphanages she visited had
single parents, House said.

"The parents had to make an agonizing choice," she said,
especially if the child had special needs. 

At one orphanage, the children were under 3 years old, while
the other had children up to teenagers. Some of the children
in the orphanages were disabled, requiring wheelchairs,
walkers or prosthetics. Others were autistic or blind.

The children had little interaction or contact with people.
House recalled a toddler -- 2 years old -- who could not
stand or walk. The child had no muscle tone in his legs and
had never pulled up or held on to someone to try standing.

There were no toys or crayons at the orphanages, she
recalled.

"The kids didn’t know what a crayon was," House said. She
thought of what could be done. While volunteering with a
domestic violence shelter 12 years ago in Washington, D.C.,
House painted a fence that surrounded the shelter for the
children. "There was a lot of power in that. I got excited
thinking about that."

"There was no stimulation," House said as she recalled her
experiences of one of the orphanages that was in the back of
the general hospital. "There were no smiles and no eye
contact."

House has started a new division within the Healing Hands
for Haiti foundation with a mural project.

"They need stimulation and physical therapy equipment," she
said. House’s idea is to make mu-rals that are interactive
and tactile for physical therapy benefits. Pieces of therapy
equipment, such as handles for children to pull themselves
up, would be cemented to the walls to prevent them from
being stolen.

"We would let the children put their own images on the wall
-- something made by their own hands," House said. Having
had an artistic background from the School of Art Institute
in Chicago, House knows the healing power of creating art.
The mural concept fits within the foundation’s
rehabilitative mission, she added.

House, who is planning on returning to Haiti in March or
April, is seeking donations and volunteers to assist with
the project. House plans on doing one or two murals during
her upcoming trip.

"Eventually I would like to do (murals) all over
Port-au-Prince and other parts of Haiti if it’s successful,"
she said. 

Her goal is to come up with a design that can be made into
stencils so non-artists can easily replicate the basic
design, House said.

"I want the children to participate," she said, adding the
children would be able to trace each other and become part
of the mural. "I want the mural to represent these children.
The most im-portant part is they participate. They can claim
each part of that wall."

A doctor on the Canadian team is "scouting out" the
orphanages to determine at what orphanages there is the
greatest need in order to implement the mural project, House
said.

Anyone interested in further information about the project,
donating or volunteering for the project can contact Cindy
House by e-mail at cndy_house at yahoo.com.

To contact Amy L. Zitka, call (860) 347-3331 ext. 211 or
e-mail azitka at middletownpress.com. 



Wicked Will Offer Three Kinds Of Listening Devices
By Amy Somensky Jan 31, 2005, 15:57 GMT
     
New York: The Gershwin Theatre, Wicked's Broadway home, will
be the first venue in the world to have captioning for the
deaf, audio description for the blind and a translation
system available at every performance. These
state-of-the-art communications tools, developed by Richard
Fitzgerald of Sound Associates, Inc., have been funded in
part by the National Institute For Special Need Audiences
(NISNA). While each of these services has been available at
other venues, WICKED will be the first show for which all
three are available, making it the most accessible show
anywhere.

ShowTrans (now available) is a revolutionary service that
provides automated multilingual descriptive commentary of a
theatrical production for the non-English speaking audience
at every single performance. Better than a word-for-word
translation, the system gives the patrons continual plot and
dialogue information that enables them to follow the action,
intention, humor and emotion of the show. At WICKED, the
languages offered are Japanese, Spanish, French and
Portuguese.

Audio Description for the Blind (available late February)
offers blind or sight-impaired audience members a detailed
description of all the visual aspects of the production,
including choreography, lighting, sets and costumes. Like
ShowTrans and I-Caption, it is timed perfectly to the show's
cueing system.

I-Caption (now available) is a revolutionary hand-held
captioning system for the deaf and hearing-impaired
theatergoer. The device, approximately the size of a small
PDA, displays verbatim texts of the entire show, including
lyrics, announcements and show information. It is visible to
the user, but is designed in such a way that it is not a
distraction to those in surrounding seats.



Blind graduate student 'reads' maps using CU software that
converts color into sound 
By Thomas Oberst 

A melody of staccato piano notes sings out from the speakers
of Victor K. Wong's desktop computer. But it is not a melody
made by Bach or Liberace or even Alicia Keys. It is the
melody of color.   
Engineering graduate student Victor Kai-Chu Wong uses
software he helped develop with undergraduate Ankur Moitra,
left, and research associate James Ferwerda, right, that
translates colors into sounds. The image-to-sound software
enables Wong to continue his research into space weather. He
is shown working with a space weather map that represents
atmospheric density in different colors. Frank
DiMeo/University Photography  

Wong, a Cornell graduate student from Hong Kong who lost his
sight in a road accident at age 7, is helping to develop
innovative software that translates color into sound. "Color
is something that does not exist in the world of a blind
person," explains Wong. "I could see before, so I know what
it is. But there is no way that I can think of to give an
exact idea of color to someone who has never seen before." 

He helped develop the software in Cornell's Department of
Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) with undergraduate
engineering student Ankur Moitra and research associate
James Ferwerda from the Program of Computer Graphics. 

The inspiration for using image-to-sound software came in
early 2004 when Wong realized his problems in reading
color-scaled weather maps of the Earth's upper atmosphere --
a task that is a necessary part of his doctoral work in
Professor Mike Kelley's ECE research group. 

It is a field dubbed "space weather," which attempts to
predict weather patterns high over the equator for use by
Global Positioning System and other satellite
communications. A space weather map might show altitude in
the vertical direction (along the y-axis), time in the
horizontal direction (along the x-axis) and represent
density with different colors. 

As a scientist, Wong needs to know more than just the
general shape of an image. He needs to explore minute
fluctuations and discern the numerical values of the pixels
so that he can create mathematical models that match the
image. "Color is an extra dimension," explains Wong. 

At first, the team tried everything from having Kelley
verbally describe the maps to Wong to attempting to print
the maps in Braille. When none of those methods provided the
detail and resolution Wong needed, he and Ferwerda began
investigating software. Moitra later became their project
programmer. 

"We started with the basic research question of how to
represent a detailed color-scaled image to someone who is
blind," recalls Ferwerda. "The most natural approach was to
try sound, since color and pitch can be directly related and
[the human ear's] sensitivity to changes in pitch is quite
good." 

Over the summer of 2004, Moitra wrote a Java computer code
that could translate images into sound, and in August he
unveiled a rudimentary software program capable of
converting pixels of various colors into piano notes of
various tones. 

Wong test-drove the software by exploring a color photograph
of a parrot. He used a rectangular Wacom tablet and stylus
-- a computer input device used as an alternative to the
mouse -- which gives an absolute reference to the computer
screen, with the bottom left-hand corner of the tablet
always corresponding to the bottom left-hand corner of the
screen. 

As Wong guided the stylus about the tablet, piano notes
began to sing out. The full range of keys on a piano was
employed, allowing color resolution in 88 gradations,
ranging from blue for the lowest notes to red for the
highest. 

The software also has an image-to-speech feature that reads
aloud the numerical values of the x- and y-coordinates as
well as the value associated with a color at any given point
on the image. "In principle I could turn off the music and
just have the software read out the value of each point,"
Wong says. "I would know what the gradient is in a more
absolute sense, but it would get annoying after some time.
It keeps reading out '200.1,' '200.8,' '200.5' and so on." 

One of the biggest challenges of the project is the
so-called "land-and-sea" problem. "Sometimes I just want to
know where is the land and where is the sea," says Wong --
meaning that he would like to have an idea where the major
boundaries in the image lie, such as the boundary between
the parrot and the background. The problem hinges on
shape-recognition, which for Wong can be difficult. 

In the simplest situation, the right half of an image would
be completely blue and the left half completely red. To find
the boundary, Wong has to move the stylus continuously back
and forth from one color to the next along the length of the
tablet, which is both time-consuming and error-prone. 

To solve the land-and-sea problem, Wong, Moitra and Ferwerda
tried printing the major boundary lines of an image in
Braille and then laying the printed sheet over the Wacom
tablet, combining both audio and tactile detection. However,
they are still working to develop software that can
effectively pick out the important boundaries in an image so
that they can be printed. 

"It is also important that there is no time delay between
notes," said Moitra. "That is something we need to improve.
Otherwise, the image will become shifted and distorted in
Victor's mind." 

One of the major issues facing the project is funding. "The
initial work was done on a shoestring as a side project to
grants Kelley and I have received," says Ferwerda, who is
preparing a proposal to the National Science Foundation to
extend this work and explore other ideas for making images
and other technical content accessible to blind scientists
and engineers. 

Says Wong, "Tackling complex color images is only one
problem out of many that blind scientists are facing. But I
think this is a pretty important idea." 

Reported and written by Thomas Oberst, a science writer
intern with Cornell News Service. 

January 27, 2005
 


Java Breakthrough: Code That Helps Blind People To Read Maps
Cornell Student Ankur Moitra Uses Java to Write Pioneering
Image-to-Sound Software
January 27, 2005
Summary
Take Java computer code that can translate images into
sound, via a rudimentary software program capable of
converting pixels of various colors into piano notes of
various tones, and what you have is a technology that
enables blind people to read maps.

 Take Java computer code that can translate images into
sound, via a rudimentary software program capable of
converting pixels of various colors into piano notes of
various tones, and what you have is a technology that
enables blind people to read maps. 
Victor K. Wong, a Cornell University graduate student from
Hong Kong who lost his sight in a road accident at age
seven, is helping to develop innovative software that
translates color into sound. "Color is something that does
not exist in the world of a blind person," explains Wong. "I
could see before, so I know what it is. But there is no way
that I can think of to give an exact idea of color to
someone who has never seen before." 

He helped develop the software in Cornell's Department of
Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) with undergraduate
engineering student Ankur Moitra and research associate
James Ferwerda from the Program of Computer Graphics. 

The inspiration for using image-to-sound software came in
early 2004 when Wong realized his problems in reading
color-scaled weather maps of the Earth's upper atmosphere -
a task that is a necessary part of his doctoral work in
Professor Mike Kelley's ECE research group. 

It is a field dubbed "space weather," which attempts to
predict weather patterns high over the equator for use by
Global Positioning System and other satellite
communications. A space weather map might show altitude in
the vertical direction (along the "y" axis), time in the
horizontal direction (along the "x" axis), and represent
density with different colors. 

As a scientist, Wong needs to know more than just the
general shape of an image. He needs to explore minute
fluctuations and discern the numerical values of the pixels
so that he can create mathematical models that match the
image. "Color is an extra dimension," explains Wong. 

At first, the team tried everything from having Kelley
verbally describe the maps to Wong to attempting to print
the maps in Braille. When none of those methods provided the
detail and resolution Wong needed, he and Ferwerda began
investigating software. Moitra later became their project
programmer."We started with the basic research question of
how to represent a detailed color-scaled image to someone
who is blind," recalls Ferwerda. "The most natural approach
was to try sound, since color and pitch can be directly
related and sensitivity to changes in pitch is quite good." 

Over the summer of 2004, Moitra wrote a Java routine that
could translate images into sound, and in August he unveiled
a rudimentary software program capable of converting pixels
of various colors into piano notes of various tones. 

Wong test-drove the software by exploring a color photograph
of a parrot. He used a rectangular Wacom tablet and stylus -
a computer input device used as an alternative to the mouse
- which gives an absolute reference to the computer screen,
with the bottom left-hand corner of the tablet always
corresponding to the bottom left-hand corner of the screen. 

As Wong guided the stylus about the tablet, piano notes
began to sing out. The full range of keys on a piano was
employed, allowing color resolution in 88 gradations,
ranging from blue for the lowest notes to red for the
highest. 

The software also has an image-to-speech feature that reads
aloud the numerical values of the x and y coordinates as
well as the value associated with a color at any given point
on the image. "In principle I could turn off the music and
just have the software read out the value of each point. I
would know what the gradient is in a more absolute sense,
but it would get annoying after some time. It keeps reading
out 200.1, 200.8, 200.5, and so on," says Wong. 

One of the biggest challenges of the project is the
so-called "land-and-sea" problem. "Sometimes I just want to
know where is the land and where is the sea," says Wong -
meaning that he would like to have an idea where the major
boundaries in an image lie, such as the boundary between the
parrot and the background. The problem hinges on shape
recognition, which for Wong can be difficult. 

In the simplest situation, the right half of an image would
be completely blue and the left half completely red. To find
the boundary Wong has to move the stylus continuously back
and forth from one color to the next along the length of the
tablet, which is both time-consuming and error prone. 

To solve the land-and-sea problem, Wong, Moitra and Ferwerda
tried printing the major boundary lines of an image in
Braille and then laying the printed sheet over the Wacom
tablet, combining both audio and tactile detection. However,
they are still working to develop software that can
effectively pick out the important boundaries in an image so
that it can be printed. 

"It is also important that there is no time delay between
notes," says Moitra. "That is something we need to improve.
Otherwise the image will become shifted and distorted in
Victor's mind." 

One of the major issues facing the project is funding. "The
initial work was done on a shoestring as a side project to
grants Kelley and I have received," says Ferwerda, who is
preparing a proposal to the National Science Foundation to
extend this work and explore other ideas for making images
and other technical content accessible to blind scientists
and engineers. 

Says Wong: "Tackling complex color images is only one
problem out of many that blind scientists are facing. But I
think this is a pretty important idea." 


November 2003 issue
  
Light in a dark world   
 
Michael Wright meets Gary Sargeant, a blind man who has
refused to allow physical disabilities to interfere with his
inspirational and vivid life as one of Britain's greatest
artists

Gary Sargeant's studio must be the tidiest in the world.
Visiting it, you feel a bit like every German commandant
you've seen inspecting huts in a prisoner-of-war film, just
a split-second after the chaps have magically hidden all the
chaotic detritus of the tunnel they were digging. Search as
you may, you can find no evidence of all that feverish
activity, but you know it's here.

For in this space, in the perfectly ordered conservatory of
a quaint brick cottage within chiming distance of the bells
of Beverley Minster in east Yorkshire, is where Sargeant -
arguably one of Britain's greatest living painters, admired
by the venerable LS Lowry and befriended by Philip Larkin
when they were both on the staff of Hull University -
creates his extraordinary paintings. He uses a brush, a
palette knife or his fingers to daub the oil pigments on to
the canvas as thickly as mashed potato.

"If I were sighted, I could have a chaotic studio," says
Sargeant. "But I can't live in chaos. It's got to be
orderly, or else I won't know where things are." A stocky,
powerfully built man with smooth skin and tufty, silvery
hair, Sargeant readjusts his Raybans as his wife, Val,
brings in a tray of tea. "Leave things on the floor, and
he'll fall over them," says Val with a grim twinkle. "And if
I impale my feet, I'll get gangrene," adds Sargeant.

He isn't being dramatic - Sargeant, 64, is one of the
calmest, most self-deprecating artists one could hope to
meet. It just happens that, besides being blind, he has no
sensation in the soles of his feet, which leaves him open to
gangrene because of his diabetes. Add to that an inoperable
back condition ("the last five vertebrae are breaking up")
and breathing difficulties which force him to wear a noisy
face mask every night, and you can see why Gary Sargeant
might have reason to feel peeved at his lot.

But not a bit of it. As he prepares to mount a one-man
exhibition of his work at the headquarters of the European
Parliament in Brussels, following a successful solo show at
the House of Commons earlier this year, Sargeant speaks with
quiet passion about his art, and the intense process of
painting a picture when you cannot see.

Sceptics have suggested that there must be some trickery
involved. For we are not talking of random splodges
abstractly daubed on to canvas. Sargeant's paintings are
powerfully evocative works which are held in public
collections all over the world. We have grown accustomed to
the deaf Beethoven composing transcendent music he was
unable to hear. But how can a blind man paint? And why would
he bother?

"I know it isn't madness," declares Sargeant, by way of
explanation, "because - having been through mental
breakdowns - I've got a piece of paper saying I'm not mad."
He smiles. "No, being able to create something that didn't
exist before gives me a wonderful feeling of satisfaction.
But it's so absorbing and so difficult to do that I'm still
trying to find out - as Leonardo da Vinci said - how to do
it."

A powerful talent, evident from his earliest years, helped.
"I was born a painter, with this innate ability to draw and
understand visual concepts," he says. "Before I went to
school, I understood perspective, so that I could draw
things in three dimensions when I was four years old." But
Sargeant, the young artist blessed with extraordinary gifts,
was slowly losing his sight. "I had a squint that wasn't
corrected," he says. "So my right eye didn't really
function."

Two mental breakdowns appeared to accelerate the decline in
his one good eye, yet he has an awesome visual memory. "I
can recall visually in my mind a scene, a dream or an idea
for a painting, even though I can't now see."

Knowing the shapes of the physical world is one thing;
transmuting them into powerful works of art is another, such
as his majestic studies of the Market Cross in Beverley, in
which an elegant tower is caged in a riot of scaffolding.
Early in his career, he had painted bombed-out London
buildings - their blasted, poetic souls on display - and it
is easy to trace a link to his subject matter today. 

"I get feelings about places," explains Sargeant, indicating
a darkly evocative painting of a tunnel of woven boughs.
"Val and I came across this yew-tree tunnel in Yorkshire.
And walking through it and touching it, I felt that I wanted
to paint it." So they returned, again and again, and
Sargeant spent four years painting this one subject.

"I use my stick," he says, referring to his white cane, "and
I will say, 'It's one stick before the first branch comes
out,' and then 'it's so many sticks wide.' And that will all
be marked down." Physically embracing his leafy subjects
helps, too. "If I can't reach, we'll both do it, so the
circumference of the tree is both Val's and my arms."
Gradually, this intensive team-effort builds up a distinct
picture in Sargeant's mind, and he is able to compose a
miniature template using blobs of Blu-Tak pressed on to a
page in a kind of Braille diagram. 

>From here, a grid of thick impasto on the canvas itself
gives Sargeant his bearings, as he calls upon his awesome
mind-hand co-ordination and several years' experience of
painting vast theatrical backcloths for Covent Garden and
Sadler's Wells. "When you're painting on a rolled canvas
that is 30 foot by 40 foot," says Val, "you need to carry
the subject around in your head. And this is the same."

Fishing around in the store-room beside the studio, Val
pulls out a paint-spattered tray laden with tubes of gooey
oil paint in various shades of lemon and ochre. "This'll be
the yellow tray, with all the different types of yellow,"
she says. "If I say to Gary, 'that's Naples Yellow,' he
knows from his visual memory of painting precisely what
Naples Yellow looks like, because he has this photographic
memory of colour. And he knows how they'll combine. So he'll
say, "No, I'm after something a bit more punchy. Naples
Yellow is a bit bland for what I want here." Val laughs.
"And here's the green tray, and the blue tray," says Val,
producing yet more gleaming grey tubes, oozing paint, like a
magician's assistant demonstrating her maestro's props.

The pair of them make a delightfully balanced couple, his
gentle intellectuality counterpoised by her firm
practicality. "I asked Val to marry me on our first date,"
says Sargeant, "and we got married as soon as we could after
that. I just instinctively knew that there was a bit of me
in Val, and a bit of Val in me. And that we complemented
each other. I never had any doubts that it wouldn't be a
lifetime relationship."

At 64, Sargeant has the air of a man happy to have reached
this point on life's journey. "I believe that I couldn't do
what I'm doing now, were I not 64," he says. "As for
posterity, I hope that having my work in public and private
collections will protect it. The opinion now seems to be
that my work is important in terms of British painting, and
it's nice to have that acknowledged and recognised."

It has become fashionable to venerate artists for showing us
the extremes of existence, for posting back reports from the
edge of the abyss, or demonstrating just how far they are
willing to push the boundaries of what was once considered
tasteful. Gary Sargeant has been closer to the edge of that
abyss than most. Yet he has continued to paint works that
are resolutely unfashionable, in the sense that they are
unashamedly figurative, painstakingly composed, and eschew
elephant dung, Barbie Doll colours and the butcher's saw in
favour of poetic inspiration, solid composition and elegant
technique.

The very act of painting is in itself a message of defiance
against the gathering darkness. And these deeply humane
works - the outpourings of a blind man, teaching the rest of
us how to see - look likely to survive us all.


09-Nov-2004

Brussels home for a little piece of Yorkshire

A unique painting by Yorkshire artist Gary Sargeant will
today (9 November) be unveiled in the European Parliament
building in Brussels.

Mr Sargeant, a professional artist from Beverley, depicts
Yorkshire landscapes uses thick, textured oil paints,
meaning that his work can be enjoyed by blind as well as
sighted people. He himself is visually impaired.

The painting to be unveiled today by the President of
Parliament is `Yew Tunnel', a scene from Helmsley, North
Yorkshire. After the ceremony today, the painting will hang
in a prestigious location in the Parliament building.

Mr Sargeant is already no stranger to the European
Parliament. In September 2003, local Labour MEP Richard
Corbett arranged for a week-long exhibition of his work in
celebration of European Year of Disabled People.

Richard Corbett MEP said: "It's a testament to the quality
of Gary's work that the President of the Parliament himself
has selected this painting after visiting the exhibition
last September. Now Gary's unique image of Yorkshire will be
displayed here permanently to commemorate the success of
2003 as the European Year of Disabled People."

Gary Sargeant's work has also been exhibited in the House of
Commons.