01 Jul 2023 Artist of the Month: Jacqualin Farmer
By Dwain Hebda
Most of the time, Jacqualin Farmer’s megawatt smile lights up a room with unbridled joy. But when the 28-year-old is in her art studio, her vivaciousness turns to all-business.
“She’s one of the only artists I’ve worked with who had me scrap a painting because she didn’t like the way it was looking. Like, throw it away,” said Susan Tillemans, who works with Farmer regularly. “Jacqualin is very methodical. There is always a sequence to her art.”
Farmer’s unyielding standards are understandable, considering her art is how she interacts with the world. Born with cerebral palsy, which has rendered her essentially nonverbal, her vivid paintings are the conduits of expression and communication that able-bodied people take for granted.
“Her artwork let me get to know the person that I already knew,” said her mother, Michelle Edwards. “She had this vibrant, lovely personality, but looking at her artwork also showed she definitely has a mathematical mind. When I look at her artwork and the precision of what she wants it to be, I’m just amazed.
“I’ll look at a piece and I’m just looking at the symmetry of the artwork. You can’t tell me that she doesn’t understand things; she knows exactly where she wants it to go, what colors she wants and her color combinations. I got a chance to watch her once as she chose this instrument she wanted to use and where she wanted it to go, and if it didn’t go in the right place then that was a problem. Her personality really showed through.”
Between her limited verbal skills and little use of her hands, Jacqualin works with Tillemans to create her paintings. The two share an innate connection that allows for communication on a different level as Tillemans carries out Farmer’s instructions regarding everything from paint hues to instruments. Using this method, part of Easterseals Arkansas’s Artistic Realization Technologies (A.R.T.) program, Farmer has developed and grown as a creator.
“One of the most satisfying things is that I’ve established this rapport with Jacqualin and we have a great working relationship,” said Tillemans, who is the art instructor with Easterseals Arkansas. “At first she struggled to get those ideas out, and it has been so satisfying to watch her grapple with that and know that it’s hers. If she would have wanted me to, I would have thrown paint on the ceiling because it’s her choice. She adjusts all her colors. She chooses the tools. Everything you see on a canvas is her. I’m just her hands.”
For more than 75 years, Easterseals Arkansas has helped individuals with disabilities live, learn, work and play in their communities. Easterseals empowers people with disabilities, families and communities to be full and equal participants of society through various services including child development centers, physical rehabilitation and job training.
Edwards, a public school math teacher, said her daughter has been involved with Easterseals in some form or another since she was a baby. She was introduced to art while attending Hall High School and the A.R.T. program dovetailed neatly into that.
“It’s amazing to me,” she said. “[Jacqualin] knows the vision in her head, and her tracker (the artist who works with her) is so patient with her to understand what she wants. That’s her freedom. She has her choices. This is one time in her life that she doesn’t have to depend on someone else for total care. It’s an opportunity for her to be able to reach out and not be stifled by what someone else is doing.
“I’ve seen her grow and mature. One Christmas she even decided her Christmas present to the people in our family was she made artwork and every one was different. She knew whom she wanted what for and made it to fit their personalities.”
In addition to the accolades heaped upon her by her family, which includes dad Booker and her brother Skyler, Farmer has received additional acclaim for her talent as a featured artist whose work is regularly auctioned to raise money for the Easterseals organization.
Edwards said she hopes her daughter’s paintings inspire other people to get involved and support the organization through donations or volunteerism – not only for Farmer’s sake, but for other artists with developmental challenges just waiting for the chance to express themselves through the hands of a tracker.
“Easterseals is a place where adults with disabilities especially have a chance to be themselves,” Edwards said. “We often see people who have disabilities who are just stuck at home, or they’re hidden away. Easterseals gives them an opportunity to live and to express themselves and to be as normal as they can be. For Jacqualin, the A.R.T. program gave her a chance to blossom and start to really be able to express herself. It’s really become who she is at this point.”
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