Andreana Donahue and Tim Ortiz’s blog Disparate Minds is a comprehensive platform for criticism on the works currently being produced by self-taught artists with disabilities and their convergence with an increasingly pluralistic contemporary art world. Disparate Minds has, since 2014, amplified the voices of marginalized artists through exhibition reviews, in-depth essays, and interviews dedicated to increasing visibility for these artists’ work and creative processes. With Disparate Minds, Donahue and Ortiz seek to articulate a greater understanding of the importance of progressive art studios, where many artists living with developmental disabilities receive support to maintain studio practices.
Andreana Donahue is a multimedia installation and fiber artist with a BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. In addition to her studio practice, Donahue has spent many years pursuing interdisciplinary advocacy efforts for marginalized artists, including curatorial projects, lectures, writing, artist facilitation, and, most significantly, building and co-managing a studio with collaborator Tim Ortiz for eighty artists living with disabilities . Artist residencies include A-Z West, the Icelandic Textile Center, SIM in Reykjavík, the Weaving Mill in Chicago, 100 West in Corsicana, Texas, and the Vermont Studio Center. Donahue is the recipient of a 2018 Nevada Arts Council Artist Fellowship Grant, 2015 Puffin Foundation Grant, 2015 Harnisch Foundation Grant, and an artist grant from the Vermont Studio Center in 2014, among other grants and awards.
Tim Ortiz is a writer and minimalist painter with a BFA from Elmira College. He is currently a home- and community-based personal care provider for adults with developmental disabilities. In 2015, Ortiz was a teaching artist-in-residence, studio facilitator, and consultant with collaborator Andreana Donahue at the Canvas, an integrated studio for artists with and without disabilities in Juneau, Alaska. Ortiz began working with this population in 2008, spending two years working with 120 individuals as a job training program case manager. He has also developed art programming for special education and high school students with autism and spent one year creating and providing weekly art-making sessions for seniors in a psychiatric hospital. Ortiz is the recipient of a 2015 Harnisch Foundation Grant and 2015 Puffin Foundation Grant.