Blind artists show their works through Friday

When Becky Bell shapes her pottery she expresses how she felt as a girl walking through a Kansas cornfield with her father, or standing in a swirling snowstorm, or feeling warm candle wax collapse in her hands.

Although as a blind woman, she can't see the art she creates; Bell draws from a rich interior world built on life experiences. Having studied pottery since she was young, living in France with her Army colonel father, she wanted other blind artists to have a chance to showcase their work and talked officials at the Washington Talking Book & Braille Library in Seattle to host its first art show.

The show, which opened Monday and closes at 4 p.m. Friday, features the work of 12 artists, mainly from Western Washington.

Across the nation, blind artists have been increasingly recognized over the past three decades, thanks to the National Exhibits by Blind Artists (NEBA), which was founded in Pennsylvania but now is an acclaimed leader in giving blind artists from all over the United States a forum for expressing their talent through juried shows throughout the United States and abroad. The Seattle show, the first of its kind, is not an NEBA show, but Seattle's blind artists can apply to be included in the traveling exhibits.

"This came together kind of quickly," said Danielle King, program manager for the library. "It's important for patrons to showcase their work, and for sighted people who aren't aware of the breadth of the capabilities" of the blind.

Bell's pieces are circular, smooth, pleasantly tactile. "I like things that feel like they come from the ocean," she said. "Close your eyes and see how it feels."

Another artist, Jessica Thompson, displayed a wire sculpture of hands, which she called "Homage," a tribute to her own hands and all they do for her. She said a few years ago she was given a bucket of crayons by a hospital therapist who told her to draw, and for the first time since childhood she did. Since then, her art gives expression to her unsaid emotions.

Like Thompson and Bell, Eleni Teshome lives in Seattle and has art on exhibit — complicated and colorful sweaters with perfect designs and no missed stitches. She knits, marking the place to switch colors by measuring sections with her fingers.

Teshome has knitted since she was a girl but it took on new meaning after she lost her eyesight in the late 1980s.

"I'm content and totally engaged in it," Teshome said. She makes things for herself, for others and sometimes weaves her emotions into the product, such as the piece she calls "Journey to Jerusalem," which has holes in it to represent the holes in the gates to Jerusalem.

The Seattle library for the blind, the only one in the state, is part of the Washington state library system and one of 57 regional libraries for the blind in the U.S., said Jan Walsh, the Washington state librarian."I'm not at all surprised to see how beautiful the work is," said Walsh, who dropped in from Olympia for the show. "We need to honor our patrons and show what amazing work they can do."

Nancy Bartley: 206-464-8522 or nbartley@seattletimes.com