AuTypical.in is a public purpose platform for showcasing the abilities of autistic children and young adults in the field of art. Autistic artists from all over India, from district towns to mega cities are exhibiting their creations here.
Autism is a spectrum of developmental conditions that impacts the way people communicate and experience the world around them. Every autistic person is different. Some are able to learn, live and work independently but many have learning differences, and co-occurring health conditions that require specialist support and assisted living throughout their lifespan. The learning, thinking, and problem-solving abilities of people with autism can range from gifted to severely challenged. Autistic traits are distinctive, often leading to their social exclusion and being labelled abnormal.
AuTypical™ was conceived to break this negative stereotype. We believe that beneath the shell of autism is a student who learns. Educational systems have to be responsive to the profile of all learners.
AuTypical™ is a lexical innovation. Every parent of an autistic child hears few things: the child has missed either all or some typical development milestones in the realms of physical movements, speech and interactivity with the world. The A-word is handed as a diagnosis and the impact of this can be far-reaching and even devastating; not so much due to the challenges of the condition but because of the accompanying nomenclature and the resultant stigma that society imposes. This discriminated atypical development is the autistic personality of the child, an alternate sensory experience of the world and it is vivid, intense and real. Simply because it is different from the neurotypical or ‘normal’ perceptions and understanding of the world, it should not be castigated. The autistic experience is rich in visual acuity, it is no coincidence that a large proportion of autistic individuals are visual learners and has been harnessed to good effect for communication protocols. This progressive orientation towards the capabilities of autistics led to AuTypical™; words and terms are important since they create affirmative identities, form attitudes and develop the ethical orientation of our societies.
In the domain of Art, autistic perceptions and unique experiences of sensory stimuli are revealed. Art by autistics is also a subject matter of several research stacks. Most autistic children do some form of art and many have very advanced skills.Grant Manier had a compulsive paper tearing habit, this was turned into an activity by his teachers and he started making the most defining collages. He is an award winning artist now. Bittersweet Creative Arts Inc in the US is a company which sells only art created by autistic children and adults. Nicholas Humphrey in his article, ‘Cave art, Autism and the evolution of the human mind’ put forth the ideas that the Chauvet cave wall drawings were made by humans with pre-modern minds who had no interest in communication. He came to these rather controversial conclusions after comparing the cave drawings of animals with the line drawings of animals made by Nadia, a non-verbal autistic with no language and conceptual ability but with savant skills in art. Examples of seeing colours while hearing sounds in synaesthesia (a perceptual phenomenon in which stimulation of one sensory or cognitive pathway leads to involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive pathway) are well known, does this explain the autistics attachment to colour and textures? Is art among autistics a strong primitive reflex? Are the answers to be found in the underlying neural structures of the left and the right hemispheres of the brain. What explains these extraordinary ‘islets of abilities’, as Uta Frith calls it in her classic work, ‘The Enigma of Autism.’ These are questions which Science has to investigate.
AuTypical.in will also be a forum for such scientific conversations related to autism. But above all, it is platform for autistic artists – their work, their life and their stories.
The site upholds principles of inclusion, autism advocacy and neurodiversity movements. AuTypical.in is owned by Mahagauri Autism Care Pvt. Ltd. devoted to creating resources and education infrastructure for the autistic children and young adults.