How a 77-Year-Old Disabled Artist Finally Got Her Moment August 24, 2016 by Jessie Heyman For nearly 30 years, Helen Rae, a 77-year-old self-taught artist, has started her drawings the same way: by looking for inspiration in the pages of Vogue or other glossy fashion magazines. When she finds an image she likes a model wearing a floral headdress, a tapestry-covered background, Karlie Kloss posing in a steel mill she takes out a set of colored pencils and, within a week or so, feverishly, painstakingly creates a new drawing. The end result transforms its high-fashion inspiration into something totally new; in Rae s vision, intricate gowns blur into a brocade of colors, patterns, and prints. Rae, who was born deaf and is completely nonverbal, has lived in Claremont, California, her entire life. In 1990, when she was 50 years old, her mother enrolled her at First Street Gallery, a local program for adults with disabilities, where she developed her drawing skills. Almost no one outside her program saw Rae s art until 2014, when Paige Wery, the owner of Los Angeles s The Good Luck Gallery, came by in search of new talent. I was going to do a group show, Wery told Vogue.com. But I just kept looking at Helen s work. Wery soon found Rae s story even more compelling. I realized how special of an artist she is and how under-recognized she is, she said. When they said that she was 76 years old and no one had given her a solo show, that was that. Last spring, The Good Luck Gallery hosted her first solo show. Rae s two live-in nurses escorted her to her opening. She had flowers in her hair and wore a string of pearls. She smiled the whole time, Wery remembered. Her 15 drawings sold out on opening night. It was a feeding frenzy, Wery said. Nobody had ever heard of her; nobody had ever seen this kind of work before. The next day, Wery called over to First Street Gallery. I asked Did she realize that we had this soldout show? And they said that she didn t; she just went straight back to drawing. Because of Rae s various disabilities First Street will not disclose her full diagnosis beyond that she suffers from developmental issues the details of her life are also somewhat opaque. Seth Pringle, the program s gallery manager, explains that this is not uncommon. It s a little more difficult to piece together biographies, especially if the artists themselves aren t able to articulate that, he said. While Rae does not speak, she has a limited ability to write and sign. I ll write notes with her and she ll usually give me very brief yes and no responses, Pringle said.
Wery, who hosted Rae s second solo show which opened this past May, is committed to giving her a level of exposure that outsider artists seldom receive. I really feel like this is Helen s voice, this is her way to communicate, she said. It was through her continuous presence in the art fair circuit that Rae got her next big break: In January, fashion designer Cynthia Rowley came across the artist s work at the Outsider Art Fair in New York and was immediately transfixed. I really didn t know anything about her but it was just the sheer beauty of what she was making, Rowley said. It hit me over the head like a frying pan. The fashion designer knows of what she speaks. With her husband, Bill Powers, Rowley founded Exhibition A, an e-commerce website that sells limited-edition works by emerging and established artists. She purchased one of Rae s drawings on the spot though she told me choosing just one was difficult then got permission to create the print for her site. I m not usually a fan of any sort of fashion reference in art, but this was different, Rowley said. I was like, We have to do this. Rae s drawing is now available on Exhibition A and her work will next appear at the Outsider Art Fair in Paris this October. Wery hopes that Rae s unlikely success will pave the way for more artists like her. It s about exposure and getting them out of their nonprofit, Wery said. Nobody ever took Helen s work, framed it, and treated it like she s a contemporary artist, which is what she is. (L) Photographed by Steven Meisel, Vogue, May 2015 (R) Illustration by Helen Rae
(L) Photographed by Steven Meisel, Vogue, May 2015 (R) Illustration by Helen Rae (L) Photographed by Annie Leibovitz, Vogue, February 2013 (R) Illustration by Helen Rae
(L) Photographed by Steven Meisel, Vogue, May 2015 (R) Illustration by Helen Rae (L) Photographed by Steven Meisel, Vogue, May 2015 (R) Illustration by Helen Rae
(L) Photographed by Annie Leibovitz, Vogue, February 2013 (R) Illustration by Helen Rae
L) Photographed by Willy Vanderperre, Vogue, March 2016 (R) Illustration by Helen Rae