[Art_beyond_sight_learning_tools] articles art, maps, ralleys

[Lisa Yayla]

Hi,

Sending 6 articles. Little mixed, maps, ralleys, art. In article 4,  

No longer impossible: blind embrace art and museums welcome blind, 
Francesca Rosenberg,Nina Levent and John Kennedy are quoted. Articles 
follow links.

Regards,

Lisa

Links

http://news.webindia123.com/news/showdetails.asp?id=241147&n_date=20060205&cat=Sports

http://news.webindia123.com/news/showdetails.asp?id=240772&cat=India

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1200/is_n23_v142/ai_13242282

http://www.canada.com/topics/entertainment/story.html?id=8af9b17a-ef49-44e4-9ebd-3200b8867f5d&k=43503

http://lfpress.ca/newsstand/Today/Entertainment/2006/02/03/1423912-sun.html

http://www.poconorecord.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060204/NEWS/602040323

http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=16052643&BRD=2228&PAG=461&dept_id=448685&rfi=6

article 1

blind navigators show the way-at car rally

Ahmedabad | February 05, 2006 10:43:14 PM IST

 

 

In a car rally with a difference, about 80 visually impaired persons 
today donned the role of navigators and guided drivers through a route 
on the outskirts of the city.

Around 30 of these navigators were women.

The rally, organised jointly by the Ahmedabad Round Table and Blind 
People's Association (BPA), was flagged off from the BPA premises.

Talking about the event, Dr Bhushan Punani, Executive Director of BPA, 
said: ''This rally has helped in creating a bond between the blind and 
the sighted. It has also helped in spreading awareness that blind people 
are also capable of doing it and can be part of the society.'' The rally 
covered a distance of over 80 km on the outskirts of the city, and the 
speed limit ranged between 20 and 35 km per hour.

There were 13 Marshall points which each had to reach on time.

Manisha Bhanushali, a participant, said, ''It was a good experience. I 
felt good directing somebody. Well, coordination was most important.'' 
Manish Bhanushali, National Extension Convenor, said the response to the 
car rally, which is being held for the ninth time, was tremendous. ''We 
were totally overbooked and had to refuse others who were keen to 
participate in the event,''he said.

The participants were given a road map (written in Braille) just a few 
minutes before the competition was to commence, he added.

UNI MMG SSS SRS KN2220

article 2

When blinds became the navigators to help sighted in a car rally in 
Ahmedabad !

Ahmedbad | February 05, 2006 4:33:10 PM IST

 

 

Not many of us may have met even a blind person driving a car or a 
motorbike. But today in Ahmedabad, many people felt astonished when the 
got a chance to watch a car rally for the blind being organised for the 
ninth time. The blind helped drivers with sight to navigate the vehicles.

Organised jointly by the Round Table India (RTI) and Blind People's 
Association (BPA) the rally has flagged off from the BPA premises. It 
was intended to develop friendship between the people who can see and 
those who cannot. As per the rules of the rally, the participants were 
given a road map (written in Braille) just a few minutes before the 
competition was to commence.

The 9th Round Table Blind People Car Rally received a lot of 
appreciation by all who came here to watch and encourage these people.

Executive Director of Blind People's Association Bhusan Punani said, 
"The only objective is to promote co-ordination between the people with 
sight and those without it. In this case, the route map is given to a 
blind who guides the driver (with sight) in terms of directions. It 
basically develops friendship and understanding between the blind and 
sighted. It also promotes the view that blind people are capable of 
doing everything provided they are given the chance."

The visually-impaired navigators directed their respective drivers.

All participants looked highly enthusiastic to get an opportunity to 
display their skills.

"I am very excited and getting a feeling as if I am driving the car on 
my own," said Bela Shah, one of the visually-challenged participants.

Another participant Burhamuddin said, "This is a real enjoyment and I 
think one can do anything provided you have a strong will."

The duo (driver and the disabled participant) will have to make their 
way through busy streets of the city and return to the starting point. 
There will be 13 marshal points, where the participant has to reach on 
time.

Timing is important and a team may lose points if they reach a point 
earlier or later than the stipulated time. The rally started at eight 
o'clock in the morning and is it to conclude by two o' clock in the 
afternoon.

For the first time a whole new women's team took part in the rally.

"It feels great as a lot of alertness is required and everything has to 
be done in a specified time frame," said Sanjay Gokani, a driver in the 
rally.

The rally showcased about 80 cars from all across Gujarat. (ANI)

article 3

Talking maps: technologies to give the visually impaired a sense of 
space - Cover Story

Science News

Technologies to give the visually impaired a sense of space

Imagine never being able to gaze at a globe's vast blue oceans, never 
seeing that Italy looks like a boot or that Long Island, N.Y., resembles 
a long fish.

Maps put states and countries into perspective (SN: 10/3/92, p.222). 
They show quite clearly that Texas dwarfs Rhode Island, that many, many 
miles separate California from New York, and that Interstate Highway 70 
connects Philadelphia, St. Louis, and Denver.

Increasingly, these visual representations of space -- and graphics of 
all kinds -- help people navigate through ever more complex environments 
and information. Charts and graphs make sense of reams of otherwise 
confusing data. With a map in hand, a person can move with greater 
confidence across unfamiliar territory, be it a shopping mall, a city, 
or a foreign country. Atlases inspire armchair explorers to wonder about 
what exists beyond their immediate worlds.

But some people have few chances to share in this wonder. Blind since 
birth, Karen Luxton vividly recalls each one. A baseball fan, she 
finally understood what the game was all about when her dad fashioned a 
crude diamond from cardboard and ran her fingers from first base to 
second to third and back to home plate. Then in sixth grade, a teacher 
and a classmate made Luxton a solar system using blocks of wood. In high 
school, she learned about Europe and Africa from a few Braille maps. 
That was it.

Soon Luxton and others like her may have many more opportunities to use 
tactile graphics. The Americans with Disabilities Act, passed earlier 
this year, could force companies and institutions to provide disabled 
people with equal access to what our society has to offer, including the 
ability to travel independently. At the University of Maryland in 
College Park, cartographer Joseph W. Wiedel now gets several calls a day 
from people who want to make their organizations more accessible.

article 4

 Tuesday » February 7 » 2006

 

No longer impossible: blind embrace art and museums welcome blind

 

Sunday, February 05, 2006

 

Warren Logan, 14, feels a 15th-century marble bust of St. John the 
Baptist during a tour for the blind at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art 
in Kansas City, Mo. (AP/Charlie Riedel)

 

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) - Warren Logan's hands skim the 15th-century 
marble bust, tracing the lifeless eyes, the slightly agape mouth, the 
precisely chiselled fur.

He is blind, but he can see.

The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art's new touch tour is among programs at 
more than 100 museums across the country that attempt to do what once 
was thought impossible: make art accessible - even visible - to those 
with little or no sight.

"I get a good picture of the art," 14-year-old Logan said after a recent 
tour. "I can actually visualize it."

The Nelson-Atkins program has participants first feel pieces of slate 
and marble - the materials from which the works they'll feel are made. 
Later, specially trained docents guide the hands of the visually 
impaired across 500-year-old Spanish tomb covers, an Italian bust of St. 
John the Baptist and numerous pieces by celebrated Modernist sculptor 
Henry Moore, asking them questions about their perceptions and offering 
them history on the piece.

Tina Jinkens dreaded class trips to the museum as a child. But now, the 
35-year-old blind woman's face fills with delight as she touches art.

"I always felt like I didn't get that much out of it," Jinkens recalled. 
"But if someone can put their hands on a sculpture and really get 
something out of an exhibit it may open up new worlds to them."

Art museums first began to make their collections accessible to those 
without sight in the early 1970s, although with major museums like the 
Nelson-Atkins only now implementing such programs, the spread across the 
country has been slow.

The Form in Art initiative at the Philadelphia Museum of Art was among 
the first to reach out to the blind. The three-year program combines the 
study of art history, tactile examinations of objects in the museum's 
collections and participants' own creation of artwork.

Because original paintings can't be touched, the Philadelphia Museum 
makes reproductions that may emphasize the heavy brush strokes of van 
Gogh or another artist's signature elements, diorama-like models that 
use materials such as glass to represent water or terry cloth for a 
lamb, and black-white interpretations that allow someone with limited 
vision to more easily see the contrast.

The museum also offers tours for the visually impaired that include more 
than 50 touchable pieces. Street Thoma, who heads the Philadelphia 
Museum's accessibility programs, said a blind person's initial visit to 
the museum can yield a strong reaction.

"When a blind person thinks of an art museum in society they think, 
'That's not for me,' " Thoma said. On a touch-tour, however, "the 
feeling that the person gets is, 'Wow. I can be a part. I'm not cut out 
of this. I'm not isolated. I'm not alone.' "

Those sentiments are repeated before pieces of art tucked in museums 
across the country.

In Boston, the Museum of Fine Arts' long-standing tour for the blind 
sometimes makes use of poetry or music. At the Umlauf Sculpture Garden 
in Austin, Tex., visually impaired visitors can listen to an audio guide 
that instructs them where to reach, what to feel and the history behind 
the piece. And at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, where touch 
tours have been available since 1972, those without sight can lay their 
hands on masterpieces by Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse and Auguste Rodin.

"Really, what these individuals are doing is what many people want to do 
when they visit the museum, which many people do when the guards aren't 
looking," said Francesca Rosenberg, who heads MOMA's accessibility 
programs.

It has been difficult to earn a general acceptance of the idea that 
blind people can actually benefit from exposure to art and even develop 
a mental image of pieces.

When Art Education for the Blind was founded in New York in 1987 to 
advocate museums making their collections accessible, many questioned 
the group's mission.

"People would laugh," said Nina Levent, associate director of the 
organization. "They thought it was a ridiculous idea."

John Kennedy, a University of Toronto professor whose 1993 book, Drawing 
and the Blind, is considered the seminal work on the subject, said those 
without sight can often understand art as well as those with full vision.

"Sculptures make perfect sense for the blind, but also blind people 
understand pictures," he said. "The image formed in the blind person's 
mind is, in most important respects, identical to the image formed in 
the sighted person's mind."

Kennedy's statement - that a blind person might come up with a mental 
image close to that of a sighted person - is stunning, and one that he 
still has difficulty getting some people to accept.

There were no naysayers when a small group of young people crowded the 
Nelson-Atkins' mezzanine sculpture gallery for a tour. Shirley Cottrell 
beamed as her nine-year-old granddaughter, Brooke, reached to caress a 
piece taller than her.

She could feel every little groove, Cottrell said. She could see.

article 5

Museums make art accessible to blind

By MATT SEDENSKY, AP

 

KANSAS CITY, MO. -- Warren Logan's hands skim the 15th- century marble 
bust, tracing the lifeless eyes, the slightly agape mouth, the precisely 
chiselled fur.

He is blind, but he can see.

The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art's new touch tour is among programs at 
more than 100 museums across the U.S. that try to do what once was 
called impossible: make art accessible, even visible -- to those with 
little or no sight.

"I get a good picture of the art," 14-year-old Logan said after his 
tour. "I can actually visualize it."

The Nelson-Atkins program has participants first feel pieces of slate 
and marble -- the materials from which the works they'll feel are made. 
Later, specially trained docents guide the hands of the visually 
impaired across 500-year-old Spanish tomb covers, an Italian bust of St. 
John the Baptist and numerous pieces by modernist sculptor Henry Moore, 
asking them questions about their perceptions and offering them history 
on the piece.

Tina Jinkens dreaded class trips to the museum as a child. But now, the 
35-year-old blind woman's face fills with delight as she touches art.

"I always felt like I didn't get that much out of it," Jinkens recalled. 
"But if someone can put their hands on a sculpture and really get 
something out of an exhibit, it may open up new worlds to them."

Art museums first began to make their collections accessible to those 
without sight in the early 1970s, although with major museums like the 
Nelson-Atkins only now starting such programs, the spread has been slow.

The Form in Art initiative at the Philadelphia Museum of Art was among 
the first to reach out to the blind. The three-year program combines the 
study of art history, tactile examinations of objects in the museum's 
collections and participants' own creation of artwork.

Because original paintings can't be touched, the Philadelphia Museum 
makes reproductions that may emphasize the heavy brush strokes of van 
Gogh or other artists' signature elements.

The museum also offers tours for the blind that include more than 50 
touchable pieces.

In Boston, the Museum of Fine Arts' long-standing tour for the blind 
sometimes uses poetry or music. And at the Museum of Modern Art in New 
York, where touch tours have been available since 1972, those without 
sight can lay their hands on masterpieces by Picasso, Matisse and Rodin.

article 6

Blind artist overcomes challenges

February 04, 2006

When children's book illustrator Michael Bryant of Saylorsburg first 
noticed he was losing his vision in the 1990s due to a degenerative 
condition, he didn't let it keep him from his artistic passion.

When the former New Jersey resident met New York City native and 
computer programmer Thomas Reid about two years ago, he found someone 
sharing three things in common with him.

Both are African-American. Both have lost their sight Reid completely. 
And both want to inspire people to not let their disabilities, be it 
blindness or something else, hamper their lives.

That's the message Bryant and Reid will be promoting at Sunday's annual 
National Black History Month Read-in at the Eastern Monroe Public Library.

"My work now focuses on two things," said Bryant, 40, who has 
illustrated books such as "Bein' With You This Way," which teaches 
youngsters to appreciate racial and cultural diversity.

"One theme that has always been present is respecting each other's 
differences," he said. "Now that I've developed this condition, the 
other theme is flipping your disability from a negative to a positive."

Reid of East Stroudsburg, who is in his late 30s, lost his sight to a 
cancer that began in childhood. He now uses a cane and is led by Bryant.

"Michael and I are planning to do public motivational speaking 
together," he said. "We want to inspire people like us with disabilities."

The two also plan to do computer training courses for the blind and 
visually impaired.

Bryant said his more recent art work, which he plans to publish in both 
book form and galleries, has more meaning.

"I don't paint in the same style I did before I started losing my 
sight," he said. "My work now is more about feelings."

Bryant's earlier pieces include use of watercolor, whereas his more 
recent projects involve use of acrylic, oil and mixed media.

"When you use water colors, those colors can run in a direction you 
didn't want," he said. "Life is like those colors. It can take a 
different direction you didn't plan on. But once you find the courage to 
deal with it, you might find the end result is an inspiring work."

 

THEATER

Rapunzel's Song, thru Feb. 3, Thursday at 7 p.m. Friday at 8 p.m. World 
premiere of Mary Ethel Schmidt's play about a pianist has wondered away 
from her instrument and the blind painter who helps her find her way 
back again. The Northeast Theatre at The Jermyn, Scranton. $20 general, 
$15 seniors. $5 students. 558-1515 or northeasttheatre.us.