Autistic Artist

Prosopagnosia

Prosopagnosia, otherwise known as face blindness, affects some of us with Asperger Syndrome. The condition can profoundly influence those of us who are artists.

I have trouble recognizing people I know on the street. Also, often I think I can recognize someone from context or the way they walk and dress, only to discover it is not them. I have embarrassed myself many times by either not recognizing someone I know or else approaching a stranger thinking they are someone else, only to discover they are not the person I thought they were!

This can happen even with members of my family. I do not recognize my ex-husband from photos -- even when he was standing next to me in the photo! And recently I went to a wedding and introduced myself to the lady sitting next to me during the reception. Not only was she one of my new relatives by marriage, but she had visited my home where we had shared several hours in a delightful conversation.

I am always surprised by photos of myself. When I first see a photo, old or new, of myself, I can scarcely believe it is me.

I also cannot tell when someone is very handsome or beautiful. Faces I find interesting I later learn are not attractive to members of the opposite gender. And those society finds very handsome or beautiful seldom look attractive to me. For example, I have always found Tom Cruise to be a very unattractive man, long before people started complaining about his personality!

Of course, this affects my art. Like some other autistic artists with prosopagnosia, I have never been very interested in drawing faces, even when I include people in my compositions.

Generally, it has taken me a very long time to be interested in drawing people at all. I know that art teachers and professional artists consider drawing people to be the epitome of learning and practicing art. Is this objectively true, or merely a kind of species-centricism on the part of humans? One thing for certain, most people strongly respond to images of people in works of art.

But, for me, drawing people just hasn't been very interesting, perhaps because I use body shape, size, dress, and so on as the components of a classification system so I can actually recognize people. I think of people details as a kind of spreadsheet.

Still, I can't ignore the popularity of those artists who feature images of people, especially faces, prominently in their artwork. This is especially true in the art journaling world to which I belong (witness Teesha Moore).

Right now I'm enrolled in a doll making class, and I am just dragging my feet on doing the work because I dread doing the faces. It is not that I don't think I can do it. I know I can. I just can't seem to drum up the enthusiasm for it. I do confess a long standing love for Amish dolls which are faceless.

I am also learning to make teddy bears. Surprisingly I do enjoy making the teddy bear faces. For some reason which I do not understand, animal faces have always been more meaningful to me.

My First Memory

My first facination was with color, texture, and movement.

I know this because my first vivid memory included all those things.

At the age of two my father took me to the park. I remember running out to his car, a sleek black sedan (later, I learne, a Buick). I remember being excited that I was going somewhere with him.

I don’t remember the ride to the park. But I remember that he taught me to feed the squirrels. He probably took me to Capitol Park. I remember how neat the lawn was. I was fascinated by all the blades of grass and the strong green color of the lawn in the sunlight. I was even more fascinated by the squirrels.

At first I was afraid to feed a squirrel. But my father was very gentle and patient with me and helped me hold the nut down low for the squirrel to take. I stared at the squirrel and was fascinated that he stared back and me. I found the way he held the nut and ate off of it to be very interesting.

This visual orientation of my life has stayed with me not only in my visual art but in my writing. For example, I have been told many times that my written fiction is very visual.