In 1998 my youngest brother, Kelton, was diagnosed with autism, a developmental disability that affects communication and social interaction. Autism currently affects 1/88 people in the United States. Kelton is a talented individual who runs cross-country and track, wrestles, plays the drums, loves history, and collects bobble heads and keychains.

This year Kelton decided to enroll in his first art class where he discovered his skill for drawing. His unorthodox style made me reconsider my artwork and examine the differences and similarities that exist between our perspectives. According to Paul Collins’ Not Even Wrong: Adventures in Autism, artists are four times more likely to have autism in their families. Considering the number of artists in my family, this statistic made me question the similarities that exist between Kelton and me. For this reason, we have decided to draw one of his 6,481 keychains a day for one year. These drawings will be as simple and uninhibited as possible. This project will explore our individual perspectives and examine the similarities that exist between us as artists.

Day 361


For the rest of the project I'm going to have a few people in
Kelt's life write guest posts. This entry is by my friend Zach.

About half a year ago Ainsley and Kenzi introduced me to Kelton. Before then I only knew a handful of things about him. Throughout the years I've learned from their stories that Kelt was hilarious, social, caring, easy to love, and easy to be loved by. Still having little knowledge of autism at the time, I had no idea how meeting him was going to turn out. All bets were off!

Within a minute of meeting Kelt he gave me the nickname of Joey, which has stuck ever since. He says I look a lot like one of his high school friends with the name... that's right, JOOOOEEEY! The name grew on me fast. It actually catches me off guard when he calls me by my real name.

Since that day Kelt has been nothing less than a good friend. He can bring a smile to my face even when it's not intentional. His positive outlook and attitude is refreshing every time I see him. Although our friendship is fairly new, I'm excited to have the opportunity to learn more about him and how he operates in years to come.

Thanks Kelt!

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