Celebrating Disability Culture at Georgetown

Second Floor Community Gallery

The Disability Cultural Center, the Department of Art and Art History, and the Georgetown University Library are proud to launch an art exhibit showcasing student artwork that celebrates disability culture and community at Georgetown. Working in various media, from painting and poetry to animation and mixed media, the students featured in this exhibit demonstrate the vibrancy and multifaceted perspectives of the disability community on campus. Works originally created for ACDC: Art Celebrating Disability Culture are displayed, alongside the Lego ramp constructed in Red Square as part of DCC’s Ramping Up Access event. Together, the works invite the audience to consider the ways they can contribute to a culture of access. 

This exhibit is on the second floor of the Joseph Mark Lauinger Library. To find accessible routes, elevators, and entrances to the exhibit, please use the interactive Campus Maps. 

Please join us for an opening reception on Wednesday, October 11 from 4:00-5:00 p.m. on the second floor of Lauinger Library. Refreshments will be served.

All 16 performers, along with Dr. Kenny, on stage in front of the ACDC poster posing for a picture.

Photos of student performers at ACDC: Art Celebrating Disability Culture, 2023

Photos from the “ACDC: Art Celebrating Disability Culture,” event hosted by the university’s Disability Cultural Initiative (DCI) and sponsored by the Division of Student Affairs and Office of the President. Artworks featured during the event were created by 15 students and included songs, spoken word performances, sculpture, animation, and the digital art found in this Library exhibition.

Two performers on stage one with long brown hair wearing yellow pants and a black shirt playing a violin. The other with short black hair wearing blue slacks and a white dress shirt playing a darbuka
A performer wearing a hot pink shirt, black tights, and black glasses with a guide dog on stage
A performer with long black curly hair wearing a red jumper with a tiger on it, and a denim skirt. There is a graphic of pink and blue swirly, thick lines projected at the back
Three dancers mid jump, each wearing purple, green, and red outfits, at the ACDC event in the Riggs Library with the ACDC poster projected behind them

 

performer wearing a black head scarf and a decorative blue and green shirt playing a guitar and singing into a microphone

Lego Ramp

Georgetown Community 

October 2023
Lego Bricks in a variety of colors and shapes 

A ramp made of 10,000 Lego Bricks, in a variety of colors, shapes, and styles, was built in Red Square by the Georgetown community at DCC’s Ramping Up Access Event. The ramp is a metaphor for access: collective, creative, and vibrant. 

Watch a video about the Making of the Lego Ramp.

 

Two people excitedly pointing at the completed Lego ramp.
A photo of 8 people standing around a table in the Red Square making a ramp out of Legos.
A photo of three people at a table in Red Square making a ramp with Legos.
Three people looking at the completed lego ramp set on top of a table in Lauinger Library
An Animated video cycling between seasons. A roughly human looking figure moves left to right as it stands in-between a field of what alternates between moving grass and billowing piles of snow. In the background, there is a gradient whose colors cycle between different shades of green, blue, purple, and red as each season changes. The sun moves around in a circle surrounded by a Halo that grows and shrinks in a cycle. Every movement is synchronized to the same speed.

You Move With Everything, Everything Moves With You

Kelvin Kafu Doe (He/Him)
March 2023

Mixed Media (watch the animation)

For as long as I could remember, people would ask me, "why are you moving around so much?" I would then immediately look down and realize my legs fiercely moved up and down as my hands shook side to side. I could do that endlessly without noticing, but somehow hearing someone ask about it broke the spell. After hearing that question enough, I began to internalize it. This animation is my answer to that question. It is a celebration of disability culture because part of recognizing my disability was coming to terms with my ever-present need for movement.
This animation is titled "You Move With Everything, Everything Moves With You." Using JavaScript and some math, I was able to sync up all the movements in the animation with one another. This art piece is my visual representation of a sensation I feel constantly.
I am not a nature person, allergies prevent that, but whenever I'm out in nature I can't help but marvel at the way the trees sway their bodies from side to side, or the way the leaves struggle against their stems until they fall, or the way the grass sweeps with the wind. In all these things, I see the desire to move. I move, because I am tuned into a deeper desire for movement that exists within the universe. I understand myself as joining in a dance that reveals it in the depths of my soul. In the same way a call to worship makes me want to sing or seeing my friends dance makes me want to dance along, seeing the motion of the world is my invitation to join in.
Upon reflection, I shouldn't question the way I am so much. Sometimes, I just have to do what my body and mind are telling me. Instead of asking myself why I move so much, maybe next time, I should ask, “why not move more.”
Description: An Animated video cycling between seasons. A roughly human looking figure moves left to right as it stands in-between a field of what alternates between moving grass and billowing piles of snow. In the background, there is a gradient whose colors cycle between different shades of green, blue, purple, and red as each season changes. The sun moves around in a circle surrounded by a Halo that grows and shrinks in a cycle. Every movement is synchronized to the same speed. In between every seasonal cycle, the background becomes gray, snow begins to fall, and the animation draws a single large, blue snowflake from the center, before starting the cycle once again.

Read Kelvin Doe's speech given at the ACDC event on March 15, 2023.

A group of hands reaches upward from the bottom part of the frame against a dark purple background. From the hands emanates a glowing, fluid heart made from a variety of colors.

Untitled

Dane Tedder (he/him) 

March 2023
Inkjet on paper, created in Procreate 

A group of hands reaches upward from the bottom part of the frame against a dark purple background. From the hands emanates a glowing, fluid heart made from a variety of colors.
 

A pink crescent moon in front of a night sky with a river of yellow, orange, red, and pink flowing from the moon.

Untitled

Erique Perez (They/Them)

March 2023
Inkjet digital print of acrylic on canvas 
 

Nebulous blends of various colors used to create the image of a solar system, including abstract representations of the Sun, Mercury, Venus, the Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus. 
 
A pink crescent moon in front of a night sky with a river of yellow, orange, red, and pink flowing from the moon. 
 

Human biology was my least favorite subject in middle school. I began learning about proteins, phenotypes, and Punnett Squares And I wondered how such perfect textbook examples Translated into a body that grows old get injured, burns in the sun …or whose eyes barely function.

Dear Future Blind Girl

Marissa Nissley (She/Her) 

March 2023
Poem 

Dedicated to a young girl in my hometown losing her vision.
 

Poem text: my brain has caused me company and has caused me turmoil/ it has partnered many of times with my disorders/ my unstable relationships / the nightmares that wake me up and cause insomnia/ the episodes i have in class and in public/
periwinkle blue and pastel pink tye-die background with a lot of thick navy blue lines extending upwards curving and bumping reaching towards thick neon pink lines curving and folding downwards to the navy blue lines. There are tiny navy blue lines zig zagging along the thick neon pink lines and there are tiny neon pink lones zig zagging along the thick navy blue lines.

Accessible Love

Angelene Leija (She/Her)

March 2023 
Inkjet on Paper, created in Procreate 
 

Poem with a background of blue sky with clouds and a few twinkling stars and a silver ring.

Tu

Briana Valle (they/she) 

March 2023
Inkjet on paper, Created in Canva and Adobe Illustrator
 

aveces quiero gritarle a todos lo 
que me hiciste 
para que así sepan que no soy 
bruta y reservado por mis moños 
son por años que pase contigo. 
solamente tu y yo por tres años 
me alejaste de mis amigos y familia 
reservada solamente para ti. para
tus manos queue siempre carraban 
mi cuello hasta que ponía roja.
reservada para poder saber en 
donde estaba a cada rato gritos
amenazas y lágrimas.
pero a ellos no les importa. Les
importa si me rio a sus chistes si 
les tengo tiempo y podido enfocar
en un sujetó en tanto tiempo.

you are a part of me I have tried
hiding over the years, embarrassed 
to let my first queer relationship 
be a wreck. I have not spoken 
about u or what u did to me to 
others since it happened. 

but u do not deserve that. u do not 
deserve the peace I haven't had in 
years. 

sometimes I wish I could yell to 
everyone the things u did to me. so 
they can know who am I. 
 

Acknowledgments

The Library would like to thank Dr. Amy Kenny, Director of the Disability Cultural Center, and Em Aufuldish from the Department of Art and Art History for their extraordinary collaboration with us on this exhibition.