What’s the connection between art and dyslexia? When I was first diagnosed with dyslexia I was 10 years old; my speech therapist – who also made the psychological evaluation, which felt long and stressful to me – explained to me what it meant, and also what I would’ve struggled with in school. Later on, another specialist taught me how to study in a more effective and dyslexia-friendly way. This study method was mostly graphic: concepts were schematized and sketched with different colors and pictures. Growing up I realized I had a photographic memory: the more I visualized pictures, patterns and visual configurations the more I learned things.
This project came out naturally, by me following my instinct. I started taking pictures of the woods as an unknown place where I felt lost without knowing where to go. Why the woods? I recently found some drawings of mine, which I made when I was about 9 or 10 years old. Those were the years when I was first diagnosed with dyslexia, and I realized that I always used to draw a lot of trees and a little girl wandering alone in the woods.
Now, with this project, I am giving a voice to that little girl who, back then, was not capable of expressing herself.
Words are important, sure, and they are immediately taught to us as the most effective form of communication. But what else can you do if they are difficult for you to use? How can you make yourself clear? And what if art was the universal form of communication?