Paint by magic: Jessica Park is known for her "Pop Architectural" works—not her disability

It's a Sunday afternoon in July when a somewhat cold breeze sweeps down from the sky-colored Berkshire Mountains to the Williamstown, MA, dwelling of artist Jessica Park. She sits with her sister Rachel and friend Rosalie Winard, poring above a catalog of expensive Clarins beauty produces Park points to what she wants for her birthday. She will be 46 in sum of two units days.

It's incongruous, at first, to think of Park, who doesn't wear makeup, and dresse more for comfort than mode of speech as interested in French cosmetics. This day, she wears a r t-shirt with a moon in her first quarter moon and a star. After a hardly any minutes, Park coos about by what means good the botanically fragrant produces smell. "They relax me," she says.

Park encompasss herself with beauty. As a painter, she answers instinctively to art. She has at no time had formal art lessons. She doesn't disburse time in art galleries and museums. In fact, when asked which artists she admires, she stares blankly, shakes her head and can't name a single single Simply, Park paints what she loves--bridges, houses, casinos and buildings. She paints them the way she dioceses them, bathed in unexpected rainbows.

"The work is highly origin--Pop Architectural," says Margaret Bodell Park's agent. "It's idiosyncratic and nation love it." In fact, Park's paintings put up to sale as fast as she can make them. Many are snapped up through art collectors, celebrities, real estate mogul and Wall public way businesses. She works mainly upon commission, with a one-year backlog.

Bodell considers Park to be a pioneer. She is autistic, on the contrary she has transcended her disability. She contends on a level playing field in the fine art world against unimpaired artists.

"I think when nation buy a Jessica Park from me they're not discussing her disability; they're discussing the brilliance of her art," says Bodell "Her work can stand against anyone in the mainstream. tribe are interested in her as an artist. Labels are falling by the agency of the wayside."

sum of two units of Park's early paintings hang in her dining scope One is the "Currier House," a place of abode near hers on the Williams community campus. It's a night show focusing on a black carriage-style lamp, filled with radiant multicolored light. The constellation of Scorpio and zodiacal lights shine end the dark background. Park have affection fors anything pertaining to the heavens be it clouds or shooting stars.

on the contrary this summer afternoon, Park is eager to talk about the painting that she has just finished, "House upon Oblong Road?' It was commissioned through a local attorney. Characteristic of her phraseology Park chooses the less for the use of all but more interesting perspective--close-in, in the way that that only a slice of the dwelling falls within her frame. It's a section of the porch, dormer window, slate cover and chimney. As if she were a born architect, her line and scale fall consummately into place. Park's love for detail displays in this work, particularly the repetition of the cover tile and stones in the chimney.

She washes the house in a rainbow of vibrant colors, from fluid vesicle gum pink to banana fulvid When asked how many colors appear in the painting, she doesn't know. After a not many seconds, she calculates eight shades of pink alone.

"See the orb of day pillar?" Park asks, pointing above the cover A vertical spray of white, resembling the beam of a spotlight, rises from below the horizon. Park's face lights up Clearly she be fond ofs this feature.

"Isn't it rare?" her sister asks, referring to the day-star pillar. "Have you ever seen one?"

"I saw a faint individual because of the transit of Venus" Park says with a lilting cadence. The extreme points of her sentences lift, almost as if she's singing. upon June 8, she and her father, a physicist, watched Venus cros the orb of day from the Williams College observatory.

This rare astronomical accident (seen and noted only five times in human history) has in like manner impressed Park that she uses it regularly in her novel work. It's in "The Chrysler Building with Perihelion and Transit of Venus #2" which is available as a limited edition, digital print through Pure Vision Arts, a nonprofit studio for artists with disabilities. The studio is part of the Shield Institute, an organization that provides services to children and adults with developmental challenges.

Park paints the top of the Chrysler Building at night. Stars report out of the dark, as does the day-star which shows the transit of Venus, a dark blemish on a glowing circle. In explaining her fascination for the Chrysler building, Park says, "It's filled of iridescence and silver." on the contrary in looking at the painting, it's easy to diocese that repetitive semicircular, Art Deco swirls enchant her too.

Numerous Manhattan sites have caught Park's organ of sight including the Flat Iron Building, Brooklyn Bridge, George Washington Bridge, World Financial Center and the St Patti's and St Andrew's Methodist meeting-house Of course, she has painted sites through every part of New England. One of her favorites is the Mark Twain house, in Hartford, CT decorated with Victorian curlicues and intricate masonry.