Images focus on artist’s longtime struggles with seizure disorders

Computer manipulated images meant to communicate the artist’s personal and varied experiences with epilepsy comprise a unique exhibit now on display in the Southern Light Gallery at Amarillo College.

The exhibit is called Measured Disorders and was created by Andrew Joseph Ortiz, an associate professor of art and history at the University of Texas at Arlington, who has dealt with the physical challenges of epilepsy for more than 30 years.

“It is a highly personal narrative of my struggles with seizure disorders,” Ortiz explains in his artist statement. “Dark in both emotional content and physical appearance, the images are computer manipulated collages of original digital photographs and scanned items that seek to express the intense psychological impact of dealing with physical challenges.

“I have had epilepsy for over 30 years and it has taken me this long to begin a body of work about it.”

AC’s Southern Light Gallery is located on the first floor of the Ware Student Commons on AC’s Washington Street Campus and Measured Disorders will be on display there through Nov. 30. It is free and open to the public.

Ortiz, who began his artistic career as a photographer, started experimenting with computers as an artistic tool in 1994. “I have found that photographic elements can be organized and expressed in a much more conscious and purposeful way with digital imaging,” he says.

Some images on display at AC include Ortiz’s face or body, but they are not altogether self-portraits, he says, because “they are also meant to express a process and an experience – what it’s like having seizures as well as the medical ‘measuring’ one undergoes on an ongoing basis.”

Additionally, says Ortiz, “Although this body of work is intensely personal on one level, I believe that the struggles and emotions that inspired them are something many people can relate to. We all have obstacles to overcome and frustrations to deal with – probably not as dramatic as seizures, but challenges, nonetheless.

“I hope the viewer is intrigued by these glimpses into my world and recognizes themselves and their own emotions in some of them.”

For more information about Andrew Ortiz’s Measured Disorder exhibit or the Southern Light Gallery, please contact René West, associate professor of photography, at rwest@actx.edu or 806-345-5654.