As a part of my SOS: Culture, Community, and Disability program this quarter, there’s an internship portion. Like many SOS’s, mine is based heavily in community involvement and individual projects. Each student was expected to participate in LEAD, which is an acronym for “Literacy and Education for Adults with Disabilities.” Along with this, each student had to work on an independent project.

A group of students decided to put together an art show in Evergreen’s Student Art Gallery, which showcased a diverse amount of artwork from both tutors and learners within the LEAD program. It was an opportunity for the class and community to come together, while also being a great opportunity for those who shared their artwork. I’ve had artwork in that gallery before and it was a special experience to share with the larger community, rather than just myself and those close to me.

It’s also a very vulnerable experience, to be able to express your soul through art and to then put that on display. So it was an amazing experience to do a walk-through and be on more of the receiving end this time, observing others’ art and the ways each piece contributed to a colorful atmosphere.

The theme of the art gallery is inclusion. This speaks to the same theme within my SOS, where we learned in depth about what it means to be excluded because of disability or difference. Especially in artistic spaces, there’s often a standard and a lot of privilege that goes into whose art gets displayed. So it was nice to see a space that didn’t have any of those expectations, yet which had just as much talent and spirit.

It was also a great celebration of the work students and learners did throughout the quarter, and I look forward to more events like it.