Disability Without Limits

By Johnson Simons

This painting depicts someone with a disability, jumping from brick to brick defying their physical limitations, and overcoming the odds that life throws at them.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Johnson Simon

I have always been interested in body movement and when an opportunity was presented to me to attend a dance recital exhibition nine years ago on the Western Michigan University campus, I was excited to attend.  Viewing the dancers and their freedom of movement inspired me to display movement in my painting.  I was stimulated to create my first dance focused expressionistic painting.  Dancing is to me, the art of moving lightly and quickly with the skill of communicating my emotion.  As someone with a disability, movement impacts me on a daily basis.   In order to help gain more knowledge of motion and movement, I used several sources of movement for research and to enhance ideas. I watch several videos of dancing to help in determining the type of movement I wanted to present in my painting.  I studied the movement of people: walking, running, swimming, and sky diving.  I then had my own walking and stepping up and down stairways videotaped. I discovered that my walking has a rhythm to it.  To further enhance my study of movement I attended several dancing classes to sketch the dancer’s movements for effect.  My painting is a representation of me dancing.  I am able to make broad and sweeping motions with my paint brush and transfer that motion and feeling of movement onto the canvas to express myself.  In my artistic work, I am able to move freely about without limitations.  I use bright colors to represent the body movement throughout the surface.  

My artwork is a way for me to express or transfer how I would move freely and uninterrupted. I can run, walk, jump, and I can dance without being bound to limitations when I paint. Zm and draw. I believe the paint brush is an extension of me and represents my idea of movement on canvas.

www.artbyjohnsonsimon.com

A man with medium brown skin, with short black hair, wearing glasses, and smiling broadly in front of a white background.