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Andrew Cathers First Show!

It’s been a busy year for art and DDA!

We are very proud of Andrew Cathers who had his first solo art show with local group Outsiders and Others in July this year. Andrew is a 38-year-old, self-taught artist from Whistler, B.C. As an adult British Columbian with autism, he often creates his brilliant work at DDA’s Main Street Drop-In. Creating art on a regular basis keeps him interested,
busy, and creatively challenged.

Outsiders and Others, a non-profit art society, whose focus is to bring non-traditional artists to the forefront. Operator Yuri Arajs says Cathers’ work has many levels, “Andrew takes in the world around him and returns it to us in the form of detailed fields of intense colour and pattern. Seeing his work in person allows you to feel all that has gone into the creation of each piece.”

Andrew began his art career six years ago at a Developmental Disabilities Association (DDA) art class with instructor Kim Almond. “I enjoyed doodling and drawing long before that, but hadn’t started exploring with paint [until] I started taking art classes with Kim at DDA, she encouraged me by telling me I was good. Being told I was good at something motivated me to keep going with it. Art has really helped to fill a big void in my life.”

The artist says quantum physics inspires his work. “There’s a law that particles can be at two places at once and that they can go through matter. It’s called tunneling. I’m also interested in colour charge (related to the theory of chromodynamics). It’s confusing to explain. It’s the idea that each element has its own colour in a spectrum of light; quark colours are red, green, and blue. Anti-colours are magenta, yellow, and cyan. That’s why I make pieces with colourful dots of particles. I’m interested in things that you cannot see with the naked eye.”