Creative Growth Polaroid Self-Portraits with Chalkboard Drawings.

I am intrigued by the drawn chalk line as it is translated by the camera into a beautiful graphic element. Adding drawing to the portrait creates a double portrait, because everyone's drawing style is unique. The artists here are fluent in drawing.

Creative Growth Self-Portraits­­­

I am intrigued by the drawn chalk line as it is translated by the camera into a beautiful graphic element. Adding the drawing to the portrait creates a double portrait, because everybody’s drawing style is unique.

 I wanted to try this process at Creative Growth Art Center in Oakland, California. The artists there, all of whom have developmental disabilities, have such fluency in the language of drawing.

 Coincidentally, a new film (New 55) had just come on the market, which followed in the tradition of Polaroid Type 55 film, in which each shot produces an instant positive print along with a negative.

Using a 4 x 5 view camera with this new film, I attached a shutter release with a pneumatic bulb, which allowed each artist to take his or her own picture alongside the finished chalk drawing. I have found in past projects how much a self-portrait eliminates the self-consciousness of posing for a photograph by giving the sitter control over the timing of the shutter release. After practicing a few times, the artists got the hang of it and took very relaxed, natural pictures. Seeing the positive print immediately added to the excitement of the process.

Some of the Creative Growth artists have been featured in the Venice Biennale, and last year the Oakland Museum of Art featured many Creative Growth Artists in an exhibition which included 2 other Art Centers for Artists with developmental disabilities, NIAD Art Center in Richmond, and Creativity Explored in San Francisco.

SFMOMA has just collected the work of many Artists from these three Art Centers.

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