[Art_beyond_sight_learning_tools] audio description, museums, exhibition

[lisa]

Barre Montpelier Times Argus, Vermont USA
Sunday, April 23, 2006

Blind welcome high-tech 'talking picture'

By Peter Hirschfeld Staff Writer 

MONTPELIER - About 50 moviegoers filed into the Capitol Theatre on Saturday morning for a premiere of a different kind.

For the first time in Vermont, blind and visually impaired residents were able to enjoy a movie without the bothersome practice of having a sighted companion whispering on-screen action into their ear.

"It was excellent," Joy Betz said of the "audio-description" technology that provides a running narrative to blind people via a wireless earpiece.

The technology has been around for five years, according to Mike Richman of the Vermont Council of the Blind, but was until Saturday almost exclusively contained to major metropolitan areas. The Council of the Blind, not to be confused with the Vermont Association for the Blind, is made up of blind Vermonters seeking to improve the lives of their peers. The nonprofit won grants and raised money to have the approximately $6,000 system installed at the Capitol Theatre.

"We're an organization working to help ourselves, and this is something we think is of real value to blind people," Richman said.

Saturday's matinee featured a new release, "The Sentinel," a taut political thriller starring Michael Douglas and Kiefer Sutherland. The blind guests, their sighted companions and a handful of guide dogs nearly filled the house. The technology offered succinct descriptions of on-screen action.

Scripted dialogue tells only part of the story. When Douglas' character lies silently on his bed pondering one of the movie's numerous plot twists, audio description tells us that "he stares pensively, one arm bent behind his head." As a Secret Service agent pursues his target, the listener is told he's "wearing a determined scowl." The narrative by an anonymous male voice includes descriptions of car chases, scenery and love scenes.

"I loved it. It's wonderful. As a blind person, it's a way for me to understand and enjoy what's happening on the screen," said one moviegoer.

The technology isn't entirely new to Vermont. Theater companies and venues including Lost Nation Theater, the Barre Players, FlynnSpace and St. Michael's College have offered audio-description presentations of plays. Such performances are generally one-time events, however, where all blind people must attend the same showing.

Capitol Theatre owner Fred Bashara says about 75 percent of movies now come with studio-produced audio description, DVDs included. He just pops the disc into the system and the narrative plays automatically. He said he plans to have at least one audio-description movie showing all the time at his theater.

Betz, a Middlebury resident, was one of the last to leave the theater Saturday. Asked why, she said she was experiencing movie credits for the first time in more than a decade."It was the Isley Brothers!" she said, referring to a song in the movie. "I don't see this as becoming an integrated part of the sighted world. I see it as becoming an integrated part of the human race."

Betz plans to attend future screenings of other movies, and Richman said he has begun an effort to get systems installed in Burlington theaters. 


http://www.timesargus.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060423/NEWS/604230359/1003/EDUCATION05



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Akron Beacon Journal, Ohio
Sunday, April 23, 2006

Blind artists' work at Weathervane

By Kerry Clawson, staff writer

Exhibit tied to `Wait Until Dark' includes quilts, sculpture, baskets

The darkness may be blind woman Susy Hendrix's greatest ally in the thriller Wait Until Dark, which opens for previews Wednesday at Weathervane Community Playhouse.

As the main character plays a cat-and-mouse game with criminals who have invaded her apartment, the audience is sure to get a chilling taste of what it's like to be in the dark.

In conjunction with the show, Weathervane curator Marci Paolucci has created an arts and crafts exhibit featuring work by blind clients from Vision Support Services of Akron and the Cleveland Sight Center.

Crafts classes at Vision Support Services include sewing/quilting, leather work, woodworking, macrame, rug hooking, knitting and beadwork. VSS crafts displayed at Weathervane are group projects by clients at the Akron agency.

Paolucci says the most touching works are ``quillows'' -- small quilts that fold up into their own carrying cases to become pillows. Vision Support Services donates quillows to children at Summit County Children Services through the Wrapped in Love Program.

Fine art featured in the Weathervane exhibit includes sculpture by Chapelle Letman, who works at the Cleveland Sight Center and with Cleveland Institute of Art sculpting instructor Kim Bissett. This will be the first time sculpture has been displayed in the Weathervane gallery.

Other pieces from Cleveland Sight Center clients include a large leather bag by Vietnam veteran Terry Kebbel, which is designed to hold a Braille book; Linda Hoffman's small ceramic flowers; Joe Crauthamel's baskets made from clothesline and raffia; and 86-year-old Rose Dicicco's crocheted animals.

Original artwork done by sighted graduate students from the Cleveland Institute of Art for the annual report of the Cleveland Sight Center also will be featured. The pieces illustrate aspects of being blind.

A huge, textural piece that includes Braille -- on display for many years at the Cleveland Sight Center for the blind clients' enjoyment -- also will be featured at Weathervane.

``It has been a very moving experience for me to meet these people,'' Paolucci said of the blind artists. ``They have such a positive attitude about life, despite their limitations. The skill levels vary, but I (as a sighted person) would not be able to make any of the things that they have.''

In addition, clients from both the Cleveland Sight Center and Vision Support Services will be the first to use Weathervane's audio-described service. Anaudio-described performance for the visually impaired will be offered 2:30 p.m. May 7. (An American Sign Language-interpreted performance for the hearing-impaired also will be offered at 2:30 p.m. May 14).

Weathervane volunteers received training in audio description last summer, but the service hasn't been used until now.

Here's more interesting news tied to the show: Susan Lucier, who plays the blind Susy Hendrix in the production, has worked hard to make her role as a blind woman believable by attending the Cleveland Sight Center's Personal Adjustment Training (PAT) Program, which teaches daily living skills to those who have recently lost their vision. After observing the clients with their blind instructors, Lucier was blindfolded and worked with an orientation and mobility instructor on walking up and down stairs, using an elevator, and moving around the building.

For more information on Wait Until Dark, call 330-836-2626.

Theater writer Kerry Clawson may be reached at 330-996-3527 or by e-mail at kclawson at thebeaconjournal.com. 


http://www.ohio.com/mld/beaconjournal/living/14404144.htm



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Miami Herald, Florida
Sunday, April 23, 2006

Officials respond to (Museum of Art) suit with action, promises

By SARA OLKON solkon at MiamiHerald.com

After disabled visitors to the Museum of Art in Fort Lauderdale filed suit over access to the Tut show, some accommodations were made immediately -- and more are planned.

As the King Tut exhibit ends its four-month stay in Fort Lauderdale, at least one controversy continues: whether the Museum of Art in Fort Lauderdale can adequately accommodate blind, deaf and physically disabled patrons.

A federal civil lawsuit filed in February accused the museum of violating the Americans With Disabilities Act, alleging that handicapped visitors faced inaccessible bathrooms, long waits for the elevator and an audio tour that only covered a portion of the exhibit.

''It really was disappointing when I visited the show,'' said a former ADA consultant for Pro Player Stadium, Fred Shotz, a Fort Lauderdale resident who is in a wheelchair.

He described how it was hard to see over the heads of visitors who were vying with him for a look at the treasures.

`A CIVIL RIGHTS LAW'

''It's not our job to hassle with other patrons so that we can see an exhibit,'' Shotz said. ``The ADA is a civil rights law, not a building code.''

In response to the lawsuit, museum officials met with advocates for the disabled and made some immediate accommodations, but negotiations over long-range improvements are still ongoing.

Shotz, a consultant for the plaintiffs, wants to see the museum set high standards for layout, design and signage.

On the wish-list: A uni-sex restroom that is fully wheelchair-accessible and ''touchable'' displays -- replicas of artifacts that blind people can touch to better experience art and culture exhibitions.

'The question must be, `How good is the experience?' -- not just ''Can [the handicapped] fit in the door?'' Shotz said.

Joshua Entin, a Miami attorney who filed the suit on behalf of All Disabled Americans, an Indiana-based nonprofit group, said the fact Tut was leaving in this month forced advocates to focus on handicapped accessibility at future locations.

The group sued the museum and the National Geographic Society and Arts and Exhibitions International of Aurora, Ohio -- organizers of Tutankhamen and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs, charging its popular exhibit violated the Americans With Disabilities Act of 1990.

''The biggest problem we had was that we were confronted with the limited period of time,'' Entin said.

CHANGES MADE

Robert Fine, an attorney for the museum, said within a week of the Feb. 6 lawsuit, staff made changes to the Tut exhibit, included allowing service animals into the exhibit, designing a guide book with large type for the visually impaired and expanding guiding tours for the blind.

Fine declined to discuss details long-range improvements but said the museum was eager to provide a good experience for all visitors.

Earlier this year, Director Irvin Lippman told The Miami Herald the museum complied with ADA regulations when it was built in 1986. He said the museum and ADA officials discussed upgrades that are scheduled for the summer, including automatic front doors and another ADA-compliant bathroom stall.

''All that we want is to have the same access,'' said Deborah Ryan, a legally blind resident of Pembroke Pines. ``We are just like anybody else.''


http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/local/states/florida/counties/broward_county/14401499.htm