Every time Veterans Day rolls around, I feel emotional. My brother Mike was born on Veterans Day. Today he is 70 years of age. I haven’t seen Mike in quite a while. My thinking about him has changed over the years. As a child, I tried to make contact with him. Mike is severely autistic, […]
I hope the comma is correctly placed in the title of this post. The whole family is reading, but I only wanted to point out that the woman with the hat was reading. I suppose it should have been entitled, “Woman with the Hat Reading, Pictured with the Rest of Her Family,” but I opted […]
When scale and resemblance fail, creative naming comes to the rescue.
Mike’s* hands at rest, were very delicate. I’m sure they still are. I haven’t seen him in a long time, since I moved to California, quite a distance from where he lives. Below is a photo I shot during a visit to his old group home. While his hands are a strong visual element here, […]
I began my blog in 2013 to share some of my experiences as a younger sibling of an autistic individual. Mike, my older brother, as many of you already know, is autistic, low functioning and nonverbal. It took me about a year to share my feelings, ideas, inspirations and desperations growing up: 1) in a […]
This may be the last portrait in the June 2017 series of portraits of and about my older brother Mike.* I don’t think there is much more for me to say, visually, about Mike at this time. Forcing the issue is not a productive endeavor, so for the moment I will put it to rest. […]
Below is another self portrait with an icon I created after my last visit to see Mike*. I superimposed etched lines of the icon onto a light sketch of a self portrait. I painted my portrait and then introduced ink into the scratches. This doesn’t seem like a double portrait, as the icon blends almost seamlessly with the […]
Yesterday’s post was an edited photograph of Dave (my younger brother) and me standing outside Mike’s building at Willowbrook. (For those of you just joining me, Mike is my older brother who is autistic, low functioning and nonverbal.) I’m hugging Dave. I replaced my head with Mike’s, from another family photograph, and Dave’s with mine. […]
I began my blog 4 years ago with the idea of sharing my experiences as the sibling of an older autistic, low functioning, nonverbal individual (my brother Mike). Most of 2013 was a recap of my struggle to get to know Mike. I relied on old family photographs; my journal entries; thoughts about the dynamics […]
We’re down here in Burbank visiting the kids. I brought my art materials to keep up with my daily paintings. I was prepared to steal some time by myself to fulfill my goal of posting my original artwork every day, but Will asked if we could paint. I was so happy that he remembered painting together […]
