Award-Winning Art Exhibit to Visit Douglasville

Cultural Arts Council press release

Douglasville, Georgia – Approximately 50 award-winning pieces of art from disabled artists across Georgia will be on display June 8-July 11 at the Georgia Artists with Disabilities, Inc.'s 29th annual statewide tour and exhibit at the Cultural Arts Council, 8652 Campbellton Street.

The entries in the 2013-14 exhibit include paintings, photographs, clay pottery, mosaics, textiles and other mediums considered fine art.

The nine-city tour kicked off in Moultrie in September and ends in Douglasville.

“Georgia Artists with Disabilities continues to be an avenue that allows hundreds of disabled artists to achieve recognition and commercial opportunities for their unique pieces of art,” said Glynice Hayes, GAWD chair. “We’re proud to be an advocate for the disabled in communities across Georgia and honored to put their art on display every year for the public to see and enjoy.”

Judges for the exhibit entries included:

• Neda Abghari, a photographer, educator and arts advocate who seeks ways to use her photography as a tool to connect, engage and educate the community about its artists. In 2007, she began a photo documentary series through which she has captured more than 70 intimate portraits of creative individuals nationwide. This body of work inspired her founding of The Creatives Project, an arts nonprofit delivering much-needed arts education and outreach programs to the local community.

• Jerushia Graham, a printmaker, fiber artist, art foundations instructor for the Art Institute of Atlanta-Decatur and printmaking/book arts instructor for Kennesaw State University, Southwest Arts Center and Abernathy Arts Center.

• Brian Hebert, who studied fine art at Southern University in Baton Rouge, La., under Martin Peyton and Robert Cox. In 2001, he moved to Atlanta and started working at the Southwest Arts Center as an arts program specialist/ visual arts, where he has taught classes in drawing and painting, art media and other instructional programs.

Georgia Artists with Disabilities, Inc. was founded in 1985 by the Pilot Clubs of Metro Atlanta and is supported by Georgia District Pilot Clubs. The goal of the Pilot International Foundation is "full citizenship for people who are disabled.” The mission of Georgia Artists with Disabilities is to provide avenues through which Georgia artists with disabilities can display their artistic accomplishments in all disciplines of the arts, and to create public awareness of the artistic skills these artists have developed by overcoming the obstacles of their disabilities. Georgia Artists with Disabilities, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) organization.

The Cultural Arts Council of Douglasville/ Douglas County, located at 8652 Campbellton Street in historic downtown Douglasville, Georgia, is open Mondays through Fridays, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. For directions and more information, visit www.artsdouglas.org or contact the Cultural Arts Council at 770-949-2787.