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My name is Vanessa Vanek, a fiber and digital media artist and an art educator originally from Lawrence, Kansas. I earned my BFA in Textile Design (fiber arts) , a graduate teaching certificate in Visual Art Education from the University of Kansas, and my MAEd in 2022. With twenty-three years of teaching experience in high and middle school visual art and design, I have had the privilege of working in diverse cultural landscapes, both in the United States and internationally in Thailand, Korea, and East Africa. Navigating these experiences with my disability, Spina Bifida, I currently utilize a wheelchair. I am now based in Shanghai, teaching high school art and design at an international school while also creating art that explores concepts connected to what is my normal living with a disability.
In a world obsessed with perfection, I use my life experiences to challenge traditional ideas about beauty and identity through my work in digital media and fiber art. Living with a disability has allowed me to address themes of identity, loss, and trauma - the beauty that can be found in this. Through my artwork, I aim to prompt viewers to reconsider their ideas of normalcy while encouraging them to find beauty in the hard stuff of life.
