In considering great heroes, dates, places and milestones in the history of disabilities inclusion, one is more likely to think of Tom Harkin, ADA, and 1990 rather than think of Herb and Barbara Greenberg and Donny Adelman (z”l), 1970 and Camp Ramah in Glen Spey, New York. Yet, without the pioneers Greenberg and Adelman, there may have been no Jewish inclusive camping. The Ramah Camping Movement’s network of Tikvah (“Hope”) programs, which currently serves nearly 400 participants each summer in ten overnight camps, five day camps and Israel programs, is currently celebrating 50 years from that first memorable summer in 1970.
In the late 1960’s, the Greenbergs, two school teachers from Long Island, NY, proposed what seemed back then like a radical idea—including campers with disabilities in a typical Jewish overnight camp. Not surprisingly, they were met with institutional opposition from all sides: People worried about the financial impact; how the level of Hebrew in the camps would suffer; and that the “normal” campers would leave. Even the camp doctors felt ill-equipped to care for these campers.
One visionary director, Donny Adelman, saw the potential benefit not only for the campers with disabilities and their families, but for the entire camp community. Adelman felt that including campers with disabilities was consistent with the mission of Ramah –and Judaism.
That first summer, the Greenbergs invited eight campers with varied disabilities to participate in Tikvah. They spent a great deal of time problem solving and supporting the specialists working with the Tikvah campers. The experiment was so successful that other Ramah camps soon replicated the program. When Ramah Glen Spey relocated to New England, the Tikvah program went with it. In 1973, Tikvah was started at Ramah Wisconsin. Ojai, California joined in 1985 and Canada in 1993. Fast forward to 2018—Tikvah and a wide range of services and supports for children and young adults and families (from a wide range of Jewish backgrounds) currently exist in all Ramah camps.
In 2018, 387 young Jews participated in in Tikvah programs across North America, supported in typical bunks, as part of a Tikvah division, or as participants in vocational training programs. In addition, 227 people (64 children with disabilities from 59 families) participated in family camps at our various Ramah camps. Teenagers with disabilities are regularly supported each summer on Ramah Israel Seminar, and more than ten groups of Tikvah participants have visited Israel over the years on Ramah Israel Tikvah trips. When Rabbi Sarah Shulman became founding director of Camp Ramah in Northern California in 2016, she insisted they not open their doors without a Tikvah program!
Ramah continues to grow, evolve, innovate and lead the field. Graduates of our vocational training programs are salaried workers in some of our camps. Staff members go on to present at conferences and lead the field. Reshet Ramah, our alumni network, strives to include graduates in year-round activities. Other year-round programs include “Shabbos Is Calling” and “Shavua Tov,” weekly video chats where participants at various Ramah Tikvah programs discuss their week, learn about the portion of the week and just say “Shabbat Shalom.”
Perhaps Ramah and Tikvah’s biggest accomplishment to date has been pioneering the field of disabilities camping. It is no longer acceptable to tell a family of a child with a disability, “I wish I could help, but…” There are now dozens of camps across movements and across the country that support campers with a wide range of intellectual, developmental and mental health conditions. The Greenbergs and Donny Adelman showed what is possible, even in the face of institutional adversity. Chazak, chazak v’nitchazek—May we be strong, continue their mission, and strengthen one another as we grow in our efforts to support the growth of our people with disabilities through the world of Jewish camping.
Parents of young adults with disabilities–from Maine to California—use the term “falling off the cliff” to describe the situation their children often face upon graduation from high school. They speak about the lack of adequate training programs and job opportunities for their children. Without job training and employment, they potentially face fifty or more years of unemployment or underemployment, inadequate opportunities to form friendships and a sadly sedentary life of movies, video games and unhealthy eating.
While the unemployment rate in the population of people with disabilities is worrisome, there is reason for hope. My recent travels across the country, generously supported by the Covenant Foundation, offer many examples of creative job training programs and work opportunities for people with disabilities—many started by their parents.
First the bad news: According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in 2017, 18.7 percent of persons with a disability were employed. In contrast, the employment-population ratio for those without a disability was 65.7 percent. The unemployment rate for persons with a disability was 9.2 percent in 2017, more than twice that of those with no disability (4.2 percent). (Unemployed persons are those who did not have a job, were available for work, and were actively looking for a job in the 4 weeks preceding the survey.).
The unemployment rate has improved slightly in 2018 across all populations. According to the United States Department of Labor’s Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP) December 2018 Disability statistics, the unemployment rate for people with disabilities was 7.9% compared to 3.5% for people without disabilities. Labor force participation for people ages 16 and over with disabilities was 20.7% compared to 68.4% for people without disabilities. Employed persons with a disability were more likely to be self-employed than those with no disability.
Many parents of young adults with disabilities are taking action and creating job training programs and creating work opportunities. They are starting dog biscuit, sock and t-shirt companies. They are running boutique laundry services, running bakeries and cafes, making and selling granola—to Whole Foods! They are running car washes, messenger services, book stores, and even hotels in Germany and India! Some are even reading mammograms and doing sound engineering. These businesses serve anywhere from one to dozens of workers.
I visited 13 such businesses between June and December 2018 and learned of many more from these business owners, parents, colleagues and the Facebook group, Autism Entrepreneurship. Business owners were happy to share lessons learned and challenges faced, including:
-Take the lead from your child’s interests [i.e. dolls, in the case Yes She Can (job skills program) and GirlAgain (a resale boutique for American Girl dolls], but also have a careful business plan and start a business likely to be successful;
-Don’t start a business when you are feeling desperate; start a business after careful research (consult with professionals who know this type of business);
-Strive to keep costs down (investigate cheapest ways to ship, purchase ingredients, package the product, etc.);
-Be aware of such unanticipated costs as legal fees, websites (which are expensive), trash removal, local green taxes, etc.;
-Decide if plan is to be for profit, not for profit or both;
-Remember that running a business takes a lot of time and money;
-Know issues related to compensating workers, and how this can impact on their benefits (including Social Security);
-Transportation is an issue for many workers. Those who don’t drive are dependent on an often unreliable public transportation system or on Access-A-Ride (which may come very early or late);
-Business owners in this space have a lot to offer each other. Some would like to be part of a trade group. Some would like to share advice and consider selling products of other disability run businesses;
There are so many wonderful examples of businesses providing vocational training and work opportunities for people with disabilities. Several are highlighted here:
Purely Patrick in Stowe, VT is a one-person business run by Patrick Lewis, 27, (with the help of his mother and two job coaches) from his room in his parent’s Brass Lantern Inn. Patrick is a young man with disabilities and many abilities who assembles and sells various products including kits for soups, cookies and dog biscuits through the use of assistive technology. He uses a pouring device that is activated by a switch that he controls. The company sells products online, at various local fairs and at the inn.
John’s Crazy Socks in Melville, NY was established two years ago when John, a young man with Down Syndrome, was nearing graduation from high school. He and his dad were brainstorming business ideas and John suggested a sock company! Father reports, “We are evangelists on what people with different abilities can do! The best we can do is make our business a success. Johns Crazy Socks is a social enterprise/business with 18 people of differing abilities making up the 35 person work force. The work place is unified with all working side by side.”
Spectrum Design in Port Washington, NY is two separate 501c3 programs started by two mothers of children with autism. Nicholas Center is the support agency and Spectrum Designs is the business component. Spectrum Designs currently consists of three enterprises—Spectrum Designs, which produces customized apparel (3000-8000 shirts/day); Spectrum Bakes (bakery) and Suds, a boutique laundry service. The apparel design employs 20+ people with autism and there are currently 60 people involved with Spectrum Designs and Nicholas Center—some are salaried workers and some are trainees. They also have a work out room, go on nature walks and teach health and nutrition.
Rising Tide Car Wash in both Parkland and Margate, FL employs 72 people with disabilities out of a total of 92 workers. The company was started by the brother of a person with autism, with the expert guidance of their father, a life-long entrepreneur. Through Rising Tide U, an online course which provides road maps for entrepreneurs who wish to start businesses that empower individuals with autism through gainful employment, they are helping others get started.
Beyond the dozens of businesses on my growing list which provide creative job opportunities to people with disabilities, foundations like the Poses Family Foundation Workplace Initiative are working with industry to improve training and hiring of people with disabilities.
I keep coming across a very hopeful term in my travels—”Autism Advantage.” Employers are slowly learning that hiring people with autism and other disabilities has a real business advantage. This is not “chesed” or charity. This is good business! People with autism, for example, are often attentive to detail, follow rules and are loyal workers. People with disabilities often don’t mind repetitive tasks, and they are likely to stay at a job without looking to move up or out. The smaller business owners and large corporations continue to appreciate the unique skills and qualities of people with disabilities, the sooner the unemployment rate will go down, and the epidemic of falling off the cliff will come to an end once and for all!
Let’s face it: Sitting through services can feel long, arduous and not so interactive for worshippers. Congregants tend to talk with seatmates and neighbors to help pass the time.
But not at Rabbi Yehoshua Soudakoff’s High Holiday services. There, you could hear a pin drop. Worshippers had all eyes focused on the prayer leader for hours on end, enjoying it so much that they wound up spending the entire holiday sleeping in the shared apartment/synagogue space of the newly married Chabad rabbinical couple in Israel.Subscribe to The JNS Daily Syndicate by email and never miss our top stories
Rabbi Yehoshua, 27, and his wife, Cheftziba, both deaf from birth, recently hosted Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur services in their Rishon Letzion apartment for members of the deaf community. “Twenty came and slept in our home. We had services and meals together. It was really wonderful,” Soudakoff tells the JNS in a phone call from Israel with the assistance of an interpreter. When asked how it was advertised in Israel, Soudakoff quickly (and playfully), replies: “Word of hand!”
“The deaf community in Israel is very close and connected,” relates the executive director of the Jewish Deaf Foundation (JDF) and director of Chabad of the Deaf Community, based in Kfar Chabad, “and Israel is a small country. Word spreads like wildfire.”
The rabbi’s main goal is to create an accessible prayer experience where “people don’t feel deaf, where they feel like regular people.” He notes that in typical services, members of the deaf community are constantly wondering, “What is going on? What’s happening?”
Soudakoff’s services resemble a more conventional, cantor-led service in many ways. But perhaps out of necessity, it’s also more interactive.
“We have a hard-of-hearing person who davens [leads prayers] at the amud [prayer platform], and he signs parts of the tefillah [prayers] so that the rest of the group can follow along,” describes Soudakoff. “Another person stands directly across and tells the congregation when to answer, and indicating the page number on the machzor [prayer book], as well as signing part of the davening [when the chazzan isn’t signing]. So it was more of an interactive experience, with the chazzan, the gabbai and the congregation all davening together, and knowing where everyone else is holding. Which is the whole point of the experience—so that a deaf person doesn’t feel like he or she is catching up or totally lost in prayer.”
He further describes some of the inner workings of the service. “There is singing in the sense that there is a sound, but also signing out the words of the tefillah. For example, we would all read ‘Avinu Malkeinu’ together, or ‘Unetaneh Tokef.’ ”
During Sukkot, he will be driving a mobile sukkah from Metula, in the northernmost town in Israel, all the way down to Eilat at Israel’s southern tip, meeting with deaf people along the way to shake the lulav and the etrog.
Singing through signing, following the cantor
Moishy Wertheimer, a board member of the Jewish Deaf Foundation who met Soudakoff many years ago when they were roommates in yeshivah, served as cantor for the High Holidays. “The crowd sings through signing, following the chazzan, with assistance of Rabbi Soudakoff,” he clarifies. “There is also shofar-blowing.”
Those who have cochlear implants can hear it; others can feel the vibrations, and some put their hand right on the shofar.
Wertheimer shares some of the challenges of leading services for a community that doesn’t sing. “To be a chazzan leading a deaf crowd is a challenge because they cannot hear me, but Rabbi Soudakoff interprets the prayers into Israeli sign language,” he says, acknowledging that it was definitely different than usual. “Rabbi Soudakoff is a real shliach tzibbur[‘public messenger,’ Wertheimer’s translation]. I learned no matter if they don’t need my voice to lead the prayer, they still they need to ‘feel’ the voice of a chazzan.”
Wertheimer says he’s proud of what the Soudakoffs have accomplished so far. “For many deaf people, our shul is very accessible for them; they can participate without any [communication] barrier.”
Soudakoff would next like to build a synagogue and community center. “We have a lot of dreams. With a physical space, we can do more activities and hold more services.” He already has an impressive record of determination and success in the world of Jewish learning, education, outreach and camping.
Working towards greater inclusion and awareness
Soudakoff was born deaf to two deaf parents. His two brothers and his sister are also deaf. He had a very rich Jewish experience growing up in Los Angeles. “My mother started an organization in Los Angeles for the Jewish deaf. It was in our living room. I always saw events there. I grew up with that exposure.”
Soudakoff then attended Yeshiva Nefesh Dovid, a Jewish deaf high school in Toronto. “There are not many deaf people who have the same opportunities that I had growing up,” he acknowledges.
After three years of studying Jewish texts, he graduated and returned to Los Angeles—thirsty to continue pursuing Jewish learning and his involvement in the Jewish community. Soudakoff quickly learned that the Jewish world offers very few resources for the Jewish deaf, including access to the Jewish community and functions. “I wanted to change that” he says.
So he began blogging and making online videos about Jewish holidays and ideas. “My sister would make videos of herself making latkes or matzah-ball soup, and I would sign and later add captions.” (See “Jewish Deaf Multi Media” on YouTube).
Soudakoff then started summer camps for Jewish children who are deaf. The camp met in the Poconos of Pennsylvania for one summer, then in California the next summer. This past summer, the two-week camp took place in Italy; it was a travel camp with one week in Tuscany, and the second week visiting the north and Rome.
Jeremy J. Fingerman, CEO of the Foundation for Jewish Camp, says “we admire Rabbi Soudakoff’s dedicated efforts. His inspired work reminds us of the importance of making Jewish camp—and indeed, our entire Jewish community—accessible for everyone.”
Jay Ruderman, president of the Ruderman Family Foundation that works to promote and support inclusion worldwide, is similarly impressed with Soudakoff and his work. “How great that we are living in a time when people are proud of who they are and teaching us that people of all abilities have the right to be equal members of our society,” he states.
Wertheimer, the prayer leader, is pleased with what the Soudakoffs and the deaf community have accomplished so far.
“We are working together to bring accessibility for the deaf community into the Jewish world,” he says, pointing out that a great deal of work still lies ahead. “They have a big responsibility for making sure that any deaf Jew has access to Jewish life. I think there has been a lack of Judaism in the Jewish deaf communities because there no awareness and sensitivity for deaf people in Judaism world.”
WEST BLOOMFIELD, Mich.—Felicia Bowers’ smile was the size of Lake Michigan when she received the latest update on the number of Facebook viewers who have watched the “Art Through Felicia’s Eyes” video. “You just broke 1 million!” exclaimed Bassie Shemtov, co-founder and director (with her husband, Rabbi Levi) of Friendship Circle. Within a few hours, the number of viewers had already jumped to 1.2 million.
The 27-year-old Detroit resident and her art have been receiving a great deal of attention, partly due to her portrait, “The Dancer”—depicting a very active dancer in a wheelchair—which sold for $14,500 as part of a recent evening event that raised more than $100,000 for the Friendship Circle.
Bowers is intelligent, articulate, persistent and has a great sense of humor. She also has cerebral palsy, is non-verbal, uses a wheelchair at all times, and communicates—and draws—with assistive technology, a Tobii Dynavox tablet with Eyegaze eye-tracking software.
The artist has many followers and admirers in the Detroit area, across the United States and online. Using her eye-tracking equipment, she recently spoke with Chabad.org at Friendship Circle’s Farber Center in West Bloomfield Township, Mich.—and shared her interest in art, how she uses her eyes to communicate and create art, her involvement with Friendship Circle, and her advice for other artists with and without disabilities.
We met in an art room, surrounded by works created by Felicia Bowers and other artists with disabilities at the Dresner Foundation’s Soul Studio. Her mother, Tina Bowers, and Friendship Circle of Michigan’s special-projects coordinator, Jamie Reedholm, joined in the conversation.
The Interview:
Q:Tell me a little bit about yourself. How old are you? Where do you live? Who are some important people in your family and circle of friends?
Felicia: I am 27 years old. I live with my mom, dad and my dog, Max. He is a Shiatzu. He comes here sometimes and sits on my lap!
Q:How and when did you hear about Friendship Circle? What are some of the things you do here?
Felicia: I was watching the news and saw Lillia.
Jamie Reedholm: From the beginning of Friendship Circle, we had a young woman named Lillia who, like Felicia, was in a wheelchair. They had a lot in common, but we learned that afterwards. We were able to get Lillia her own apartment. And with the generosity of the people in our community, it was fully accessible and totally hers. The news came and did a story about it. That’s how Felicia and her family learned about Friendship Circle. Sadly, Lillia passed away.
Q: Can you explain how you are communicating with me right now?
Felicia: I use my eyes to say what I want. There is a camera in the bottom of my device. It tracks my eyes, and when I look at a particular square, selects it. It is a type of Dynavox, a Tobii Dynavox.
Tina Bowers: It can strain your eyes. She is very strong. She had help programming each page—each square has a sentence underneath—she knows what is under each square. She knows where everything is, where she needs to go. She does a lot of spelling. She goes to the dictionary. She looks for a word.
Felicia: My boyfriend, John Wirth, programmed my Tobii.
Felicia Bowers using her Tobii Dynavox tablet with Eyegaze eye tracking software, as her mother, Tina Bowers, looks on.
Q:What are some of the things you do when you come to Friendship Circle?
Felicia: I went shopping and bowling and swimming. I met new friends.
Jamie: The first program she was involved in when she came to Friendship Circle is called “Teen Trips.” Every Sunday, we take teens and young adults on trips.
Q: When did you start with the art part of the program?
Felicia: 2016
Q: How did you discover that you were interested in art?
Felicia: I have always enjoyed art. I remember the first time I created art in middle school. It was the first time I felt free from cerebral palsy and in control of my body.
Q: What did you do? What was the project when you had the moment when you felt so free?
Tina prompts Felicia: Do you remember what you were drawing? Were you painting? Painting with your foot? You were painting with your foot. You had different colors, with a paintbrush taped to your foot. She colored with her hands, but we had to tape crayons on to her hands and we had to mount the paper a certain way to the table for her to color. When she was about 2 or 3 years old, she was walking in the baby walker. I had taped crayons onto her hands, and she walked over to the wall and I had told her not to color on the wall, and she colored on the walls!
“The Dancer”
Q: So she was very typical … big surprise … a defiant 2-year-old …
Tina: Her dad saw it and said, “No!” so we got a piece of plywood and leaned it against the kitchen cabinet and stuck paper on it, and she used to draw while walking over there. It is funny—while in baby-walker upright, she would always go backwards because she didn’t have good support of her body. I was talking to my mom one day and saying, “I wish she could walk forward.” Next minute—she came out from the kitchen, into the living room, walking forward. She leaned against the tray and was walking forward. That is how she was coloring—she would support herself on the tray of the baby-walker, and she would go over and color on the board—that’s why her dad set it up there so she could get to the paper, leaning against it and just color.
Q: (For Tina): You saw she had this interest from an early age, that there was this interest in art, something inside … ?
Tina: Yes. She was drawing lines, always telling me what colors she wanted. She was doing color selections. That’s when she was a baby. I didn’t know it was going to go anywhere because we didn’t know how much her body could do. As she got older, it seems she went from elementary to junior high, and when she got the communication box, she was using a switch. We didn’t have the Eyegaze at that time. But she still had a unit where if she wanted something, she would go to each block, and when she wanted that square, she clicked the clicker—with your foot, right?
A self-portrait by Bowers with her boyfriend, John Wirth
Q: I get the feeling the artist was always inside and with each technology (brush on foot, crayons on finger, etc.) it became …
Tina: She is still growing, and doing more and more and more. And now look what she is doing with lines, with her eyes.
Q: What is your favorite form of art? Is it line drawings, painting, ceramics …
Tina to Felicia: Is it the line drawing? You should put that (the response) in there (in the Dynavox).
Tina: It refreshes her memory for what she wants to say … when she hasn’t talked all day, she is trying to figure out what to say …
It has always been inside of her. It’s just now she is trying to get it all out and it is really very frustrating for her to get her thoughts on the screen, to type all the sentences out. It has been very frustrating all these years. She has been trying to tell us so much all these years.
Now that she has started Soul Center, she has gotten stronger and is learning a lot more—not just drawing, but talking.
Jamie: The social aspect.
Tina: She needed all this. She had some at school, but it is stronger here. And since she has been with John, she has gotten stronger. It is amazing.
Works on display at the Dresner Soul Studio, a unique vocational training program, studio and gallery where artists with disablilites work daily from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Their work is then sold in the gallery.
Q: What are some of the themes in your art and why? Things or ideas which keep coming up? That you like to draw?
Felicia: My favorite art piece is to make art which reminds me of the people I love.
Q: Can you give me an example? Something you draw that reminds you of people you love?
Felicia: (Staring at the wall across from her, at her self-portrait of her and John) (Everyone laughs)
Q: Where did you get the idea of the dancer? Do you like to dance?
Felicia: I was little and used to go to Eagle’s Club.
Tina: They used to have a dance; you could take your family and dance. My sister would push her around in her wheelchair and dance with her, twirl her around. That’s what brought that out. That’s what she’s feeling when she sees a dancer. The painting is an actual dancer in a wheelchair dance company in L.A.
Rabbi Levi Shemtov, co-founder and co-director with his wife, Bassie, of Friendship Circle
Q: What are you working on now?
Felicia: I am drawing Ellen!
Tina: Television host Ellen DeGeneres.
Q: I know you guys aren’t Jewish. What is it like to be included in a Jewish program?
Felicia: We appreciate being in the program.
Tina: She really appreciates everything they are doing. She is growing so much more with her communication box, learning more, talking more and getting more words out there. This has opened doors even more.
Q: What is your advice/message for other artists—with and without disabilities?
Felicia: Never give up!
Q: What do you think our society has to keep doing to be more welcoming and inclusive and better for people with disabilities?
Felicia: Be caring and understanding.
Q:Last question. Can you describe the night when your “Dancer” portrait was sold? What was that like? How did you feel?
Felicia: Wow.
Bassie Shemtov, co-founder and co-director (with her husband, Rabbi Levi Shemtov) of Friendship Circle
Artists and Teachers Express Hope for the Future
While Felicia and her art continue to receive worldwide attention and praise, she is one of a number of talented artists and teachers at the Dresner Soul Studio, a unique vocational training program, studio and gallery where artists work daily from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Their work is then sold in the gallery.
On the day of my visit, Rollie King of Minneapolis was walking around the gallery. “I really love art, and I’m beyond amazed. This stuff is really great!” She pointed out some of her favorite pieces. “This clock is outstanding!” She is particularly proud of her nephew, Kevin Shink, an artist in his mid-50’s, and pointed out his large three-dimensional creation depicting the city of Detroit.
While Bassie Shemtov is proud of all of the artists, there is particular pride in Felicia Bowers. “Felicia will be able to make a real living, especially as her story is getting out there and as she creates more work, which is something that nobody thought was possible.”
Shemtov says that much of the studio’s success can be attributed to the dedication and creativity of Anthony Marcellini, programs and exhibitions manager at the Soul Studio. “Anthony is so talented. He had no experience working with people with special needs before joining us here,” says Shemtov. “Yet he has a knack of understanding people and truly respects and loves the artists.”
Paintings on display at the Dresner Soul Studio
Marcellini notes the unique opportunities at Soul Studio, “For me, what has been most revealing about working with someone like Felicia is discovering her potential. Because cerebral palsy limits normal methods of communication, many people would write her off as non-verbal and perhaps even low functioning. But actually, she is very smart and has enormous verbal and creative potential. She simply needs the right tools to work around her specific situation. She needs challenges and encouragement to create, newer, different and better work along the way. This is actually the same with every artist in our program, though each person’s specific needs and drives are different.”
Marcellini has been instrumental in helping Felicia continue to find ways to be her best as an artist. Felicia has evolved from painting with her feet and using crayons attached to her fingers, to carefully sketching with her Dynavox. Marcellini explains the technical aspects of Felicia’s drawings.
“Felicia draws using a Tobii Dynavox tablet with Eyegaze eye tracking software. Because of Felicia’s cerebral palsy she is unable to use her arms and legs to the precision she would like to make art. So she has learned how use eye tracking software, to move a cursor across the computer screen and make lines. Every time she turns her eye towards the screen it is like she is clicking the button on the mouse, or like putting pencil to paper, and when she moves her eye away it unclicks, like lifting the pencil off the paper. This, as you might imagine, takes tremendous precision and concentration to operate. Felicia has been using this software and similar software for quite some time, and is able to do this simply because she is very precise, hardworking and talented at it. We are now trying to get her to loosen up and be a little freer with it, to explore new and freer ways of expressing herself. We are also trying to bring in some of the methods she used in the past, like painting with her foot or head, to add some expression to the drawings.”
Marcellini loves his work at the Soul Studio. “What is so exciting about this place is that it is an art studio first, where participants come to the studio curious, enthusiastic and driven. They are met by an equally curious, enthusiastic and driven staff of practicing artists and designers, whose sole aim is to propel their creative ideas into new spheres by providing tools to sidestep or surmount their disabilities. It is a place of constant surprises that has totally shifted my perspective, on education, service and ability. Here art serves as a primary form of communication when common forms are less accessible.”
Artist Kevin Shink with his large three-dimensional creation depicting the city of Detroit
Nicole Kahan began volunteering at the Friendship Circle when she was in seventh grade and continued to work here through high school. She sees tremendous benefit in Friendship Circle for both participants and for the community. “It benefits the overall community because it normalizes people with disabilities and shows the community that we can all be friends. It benefits its volunteers because it allows people to interact with others they wouldn’t normally interact with. It also helps you gain a lot of leadership experience as well as normalizing these interactions. It creates opportunities for teens.”
Kahan is one of the many admiring members of the Detroit community who appear in the viral “Felicia’s Eyes” video. “When I first saw Felicia’s artwork, I truly was speechless. She had the ability to create something so incredible in such a different way.”
