This was our first workshop at a residential care center serving people with developmental disabilities, and we were not quite sure what to expect before arriving. Once the workshop began, however, the room quickly filled with small observations and conversations.

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   We started in the residential center's garden. We let participants look closely at them and picked a few they liked. After that, they brought the plants back to the classroom and traced the plants' outlines. We asked them about their observations; some communicated with only a few words or gestures, but their observations were often surprisingly specific.

 

   When we introduced cyanotype, we described it simply: sunlight could help make the image. One participant immediately questioned us—how could the sun possibly draw?

That question stayed with us until the prints began to appear.

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   As the papers were exposed and rinsed, the shapes slowly emerged in blue and white. The room changed almost immediately. Participants gathered around the prints, eager to see what had appeared and to make another one. For those who found precise drawing difficult, arranging leaves on the paper offered a different way to make visual choices without depending as heavily on control of a pencil or brush.

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   One of the moments we remember most came after the prints were finished. We had worried that the wet paper might be difficult to handle, but participants held their works carefully and could quickly recognize their own pieces among the prints drying together. Several kept returning to look at them, carrying the finished cyanotypes almost like small treasures.

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   By the end of the workshop, the phrase “the sun can draw” no longer sounded quite so strange. Sunlight had become part of the process, but the choices—the leaves, their placement, the shapes, and the ideas behind them—still belonged entirely to the people who made the work.