[Art_beyond_sight_learning_tools] technology, exhibits, photography

[Lisa Yayla]

Hi,
Links to articles about various subjects, technological research, 
exhibits, one very interesting in Boston about tactile photography. Have 
included text to most of articles, though where subject of interest is a 
short bit, have just included link to article.
Exhibition Senses run through to Oct 30 at the The Danforth Museum of 
Art's at the Danforth, 123 Union Ave., Framingham.
Regards,
Lisa

ASU lab has a vision for the blind
http://www.eastvalleytribune.com/index.php?sty=48002

Artisans Illustrate Courage
http://www.fchornet.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2005/09/22/433309a92255a

Berkeley: Blind photographer's vision extends beyond her eyes
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/chronicle/archive/2005/02/18/EBG90B98SE1.DTL

Blind artist's works go on show
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/Story.asp?Article=122337&Sn=BNEW&IssueID=28183

Finding confidence, friendship at a yearly retreat (camp with art)
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/aplocal_story.asp?category=6420&slug=Blind%20Deaf%20Retreat

Performing beyond their limitations (a bit about Mexico Blind Theater)
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1127182724321

Tactile photography
http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2005/09/22/indian_dances_both_old_and_new/?page=2
Among the exhibits opening is ''Mariliana Arvelo and James Patten: 
Senses," a show documenting the deaf and blind
community that pairs photographs with etchings of the same images so 
they can be touched by the blind.
''These are both young, emerging artists in their 20s, and their work is 
fantastic," French said of the
Cambridge-based couple. ''It's wonderful that the people in the pictures 
can 'see' the pictures by touching them,
but it also really challenges a sighted person to think about how we 
see, and what's available to us, and how we
access our vision."
blurb about the exhibit Senses
http://futurefeeder.com/index.php/archives/2005/09/16/tactile-photography/
exhibition Senses
http://www.jamespatten.com/tactilephoto/




ASU lab has a vision for the blind
By Sara Thorson, Tribune
September 14, 2005
An Arizona State University lab aims to help the blind do something even 
the sighted can’t. Scientists at the
Center for Cognitive Ubiquitous Computing, or CUbiC, are developing a 
pair of gloves that would take just seconds
to create a virtual object for the wearer to feel after a spoken or 
gestured command.

Related Links
Cognitive ubiquitous computing center
Today's Top Stories
News
Education

Called a haptic interface, the gloves would allow the blind — who often 
see by touching — to use their sense of
touch to see distant objects or ones that can’t be touched.
"Let’s say you’re in a museum and there is a 1,000-year-old bowl, you 
can’t really touch it, but you can see it,"
says Daniel Villanueva, a CUbiC research assistant. Wearing the haptic 
interface equipment would allow someone to
feel the shape and texture of such an object without touching it or 
seeing it, he said.
"It’s kind of like virtual reality but through your hands," Villanueva 
said.
So while sighted people could only eye that 1,000-yearold bowl behind 
its glass case, a person who is visually
impaired and wearing the gloves could feel its shape and texture.
Devices like the gloves exemplify cognitive, ubiquitous computing. The 
science involves using computer technology
in everyday life to do everyday things.
The haptic interface gloves are part of a group of devices in CUbiC’s 
flagship project called iCARE, short for
Information technology Centric Assistive and Rehabilitative Environment.
The idea is to create unobtrusive computing devices to help the visually 
impaired with aspects of life such as
studying, recognizing friends and family, visiting a museum and shopping 
in a store. So, at CUbiC, it’s what you
don’t see that puts the lab on the cutting edge.
"It’s one of those labs that’s more internal than visual because we work 
for the blind," says Terry Adams, the
center’s coordinator.
Like the pair of sunglasses with a camera embedded in the nosepiece and 
a speaker in the strap — they look like
regular Oakleys or Ray-Bans, but they’ll tell someone who is blind if a 
familiar person is approaching.
"It looks really, really simple, but behind this is a ton of 
technology," Villanueva said.
One day that technology, in the form of the iCARE Interaction Assistant 
sunglasses, could help the visually
impaired not only recognize familiar people, but learn details like 
their emotional state and whether they’ve
changed their haircut or hair color.
To people who are blind, those simple details can matter most in many 
everyday situations. Shopping in retail
stores where merchandise is constantly rotated on shelves is daunting, 
and touching every breakable item can be an
expensive endeavor.
CUbiC proposes using radio frequency identification tags on merchandise 
in place of barcodes and PalmPilotlike
devices that read the tags to the shopper, said Terri Hedgpeth, a 
research professional at the lab.
"It allows the person who is blind or visually impaired to shop 
independently without sighted assistance," said
Hedgpeth, who is blind.
CUbiC has a mock store full of breakable stuff in its lab at the 
Brickyard on Mill in Tempe for testing its
devices designed for retail situations. Hedgpeth said the lab may use 
the store to show retailers what can be done
with assistive technology.
Perhaps the lab’s bestknown and most complete device is one that is 
crucial on a university campus — the iCARE
Reader makes it more convenient to read and study written material.
The tabletop version looks like an overhead projector with a mounted 
camera that transmits pages of books to a
computer as the reader turns them.
Software translates the written word into the spoken, allowing a person 
who can’t see to read the book.
The software allows for highlighting and skipping passages, and the 
speed at which the text is spoken by the
computer can be sped up or slowed down.
Tabletop iCARE Readers have been installed at the Disability Resources 
building on ASU’s campus, at the Foundation
for Blind Children in Phoenix and in the CUbiC lab.
A portable version of the iCARE reader is now in testing at CUbiC.


Artisans Illustrate Courage
The persistent work of the visually impaired shines at exhibit.
by Renee Cain Hornet Staff Writer
September 22, 2005
Shared Visions is an art exhibit that features works by blind or legally 
blind artists. The Southern California
College of Optometry located at 2575 Yorba Linda Blvd.
in Fullerton will be this years host of the event. There will be a free 
exhibit at the Eye Care Center Saturday,
September 24 from 6–8 p.m.
There will be 45 pieces of art displayed and amongst these pieces there 
will be photography, ceramics, and
paintings. Many of the artists featured will attend the reception which 
is open to the public. This will give
individuals a chance to interact with the artists.
“This exhibit showcases the ability, talents and achievements of these 
most inspirational artists,” according to
Les Walls, O.D., M.D., and President of Southern California College of 
Optometry.
Kurt Weston, photographer, and one of the artists displayed is the 
person responsible for informing the clinic
about the Very Special Arts California organization.
Weston got his degree in business and attempted the corporate world but 
it was not for him so he went back to
school and got a degree in photography.
He became a fashion photographer, but his career dwindled in ’91 when he 
was diagnosed with AIDS. He continued
practicing photography until he was too sick. In 1993 he was informed 
that he has CMV retinitis which caused him
to loose his sight and became legally blind.
Weston was devastated by this news because he would no longer be able to 
pursue his passion of photography.
The CMV was not diagnosed soon enough which caused esophagus problems 
and was given six months to live. He left
Chicago to spend his last moments of life with his younger brother who 
lived in California.
In 1996 they came out with the drug AZT that helped the immune system 
and Kurt’s health completely turned around.
In 1998 after the passing of a close friend, Weston went to a party at 
an organization that his friend spoke
highly of to honor his death.
At the party he was asked if he could create a calendar for them since 
he was a photographer and after careful
consideration, he agreed.
The project was a success, he regained his self confidence and continued 
to pursue his dream once again.
Today Weston is a part of several organizations concerning art for the 
impaired and is attending Cal State
Fullerton to receive his Master’s degree in Art.
When asked how he takes photos, considering he is legally blind, he says 
“art is how you feel or react to
something. This is an inspirational thing, a guy doing it [who is] going 
through hell.” He has a whole series on
how he feels about his visual impairment.
This is an amazing story of a man who faced his illness head on and in 
one brief encounter is fulfilling his
destiny. He is just one of several artists who against the odds has 
defeated their illness by continuing to live
their dreams.
Most of us don’t know much about art except what they teach us in class. 
Even then, it is someone else’s thoughts
or feelings on what it means. Art is not something that is taught, it is 
an individual feeling or reaction that we
have on something we admire. This exhibition commends the 
accomplishments of these visually impaired artists and
the determination to continue living their dreams.
Support these artists by acknowledging their triumphs in life by 
attending the Shared Visions 2005 exhibition.
Berkeley: Blind photographer's vision extends beyond her eyes
Rick DelVecchio, Chronicle Staff Writer
Friday, February 18, 2005



Blindness hasn't removed Berkeley photographer and sculptor Alice 
Wingwall's vision. Pictures keep coming into her
head. Only the way she composes and frames them has changed. She's busy 
with her camera, and her world is full of
color.
One of the life-affirming finds Wingwall made after the ordeal of 
gradually losing her sight to a retinal disease
was that light is one thing, vision another. True vision takes place in 
the brain, not in the eyes.
Wingwall's brain works fine and therefore she thinks and creates 
visually, as before. She not only continues to
make visual art but also is entering a new phase as an artist. She's as 
much in charge of her creativity as she
was when she could see. She just needs her guide dog, her auto-focus 
camera and human helpers to keep her
spatially lined up on the goal her inner eye points toward.
"Most people think it's not possible, but the rest of us are out here 
slogging away," said Wingwall, whose ability
to perceive light all but vanished about four years ago from retinitis 
pigmentosa, a hereditary disease she has
had since she was a young woman. "Most people say, 'How do you do that?' 
But what they're really saying is, 'You
can't do that.' "
Examples of Wingwall's work as an artist going blind are appearing at 
new exhibitions at the UC Berkeley Art
Museum and the Townsend Center Gallery on the UC Berkeley campus. The 
museum show, "Blind at the Museum," explores
the visual worlds of photographers Wingwall and John Dugdale, sculptor 
Robert Morris and multimedia artists
Theresa Hak Kyung Cha and Joseph Grigely. Opening Feb. 17, a companion 
show at the Townsend focuses on Wingwall's
photography.
"We wanted to explore vision and explore what it means to actually see, 
and all the different modalities of
seeing," said Katherine Sherwood, a UC Berkeley art professor who is 
co-curating the museum show with Beth Dungan,
a postdoctoral student at the university's Center for Medicine, 
Humanities and Law.
The two events come at a time when the traditional meanings of vision 
and blindness are giving way, and along with
them the barriers visually impaired artists have faced to getting 
defined by their work instead of by their
disability. Behind the shift are revolutionary ideas about how the brain 
forms images.
It seems a healthy brain is capable of representing line, color and 
perspective from a variety of sources, not
merely from eyesight. This means that a sightless person can see and 
that a sightless person with artistic ability
can give a powerful, organized representation of reality in a way that 
an artist with intact eyesight normally
wouldn't. And because the optic eye fixes on objects and on the 
boundaries between things, some say the inner eye
sees wider.
"Because we live in a visually dominant world, people think that when 
you go blind your cognitive world goes, too.
That's not true," said Christine Leahey of Santa Monica, founder of The 
View from Here, an organization that
supports blind and visually impaired artists. (The organization's Web 
site, www.zoot.net/theviewfromhere/, has
articles and images.)
The idea that blindness isn't the opposite of vision is something 
philosophers proposed decades ago. Brain
research has affirmed it in the past 10 years, and in the past year or 
two the work of blind artists has begun
breaking into mainstream venues.
"For these artists to be shown simply because they're artists, that's 
the novelty," Leahey said. "That's a cause
of social justice. The way I see it, that's an extension of the civil 
rights movement."
Wingwall, who is married to architect and UC Berkeley architecture 
professor Donlyn Lyndon and has three children
and three grandchildren, has advantages that many blind artists lack. 
She had been a respected conceptual artist
long before her eyesight failed. Her disability developed slowly, 
enabling her to adjust. Perhaps most important,
her visual memory is rich from a lifetime of working and traveling.
She can't make out edges now unless the light is very bright, but memory 
keeps her encounters with sculpture and
architecture alive in her mind and available to guide new work, such as 
"Cordelia's Granite Waterway," a four-
pooled water sculpture she created in 2002 for a residence in Austin, 
Texas. She can't see colors, but memory lets
her experience her favorite -- magenta -- as intensely as when her eyes 
could translate to her brain the frequency
known as red.
In some ways color is more vital to Wingwall as a blind woman. Along 
with humor and industry, it's a critical part
of how she keeps her spirit and identity strong in spite of the trauma 
of her disability. She expresses her
attitude every day by wearing bright clothes.
"I have this one idea, which is 'see or be seen,' '' she said. "If I 
can't see, I'm going to make myself feel
better and everybody else look at these wonderful colors -- mostly red, 
orange, electric blue, magenta, fuchsia."
Along with fully lit memories, Wingwall combines elements gathered by 
touch and sound as her vision faded and
finally went dark. The most important of these deal with the 
relationships she has had with her two guide dogs,
the Labrador retriever, Slater, and his predecessor, Joseph. All four 
images on display at the museum concern
Wingwall and her dogs.
"Hand Over Dog: Joseph at the Temple of Dendur," is a photo Wingwall 
made 11 years ago, when her vision was going
but she could still make out shapes. She had long admired the ancient 
Egyptian temple installed in a museum in New
York. She took Joseph to see it and used her camera to explore the bond 
she and the dog were developing.
The picture shows Wingwall's hand held out in front of the camera and 
pointing toward the temple, with Joseph
sitting in the foreground. "I'm pointing to a building that I love and 
that I want him to know about," she said.
She went on to develop the theme using blowups of the dog superimposed 
on other admired buildings. Joseph floats
down through the clouds over Mission San Rafael and fills the sky over 
Chambourd in France. "It's like now he's
entered my life and he's a gigantic presence," Wingwall said.
The adjustments in perspective that Wingwall has made since going blind 
also apply to how she frames images. She
has a newfound freedom about where the edges of a picture should go. The 
clear-cut centering that a person with
eyesight takes for granted isn't available to someone who can't see.
"The edge just starts going," Wingwall said. "I don't really start with 
the frame. Lately I've been trying to work
with things, trying to bunch up against the frame."
A photographer fully tuned to light and architectural history might see 
her task as to capture the full unity of a
building such as San Trovaso, a historic church in Venice. But to make 
her "Self-Portrait at San Trovaso,"
Wingwall photographed the front of the church and composed a mosaic of 
architectural parts and parts of herself.
Curved decorative stone pieces became hair curls around her face, a 
round window became her torso, an engraved
stone from ancient Rome her pelvis and a column one of her legs, paired 
with an image of one of her real legs.
Wingwall's passion for architecture is reflected in her name. Inspired 
by a street shrine on a Roman building with
a stone cherub who seemed to be pulling the building forward despite 
having lost one of her wings, she changed her
name to Wingwall in 1980. She was born Alice Atkinson in Indianapolis 
and grew up in rural Indiana.
Wingwall co-directed a short autobiographical film, "Miss BlindSight/The 
Wingwall Auditions.'' Since going blind
she has become more interested in movement and hopes to make more films.
"You can have bad days," she said. "You can sit there and cry. Then you 
think there's always something I want to
do. Better get up and load the film."
In addition to photography, Wingwall is working on a project with a 
rugmaker in Sonoma County, Hansine Pedersen
Goran. They're designing a rug based on one of her drawings, showing the 
artist's hand holding a coin with a Roman
temple engraved on it. She is working on a second design that will be 
dominated by dark red and will include a
written message.
"What I'm going to have on that one are Braille dots for three words: 
lumière, magenta and aileron," she said.
"Lumière is French for light -- we're wishing for light, wishing I could 
have more light, more physiological
vision. Magenta is just a color I adore and wear a lot. Aileron has to 
do with wings and flying."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Learn more
-- "Blind at the Museum," an exhibition of the work of Alice Wingwall 
and other blind or visually impaired
artists, UC Berkeley Art Museum, through July 24. $8, $5 for seniors and 
students ages 12-18. (510) 642-0808.
www.bampfa.berkeley.edu.
-- A free public conference on visual impairment and art is set for 4-7 
p.m. March 11-12, in the Museum Theater,
with a public reception for the artist 6-7 p.m. March 11.
-- A companion show highlighting Wingwall's work runs Feb.17-April 4 at 
the Townsend Center Gallery, 220 Stephens
Hall on the UC campus. A conversation between Wingwall and John Terry, 
dean of fine arts at the Rhode Island
School of Design, with a screening of Wingwall's film "Miss 
BlindSight/The Wingwall Auditions," takes place at the
gallery 4 to 6 p.m. March 3. Free. (510) 643-9470. 
townsendcenter.berkeley.edu.
Blind artist's works go on show
SCORES of people flocked to see Bahraini artist Nasser Al Yousif's last 
art exhibition, which opened last night at
the Albareh Art Gallery, Adliya.
Around 30 limited edition linoleum prints are being showcased at the 
gallery under the theme More Than Meets the
Eye.
The accomplished painter lost his sight eight years ago, but continued 
working on linoleum etchings, a technique
that he experimented with in the past.
However, due to health complications, he is no longer able to work.
The exhibition shows the last of his production, as well as some works 
produced through 1999-2002.
The opening was celebrated with traditional and contemporary Arabic 
music by Bahraini musicians Hassan Haddad
(oud) Ahmad Al Ganim (flute) and Ali Al Elaiwat (violin).
The exhibition, under the patronage of Culture and National Heritage 
Assistant Under-Secretary Shaikha Mai bint
Mohammed Al Khalifa, will continue until September 27.
It is open to the public Saturday to Thursday, from 10am to 8pm.
For more information, contact 17717707 or info at albareh.com
Last night also saw the launch of the Café Gallery's new exhibit hall 
(next door to the gallery).
It was opened by Bahraini artist Jamal Abdulrahim, who is showcasing 
around 20 lithographs and mixed media pieces
of his latest work at the Café Gallery.
The exhibition, which continues until September 27, is open Saturday to 
Thursday from 9am to 10pm and on Fridays
from 5pm to 10pm.
For more information, contact 17713535 or café@albareh.com.

Performing beyond their limitations
By DANIELLE MAX

The extensive line-up of the 100% Art Festival proves that it is not who 
you are but what you can do that matters.
For three days, hundreds of artists from around the world will convene 
at the Tel Aviv Performing Arts Center for
Israel's first international, multi-genre festival of disabled artists 
and performers.
Participants are coming from countries including Mexico, Scotland, 
Turkey and Austria. Turkey alone is sending
over 50 performers, including both Turkish and contemporary dance 
companies as well as a Balkan music company.
Other performances include the Mexican Theater of the Blind; the No 
Problem Orchestra, a group made up of youth
with Down's syndrome and mental disabilities, and Sounds of Progress, 
Scotland's largest integrated music theater
company.
Says festival director Michael Kirschenbaum, "100% Arts is run according 
to two guidelines. It is based on
professional art and artists, but it is also based on the integration 
between the able-bodied and the disabled."
Nowhere will that integration be more evident than in the opening-night 
extravaganza, when festival participants
will perform alongside almost 200 mixed-ability dancers.
The busy schedule incorporates a full range of the creative arts. As 
well as theater, music and dance
performances, paintings, sculpture and photography will be displayed in 
the Cameri Theater foyer and will be open
free of charge to the public throughout the event.
The public is also invited to view the entries in Israel's first 
disability film competition. The festival within
a festival has two components: films based on the theme of disabilities 
and movies made by disabled filmmakers.
Competition winners will be announced on the final day of the festival.
For Kirschenbaum the 100% Arts Festival is not just about art and 
culture, it is also a social tool for the
integration of disabled people into mainstream society. "We want the 
'regular' community to come and see the
benefits that they can get from disabled artists," says Kirschenbaum, 
who is himself wheelchair-bound following an
accident resulting from a sniper shooting along the Egyptian border in 
1987.
Since his accident Kirschenbaum has been involved in general 
organizations for the disabled and is now the
director of Mateam, the NGO organizing the festival, whose function is 
to promote the work of disabled artists in
Israel to the general public.
"People should come and see, touch and participate," implores Kirschenbaum.
"I am sure that after they are involved in such a happening, they will 
be totally changed and realize that art is
art, no matter who creates it."
September 28-30, Tel Aviv Performing Arts Center. Tickets are available 
from Castel, (03) 604-5000 or *5000.
Prices range from NIS 40 to NIS 80. For further information visit the 
Mateam Web site www.mateam.org.il
http://www.jamespatten.com/tactilephoto/
Tactile Photography
In collaboration with Venezuelan artist Mariliana Arvelo I created this 
series of tactile photographic prints as
part of a project about the deafblind community in Boston, called 
"Senses". The works are produced through a CNC
laser etching process that removes the top portion of the wood. The 
darker the image is a any particular point,
the more wood is removed by the laser at that point. The result is a 
photographic relief that can be touched as
well as seen.
As people touch the images, the surface of the wood continues to wear, 
and people's experience of the work becomes
part of the work itself. I think of these works "interactive art" even 
though there are no computers or
sophisticated mechanical mechanisms.
The most fascinating part of this work for me is watching people 
interact with the images, and seeing the
different ways that sighted, blind and deafblind people experience them.
These images are on display until July 31, 2005 at:
The Gallery at the Piano Factory
791 Tremont Street
Boston, MA 02118
617.230.7361
Sat-Sun 12 - 5pm and by appoinment
This work was made possible in part by a grant from the St. Botolph Club 
Foundation.


/The Danforth Museum of Art's reopening event runs from 1 to 4 p.m. on 
Sunday //at the Danforth, 123 Union Ave., Framingham. ''Diagnostic Arts" 
runs through Oct. 30 with an opening reception from 6 to 8 p.m. Sept. 
24. ''New England Currents: Catherine Carter" runs through Oct. 22 with 
a gallery talk with Carter at 3 p.m. on Oct. 15. ''Senses" and ''David 
Ratner: Painting" both run through Oct. 30. Call 508-620-0050. Hours are 
Wed. through Sun., noon to 5 p.m. Admission is $5, or $4 for 
seniors/students, free for //children younger than 12./