A Disabled Artist’s Journey through Art & Activism
Stop by Scott Memorial Library, on the Thomas Jefferson Univeristy — Center City Campus, to explore our latest art exhibit, created by Wendy Elliott-Vandivier, cartoonist and disability advocate.
The exhibit highlights examples of Wendy's cartoons, which focus on disability awareness and microaggressions that disabled people experience as they try to live their ordinary, "un-inspirational" lives. Wendy's artwork will be displayed on Scott's 2nd floor until the end of December 2024.
Wendy Elliott-Vandivier is a graduate of Tyler School of Art, Temple University. She has been making art and mischief since she was a young child, growing up in Philadelphia. In college, she majored in sculpture and staged a funeral of a disabled poster child to lay stereotypes of pity and helplessness firmly to rest. Her paintings explore issues of family, memory, and experiences as a disabled woman.
Her autobiographical cartoons focus on attitudinal barriers and stereotypes regarding disabilities and some of the micro-aggressions that disabled people experience while living normal, un-inspirational lives. She is also a photographer of micro-scale monuments in nature and is often inspired by close-up images that people often do not notice in daily life – tree bark, dead leaves, flower anatomy, and water.
Library Resources
Explore the eBooks, graphic medicine books, and print books available via the Jefferson Libraries, which highlight disability awareness and microaggressions in medicine.
- Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice (eBook)
- Hearing Happiness (Print, Scott Library)
- Microaggressions in Medicine (eBook)
- Sensory: Life on the Spectrum (eBook)
- Sunshine: How One Camp Taught Me about Life, Death, and Hope (Graphic Medicine Print, Scott Library)
- Patho Graphics: Narrative, Aesthetics, Contention, Community (Graphic Medicine Print, Scott Library)
- A Quick & Easy Guide to Sex & Disability (Graphic Medicine Print, Scott Library)