Art for visually impaired youths: ‘Like I’m watching a birth’

Jessica Thao dabbed acrylic blue paint onto a palette and then carefully created lines on a blank canvas.

The 18-year-old Westminster resident, who is blind, stopped to ponder whether she needed more paint.

“That looks so cool,” said her art assistant, Emily Rodriguez. “It sort of looks like the ocean.”

Thao wasn’t the only one enjoying the art-making process on a recent Thursday afternoon.

She and nine other blind and visually impaired young people were invited to express their creativity with art organization, Art4Kids.

The Newport Beach-based nonprofit, which provides art materials to children recovering from trauma, hosted its third-annual painting event for students at the Braille Institute in Anaheim.

With guidance from the school and the organization’s volunteers, classmates explored the materials, discovering textures that they may not have encountered before.

As students and their assistants lined up in the Braille Institute’s cafeteria to select embellishments, such as feathers, jewels and sea shells, Art4Kids founder Pam Schader stood behind the art station and explained the creative process.

“Reach out your hand to touch the materials,” she said. “Once you put what’s on your mind on paper, something magical happens. It’s no longer occupying mental space.”

At a nearby table, 14-year-old Emily Rubalcava held a pencil in her right hand and a cellphone in her left. She began sketching a picture that appeared on the screen.

Emily, who has retinal dystrophy, a chronic and progressive eye disorder, recreated on paper an image of a character from the Japanese animation show “Black Butler.”

“That’s a beautiful drawing,” Schader said.

While some students drew shapes and others colored in circles, Wayne Heidle, an assistant professor at Marshall B. Ketchum University in Fullerton, complimented the group’s artwork.

Heidle, who is visually impaired, said the young people’s artwork will be displayed for a year at the optometry college.

“It’s always so much fun watching what they make,” Heidle said. “It’s amazing to hear their stories too.”

It’s art therapy, Shader said, that provides children a way to express their emotions using paint, crayons and markers.

Schader, a Costa Mesa resident who has been a college art professor for more than 30 years, founded the organization on Sept. 11, 2001 — the day terrorists launched four coordinated attacks on the U.S. using hijacked airplanes.

She was listening to a radio news segment when she heard a commentator say somberly: “If you can think it, it can happen.”

“I just decided to accept that statement with a positive reaction,” Schader said. “I put my hands on my hips and said, “OK, where do I start?’”

She imagined giving children in distress art materials.

Schader set out by asking friends, family and colleagues for donations to help her buy art supplies.

After reaping a good collection of art materials, she and volunteers filled Ziploc bags with crayons, water colors, paper and brushes.

Fourteen years later, Art4Kids has provided 50,000 art packs to children nationwide.

Even when on vacation and traveling, Schader and other volunteers will take the art packs with them and distribute the donated items to children’s hospitals.

Fostering art therapy helps increase self-esteem, reduce anxiety and manage behavior, she said.

Schader, who grew up without art tools, made her own books and illustrations with materials she could find around the house.

She said the organization is always in need of new or used supplies.

“The high-water mark of a society is the level to which art is provided for its population. We cannot be doing too much,” Schader said. “When I watch children paint, I always feel like I’m watching a birth. It’s always this emotional for me. It’s always a precious moment.”

For more information, visit art4kidsinc.org.