Charles Blackwell Archives - LightHouse for the Blind and Visually Impaired

The LightHouse for the Blind Gallery is an avenue to highlight the vast depths of creativity and talent in our community, through a series of rotating exhibits by blind artists. The gallery, which resides in the lobby of 1155 Market St., has held dynamic mosaic pieces, photography and multimedia art, and rotates about twice a year. Besides providing aesthetically poignant and culturally impactful art, we aim to challenge conventions of blind ability and ambition through the work on display.

If you are a blind or visually impaired artist, or know someone who is, and would like to show their work in our gallery, please contact Jennifer Sachs at JSachs@lighthouse-sf.org.

Ted Tahquechi

Blind photographer Ted Tahquechi shares the way he sees the human body. Art opening January 30, 5 to 7 p.m. at LightHouse headquarters, 1155 Market St. 10th Floor, San Francisco, CA 94103. For more information please email jsachs@lighthouse-sf.org.

Ted Tahquechi explores light on human body curves.
Ted Tahquechi explores light on human body curves.
Ted Tahquechi explores light on human body curves.
Ted Tahquechi explores light on human body curves.
Ted Tahquechi explores light on human body curves.

Claire Spector

Claire Spector is a legally blind contemporary textile artist. She sews by feel. Her latest exhibit, Blind Stitching: Vis-Ability^TM, is on display in the LightHouse Gallery. Claire’s work is up through December 2019.

Claire Spector photo by Gabriel Sakakeeny
Artwork by Claire Spector; Thangka patterns created with Perle cotton thread embroidery technique displayed in the LightHouse lobby. Photo by Sarika Dagar
Artwork by Claire Spector; Thangka patterns created with Perle cotton thread embroidery technique displayed in the LightHouse lobby. Photo by Sarika Dagar

Kurt Schwartzmann

Kurt Schwartzmann’s pen, ink, watercolor and acrylic pen multimedia pieces, inspired by and depicting the SF MUNI system, are currently on display in the LightHouse Gallery. Kurt’s work is up through May 2019.

LightHouse CEO Bryan Bashin and Artist Kurt Schwartzmann stand in front of Kurt's work at the LightHouse Gallery.

A panel of eight hand-colored drawings in a yellow template depict a series of city bus drivers and details of the front of a bus. In a variety of styles and colors, ranging from a dreamy purple coloring to a terse red rendition, the images depict, at once, a sense of urgency, agency and calm.

Muni driver, friend and subject of Kurt's work, shakes Kurt's hand in front of one of the framed drawings.

A panel of eight hand-colored drawings in a yellow template depict a series of city bus drivers and details of the front of a bus. In a variety of styles and colors, ranging from a dreamy purple coloring to a terse red rendition, the images depict, at once, a sense of urgency, agency and calm.

Mary Dignan

Deaf- blind mosaic artist Mary Dignan displayed her lively tactile works at the LightHouse in the summer of 2018.

A swirl of pink, blue and orange glass beads flow through the center of a red, heart mosaic on a blue tiled background.
Red, white and yellow flowers sit below a yellow, swirling sky.
Maroon and green fireflies light up the center of a blue mosaic; the bugs fly above glass tulips.
Flowers and glass stones are embedded in a colorful mosaic, with a clock at its center.

Alice Wingwall

Blind photographer Alice Wingwall displayed her dynamic, vibrant photographs at the LightHouse in the fall of 2017.

A portrait of artist Alice Wingwall.
The inside of a cathedral with sunlight streaming in through rounded windows, overlaid by a lace pattern.
A photo of shoes and flower pots in on a set of outdoor stairs depicts objects at rest and communicates a sense of muted repose.
A resting dog sits on concrete steps, looking powerful and pensive.
Alice Wingwall sits with art opening attendees in front of her work, drinking a glass of wine and chatting.
A woman wearing a headband with a red floral ornament speaks with a man opposite her in front of Alice's framed photographs.
Holman Prizewinner Ahmet Ustunel places listens to his phone, place near his hear, in front of Alice's photographs at the LightHouse Gallery.

Charles Blackwell

Longtime LightHouse community member Charles Blackwell displayed his jazz-inspired acrylic paintings in the spring of 2017.

A portrait of artist Charles Blackwell in front of his works.
Three of Charles' paintings, their vibrant, colorful form, hang in the gallery at LightHouse.
Charles Blackwell's paintings hang in the downstairs gallery in the LightHouse Lobby.

On March 23, we hosted the opening of painter Charles Blackwell’s art exhibition in our headquarters building lobby at 1155 Market Street. Blackwell is a longtime member of the LightHouse community, and we are thrilled to provide a platform for his bright and expressive acrylic and pastel paintings, along with braille descriptions of each one.

“My blindness, in a sense, gives me the originality,” says artist Blackwell of his lively, jazz-inspired paintings, which are on display starting today in the 1155 Market Street lobby. “Before, I was trained. I could do a sketch of you in a minute and a half. I could have been a courtroom artist. I can’t do that no more, so I just had to take another approach. I use my fingers, I use the bottom of a paintbrush, I pour paint onto the paper. I’d much rather do that. That’s what I’m after — that improvisation, that serendipity.”

Blackwell’s paintings will be up in the lobby until October. Get a taste of photos and descriptions below, or come by our headquarters and ask at reception for braille or large print titles, prices, and descriptions of the paintings.

A shot of the lobby with paintings hanging on the righthand wall as you walk in.

An image of three paintings, from left to right:

73 Miles Away X the Speed of Light

24 x 39.5 inches

$1,400

Acrylic on Canvas

Quick, bold strokes of paint form the uneven figure of a saxophonist in the right quadrant of the canvas. The figure leans into his yellow and orange instrument. Short blue, gray, tan and green brush strokes give the background depth and accent an ovular silver and yellow globe in the top left corner.

(#5) Drummer in the Thick of It

20 x 24 inches

$350

Acrylic on Canvas

A drummer keeps time with wire brushes on a pair of golden cymbals. He is seated, wearing green pants and blue shirt. His face sports a classic drummer’s grimace — as though he just settled into a particularly groovy beat. The paint strokes are thick and bold — black outlines filled with jewel tones of blue, pink, gold, yellow and green.

(#20) Hummin’ Down That One Lonely String

2011

30 x 40 inches

$1,600

Acrylic on Canvas

A bass player in a blue suit plays on a textured stand-up bass. His loosely depicted face is jovial. The background is a patchwork of lines in primary colors with a large golden orb in the top right and a window in the top left. The number 3 stands out against the lines in the background.

(#1001) After the Movement of the Blue Note Mystery

24 x 30 inches

$880

Acrylic on Canvas

A standing, bowed saxophonist emerges into the canvas on the right. He plays a golden saxophone that is almost the length of his body. A smaller figure playing a trumpet is behind him. Both figures play into a silver old-fashioned microphone in the bottom left-hand corner of the canvas. Two golden spotlights hang in the top left corner of the image. The background is a repetitive rhythm of short, blunt strokes of blue, pink, purple, yellow and maroon.

(#14) Savory Smoky 1967 Night Club

2013

26 x 34 inches

$875

Ink on Paper

A freely depicted trumpet player, saxophonist and drummer are grouped at the right of the painting, all in smoky tones. Their instruments are accentuated with yellow. The background is a warm wash of yellow with a few red accents.

(#1004) Downstairs in the Dark of Blue with Rahsaan Roland Kirk Inflated

57 x 38 inches

$3,800

Acrylic on Canvas

Jazz artist Rahsaan Roland Kirk wears sunglasses and plays three saxophones at once. Directly behind him is a trumpet player, and in the background, a small bassist and a drummer. A mask adorns the wall and a banana hangs from the sky to the right of Kirk. All of the figures are made up of bold lively pinks, purples, yellows, reds and blues. The background is a deep blue patterned with straight but variable lines.

Kulu se Mama in Conference with Moe Betta over Lucy

16 x 22 inches

$750

Acrylic on Canvas Board

Three African-inspired figures stand, statue-like, in a row. The smallest, on the left, is a female form, perhaps in the distance. The figure in the center is indigo blue and the other two are covered in geometric patterns in bright red and yellow.

Stop by our headquarters at 1155 Market Street to view the full exhibition!