The Barbican’s Curve, London
This moving project includes painters who need assistance and an artist who communicates through blinking. It asks the question: who gets to be an artist?
Who gets to call themselves an artist? Is it Chippy Aiton and Jon Barry, who need assistance to hold their arms up while painting? Is it Terrance Barr, who is partially blind, feeling his way around clay? Is it people who can create for a maximum of 20 minutes a day, or only those who are able to sit and work for hours?
differently various opens with an interrogation of what defines an artist and who that definition excludes in an industry that is overwhelmingly white, middle-class and non-disabled. The grand finale of a five-year partnership between the Barbican and brain injury charity Headway East London, the exhibition is thought to be the largest ever created by people with a brain injury, displaying 124 works by more than 70 artists.
