By Alex Pastor
WHAT exactly is autism? This was the question that kept on recurring in this writer’s mind while covering a recent art auction and exhibit put up by the Center for Possibilities (CFP) Foundation, held at the RCBC Plaza. The artist, Samantha Kaspar, is a 19-year-old who’s afflicted with autism. According to the National Autistic Society (www.autism.org.uk), the leading United Kingdom charity for autistic people, autism is “a lifelong developmental disability that affects how a person communicates with and relates to other people, and how they experience the world around them.”
Further to this, in a new study published in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, it was revealed individuals with autism can also be highly creative, for they are able to process large amounts of information while also being very detail-oriented.
This was very apparent in the case of Samantha and her amazing creativity, despite her disability.
She featured all 40 of her artworks in the auction, some on fabric to be used as fashion accessories, while others on canvas. All were intricately done and we were told by her parents, Martin and Mitzi Kaspar, the colors Samantha uses for each of her masterpieces show exactly what she was feeling at the time of creation.
“When she’s happy, she would use bright colors, and when she’s not, she would use darker colors,” shared Samantha’s mother, Mitzi.
Samantha uses a wide variety of media but works primarily on piña silk using silk paints and acrylic paint on canvas. Of Filipino and Swiss descent, Samantha always tries to infuse her Filipino roots in her artworks. She has a signature style of using a lot of lines and edges, making her paintings look quite linear. She also has a unique way of putting different kinds of shapes inside images. Her paintings will be featured in the upcoming Fashion Arts Autism Benefit (FAAB) happening at the Philippine Center in New York City on April 7.
The FAAB, a project by Autism Hearts Philippines, is meant to showcase the artistic talents of children with special needs. Samantha is one of the eight Filipino artists chosen to present their works on piña silk, and translated into fashionable clothing by Patis Tesoro and Anthony Legarda, the featured designers for the fashion show. All the eight chosen artists took a yearlong workshop under master weaver India Legaspi to develop their skill and familiarity with piña silk painting.
Many, if not, all of the artworks of Samantha were sold during that day, the proceeds of which will fund her trip to New York.
BENEFIT CONCERT
AFTER the auction, the Manila Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Prof. Arturo Molina and annotated by Jeffrey Solares, held a concert, billed as Soundtracks and Symphonies. Their repertoire included a John Williams tribute, as well as popular pieces from Beethoven, Mozart and Bach.
The concert is for the benefit of special education (SPED) centers that have been the focus of the Center for Possibilities’s recent efforts. These centers will act as a venue for the learning of indigent persons with special needs, taught no less by a teacher specially trained by the SPED Division of Reach International School.
The two beneficiary centers are the Sagada and the Norzagaray SPED centers. The Sagada SPED Center is already up and running but will be undergoing enhancements through a series of livelihood and vocational programs meant to teach income-generating skills.
The Norzagaray SPED Center, on the other hand, still needs a lot of help. Currently, it is just an empty building without any facilities. The most needed for this center is a fence, a water tank and a playground area, among other things.
“Caring for special kids is very taxing, because it’s usually just a one-income household, so we also need to help the parents themselves to increase their finances. We are also in the process of doing our due diligence by determining the number of special children in all the barangays relevant in Norzagaray. We will be holding an orientation for all the parents in the Norzagaray communities. We are also concurrently planning for the provision of testing, diagnosis, and analysis of the children with special needs,” CFP founder Dolores Cheng said.
Enrollment in both SPED centers is for free, further helping alleviate the family’s cost of taking care and providing education for their special children.
If you would like to extend assistance, you may reach CFP at www.centerforpossibilities.asia or 723-1242 or 0918-8881759.