Believe in me

«As the mother of a 7 years old autistic boy, I’ve been able to experience first hand how much misinformation there is about the condition, and the stereotypification to which autistic children are subject to.

My project it’s about portraying autistic children on a different light, one that shows the child and not the label. Autistics are often seen as unable to feel empathy, and disinterested about everything that surrounds them, nothing could dbe further from the truth. Autistics may lack the tools for efficient social interaction, but not the drive and need for it, and as much as they need to learn how to reach to society, society also needs learn about autism and how to reach to them.

The idea is to show the spectator 20 paintings about 10 different stories at the same time, 10 children in different places of the autism spectrum. As diverse as they are, they will shake off the stereotypes from the spectator’s mind and the 10 individuals will appear.

The project will have two series of large format paintings, one called «Believe in Me», where the child is engaged into whatever she/he is passionate about, to show that what most people consider as a weakness is actually their greatest strength, which is an astounding power of concentration and observation; and another series called “Here I am”, where the kid reaches out to the viewer and makes it clear that he/she is not really absent.»