Art + Medicine

- And these are gonna be strikers.

And strikers is where you hold matches.

'Cause, you know, I'm about ready for the barbecue season.

First of all, I was born Blind.

I don't let my disability stop me from being a potter.

And what drew me to it is the fact that I like tactile.

Like you're always picking up, touching everything, that's me at the store.

Everything that you see in life or that you experience and touch, it inspired me to figure out what I'm gonna make.

Your mind keeps saying, well let me see what it takes to build that.

These are berry bowls and believe it or not, this is a soup container that comes off of those packaged soups.

And I take my berry bowl and I set it up this way.

When I say that I do pottery or they see me working and doing pottery, they're shocked.

Traditionally, there's not that many women and especially women of color or people with disabilities, I don't know any Blind female Black women in pottery to tell you the truth, I've never met one yet.

(chuckles) (calm music) I like texture.

Texture is my way of knowing what's around me.

So your mind is always trying to figure out exactly how is it supposed to be.

And that's part of the reason why I got into pottery was because I wanted to always figure it out and not just live in the world of a woman with a disability.

You can live in the world but you need to exist in the world that you live in.

And the only way that can happen is that you actually get out there and you touch things and you feel things and you don't let people say what your world is supposed to be.

And I just start putting that coat on there somewhere.

A disability does not mean no ability.

Disability is about ability.

Using the abilities that you have to create.

And if you really wanna do it, you'll figure out how to do it.

I want in the future to make sure that I stay doing public art with communities of individuals with disabilities so that we can become visible in the art world.

- [Announcer] This program was produced in collaboration with the Center for the Art of Medicine at the University of Minnesota Medical School.

And funded by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens of Minnesota.

(calm music)