I first used the word ARTism in 2000 to describe how my artistic personality trait had taken over where my autism left off, hence, artism. In 2004 I gave a presentation on ARTism in Those With Autism at Flinders University. The first web references of the use of the word artism go back to 1969. Today the term artism is used by both artists with autism, and many without. And why not? Artism is to artists what chocoholism is to chocoholics.

The ARTism store
Once upon a time there were Donna Williams‘ T-shirts which people bought around with world and mostly in the UK where I was touring when I lived there. Well, they’re back. Not exactly the ones available back then but well worth a visit to the new online shop, if only for a look around. And if t-shirts don’t interest you, there’s plenty else; mugs, mouse mats, bags, and other stuff. Its ARTism city. Hope to see you there.

at http://www.cafepress.com/donnawilliams/

Hope to see you there.

Even better, consider the service this place offers artists and how you might utilise it to express your own creativity.

Every the arty autie….

Donna Williams *)
http://www.donnawilliams.net

Bestselling fantasy fiction author, Caiseal Mor, was diagnosed with ASD as a child. He’d written his autobiography in adulthood but the publishers and the journalists who helped his fiction works climb to fame were convinced that public awareness of his autism would be unhelpful to book sales. He was not only strongly discouraged from going public about having ASD but a whole other persona was created for him instead. Read the rest of this entry »

Imagine if you could erase all dialogue, all faces from your dreams yet still have deep, meaningful dreams, even more so.

Imagine a world that is purely spatial, logical, a 3D world in which you exist as a bodyless entity, as if you have entered the pure cognitive workings of your own brain. Read the rest of this entry »

He broke up with his girlfriend. She was seeing an older man. So he shot 32 people on a Virginia college campus.

Illogical?

Somehow not to him. But how? Read the rest of this entry »

With up to 60% of people with Asperger’s Syndrome reporting being bullied in secondary schools on a daily basis we have an epidemic of intolerance which points at a currently undiagnosed and far more widespread and damaging pathology than Asperger’s Syndrome will ever be. Others reports put figures at closer to 90%. Read the rest of this entry »

I have an art exhibition coming up in Melbourne

April 11th-May 2nd,
Gallery 15,
15 William St, Melbourne.

open Monday-Friday 9am-6pm.
info@peakevents.com.au

It’s a wonderful inner city gallery involved with a program called Art for a Cause in which artists can use their work to raise awareness or funds for a cause they support.

Read the rest of this entry »

I received a letter from a reader, convinced that autism was a state of torture, of being one of the living dead, unable to feel anything for anyone or anything in the external world. Read the rest of this entry »

I went for an updated eye test at the opticians today and had a most interesting discussion. Read the rest of this entry »

Reading an article on emotional incest I came across some interesting inter-generational dynamics. Emotional incest was more prevalent in parents with their own challenges and the impact on their children seemed to have some interesting implications for social-emotional interaction patterns in their children. Could parents of kids diagnosed with ASD be more at risk of emotional incest which in turn exacerbates issues commonly identified with adults with Asperger’s? Read the rest of this entry »

With the new government proposal to phase out incandescent light bulbs, what about those on the autism spectrum with the visual perceptual processing challenge of Scotopic Sensitivity Syndrome who struggle to concentrate, read and learn under fluorescent lighting? Read the rest of this entry »