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Butler hosts exhibit
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Debra Chwast appears with her son, artist Seth Chwast, at a reception Sunday at the Butler Institute of American Art in Youngstown. Several of the artist’s paintings are on exhibition at the Butler through May 8. Museum hours are 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday and noon to 4 p.m. Sunday.
By Jeanne Starmack
Youngstown
Seth Chwast is a man of few words.
He might take an interest in you — coming over to shake your hand, asking you whether you have kids and wanting to know where you live.
If you live in a city that has some rockin’ roller coasters, he’ll make sure to let you know. A coaster afficionado, he’ll happily want to discuss them.
Try to talk with him 15 minutes later, and he may not seem to remember meeting you. Any conversation you initiate could be met with silence.
He does, however, remember the names of every one of the 700-plus paintings he’s created since age 20 after taking a four-day art class at the Cleveland Museum of Art. When he’s asked, he can recite them.
Seth, now 28, is not an autistic artist, said his mother, Debra, at a reception Sunday afternoon at the Butler Institute of American Art, where several of his works are on display through May 8.
Rather, “he is an artist with autism,” she said as she read passages from her book “An Unexpected Life: A Mother and Son’s Story of Love, Determination, Autism, and Art.”
The book is about Seth’s life with autism and his discovery of art, which was his life all along.
Debra also presented a short film that showed Seth in various stages of creativity, from choosing colors to mixing paint to brush strokes.
In the film, she points out that it took Seth only four days to absorb his passion for art and then reveal a natural talent for it.
“Some people study for years,” she said. “Seth just lives it. It’s who he is.”
The Cleveland native’s art has been displayed throughout the world. He favors vibrant colors and subjects that include his beloved roller coasters; horses; and mythical creatures such as Pegasus, griffins and the hippocampus, which is part horse and part fish.
He painted “Rocket Man” for Elton John, making sure that Pluto was included in the space scene because he was very agitated when it lost its status as a planet, Debra said.
She also noted that Elton John has yet to come and pick up his painting.
Seth won an international contest to have his artwork on a stamp for the United Nations when it honored Autism Awareness Month in 2012.
That work, part of his Mythic Creatures Mural, is a giant hippocampus stepping on the edge of a small green island where a woman holds a unicorn on her lap. The mural is one of several works featured at the Butler.
Seth’s largest work is an imaginary take on the New York skyline. The huge acrylic mural, consisting of 104 16-by-24-inch panels, is called “Manhattan Floating.”
The buildings are bright orange, pink, purple, yellow and blue. A roller coaster on one end of the island also snakes under it into the East River. Creatures flying above the skyline include a yellow submarine — a nod to The Beatles — surrounded by flying fish.
The river is full of sea turtles, whales, dolphins and in the left bottom corner, a hippocampus.
“Manhattan Floating” premiered in New York in 2010 at the Time Equities building on Fifth Avenue. It’s now at the Columbia Memorial Children’s Hospital in Hudson, N.Y.
Seth doesn’t talk much, said his mother. But whether it’s two griffins flying against a pink and red “Valentine’s Day” sky or a happy monster on a Ferris wheel in Manhattan, his art speaks for him.