There are many people who enjoy doing creative work. They like to make things with their own hands, like a painting or a work of art. If these works are being sold, they deserve their own money with it.

There are also people, who wrote a book, or who act in a movie or television show.
Sometimes, mentally handicapped people themselves, are the subject of a work of art or an art project. Like in the photo series Downpower.

"Rembrandt in een nieuw jasje"

In November 2002, there was a group of mentally handicapped people from the Amerpoort in Amersfoort, in the news.
They were invited on the televisionshow 'Kopspijkers', to tell something about their artefacts.
Their art project was called “Rembrandt in een nieuw jasje”. This means: "Rembrandt in a new coat."
They were given the assignment, to copy a famous painting, in their own way. Some had painted the Mona Lisa, for example. Others chose a painting of Picasso to re-paint.
They were given loads of compliments about their work, because, according to people who knew a lot about art, it was so good.
There was an article in the newspaper, with the headline: “Not childish, but it is unprejudiced.”
The same group of artists has made some artefacts for an art agenda. On this site, there is more information about that: www.amerpoort.nl


Art contest
Mentally disabled people, who are good in making art, could join a contest. The foundation K4 in the Netherlands is a national working organisation for art, established by mentally disabled people. All sent in pieces of art were exhibited in the Cobra-museum in Amsterdam.

In the year 2004, K4 handed out the fourth k4-Award. The Award is a national art contest for mentally disabled people. With this Award, people want to show the expressive art abilities of mentally disabled people optimally.
When you are on this site: www.stichtingk4.nl, and you click on the headline ‘links’, you will see some references to sites of art workshops, where mentally handicapped people work.
This site is in Dutch. The English translation is on: www.d-tail.com.

Art: a photograph exhibition
Mentally disabled people also keep themselves busy with art. This is possible, because they make art themselves, like paintings and drawings, or because they joined an art project.
Downpower is a project, where a couple of adolescents with the Down Syndrome worked on. A photographer made some really nice portraits of them. They also told what is really important for them. The exhibition toured through the Netherlands in September 2003.

The photos can be seen on: www.humanphoto.nl
Alex, Sjoerd and Jasper live in Almere, the Netherlands.