User:Jfunk93

Jessica "Jessy" Park Autistic Artist

There is a brief reference to Park on the Autistic Artist Wiki page, but the page in general is greatly lacking representation from the field of autistic artists.

Jessica Park, born in Williamstown MA on July 20, 1958, a primarily self-taught artist. Autism Spectrum Disorder is often diagnosed by the individual’s level of social impairment and their verbal interactions (1) both of which Park exhibited in her early life. Her mother, Clara Claiborne Park, described Park’s early years as a state of Nirvana because Park would lapses into states of timelessness and become singularly enrapt by nothingness (6). Clara Park became a social advocate for Park, published two books The Siege: A Family’s Journey Into the World of an Autistic Child (1982) and Exiting Nirvana: A Daughter’s Life with Autism (2002)(5).At the age of five Park began learning verbal speech by being shown series of shapes and then learning drawing them, which soon enabled her to identify colors and led her to drawing in perspective before age eight (2)(6). Through out her career she has developed a focus on buildings and the colors she associates with geometric colors, reflecting on her fascination with shapes and perhaps her disassociation with people.

Autism in Western culture is often seen as a life limiting diagnosis, placing constraints on what an individual can accomplish and desire from life. Society is predominately neuro-typical and is constructed to fit the majority rather than embrace the continuity of human existence. Clara Park (The siege) rejected this philosophy while raising Park and encouraged her visual for of self-expression. Park’s artwork has been exhibited throughout New York City in different autism awareness exhibitions from 1993-Present, the United Nations in 2008, through out Boston from 1993-Present, and she is often exhibited at Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts (7).

References (1) (2) (3) (4) .(5) (6) (7)