Eighteen-year old Dylan Guest and seventeen-year old Kevin Hosseini, both artists on the autism spectrum, were honored through VSA, an affiliate of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and Volkswagen of America at a Congressional Reception in Washington D.C. for their art work. Their art and art of 13 others will be on display at the Smithsonian S. Dillon Ripley Center in Washington D.C. from September 11, 2012 – January 13, 2013. The event is called “Sustaining/Creating” and is a national juried exhibition of 15 young emerging artists with disabilities.
Dylan, the grand prize winner, won a $20,000 cash prize for his sculpture titled “Holding His Own.” He describes himself as a visual thinker, who molds light, color, and space. Dylan’s says his work represents “the nature of each individual’s relationship to everyone else…the balance of each of us is balanced by the rest of us. We all help to sustain one another.” Dylan is a freshman at Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore, Maryland.
Kevin Hosseini, won a $2,000 award of excellence, for his art titled “Bus or Cycle.” Kevin has been encouraged to paint from a young age in order to help him express himself. Hosseini was featured in 2011 in a Neurodiversity Exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art in the Ukraine and has won awards nationally and internationally for his art.
The jurors were Jason Bowman, Director of Fountain Gallery, in New York City, William A. Newman, Artist and Professor, at Corcoran College of Art and Design in Washington D.C., and Sarah Tanguy, Curator, Art in Embassies, U.S. Department of State, Washington D.C.
Click here to find out more about VSA Kevin Hosseini’s website is at www.kevingallery.com
[nggallery id=20 template=caption]Jean Kennedy Smith, Assemblywoman Lois Capps, and James Billington, Director of the Library of Congress were on hand at the Congressional assembly.
