Outlook 2023-06-12 - "Your Eyes, My Vision", Accessible Visual Art for the Blind Community, Part 2

“Persevere”, “Rise”, “Flow”, “Connect”. These are the titles of 4 paintings Vera Popovic created for an exciting art project in British Columbia.. We’re back this week with Part 2 of our look back at “Your Eyes, My Vision”, a program in B.C. where blind adults were paired with sighted facilitators to encourage, create, and showcase “visual” art. It consisted of an online VocalEye event where some of the artists got to show and talk about their creations. There was also an in person show in Victoria where some of the participants had the opportunity to display and sell their artwork. On part 2, we meet Vera Popovic who shares first about her background and long time love of art. As a preschool teacher for 40 years, Popovic discusses the importance of getting away from rigid structure and providing more freedom when creating art. Like Delores Thompson in part 1, Vera chose painting as her medium. The similarities end there as they each come from such different life experiences which in turn changes how they approach painting. Vera was able to use a moulding medium which gave texture to the canvas, something she’d never used before. When painting, Vera points out how the facilitator would tell her she didn’t need to use as much paint at a time, while for her having low vision, she wasn’t able to detect such detail and it didn’t feel like she was measuring out that much. This is another example of facilitator learning from blind artist and vice versa. She was even able to sell three of her paintings at the art show in Victoria, the first time Vera had ever had that chance. From painting we move to something completely different with Ruth Bieber. Ruth enjoyed art in school, but when she suddenly became legally blind at the age of 7 she adopted the attitude that “blind people and the arts didn’t go together” even though she knew deep down she was an artist. Years later Ruth was introduced to a program in New York called “Art Beyond Sight” which completely changed her assumptions. For “Your Eyes, My Vision” Ruth wan