A2 (42 x 59.5 cm) acrylic on heavyweight, recycled paper  
by Eldest Sonshine, age 15
 
This painting was named 'Brain' and my goodness doesn't it look just like a slice-through of a brain?! I can't get over it! 
 
For those reading this who don't know much about the artist - let me explain how extraordinary this painting is:
 
Max is 15, he is Autistic, severly learning disabled and has Tourettes. He is non-conversationally-verbal; only speaking in 1 or a few-word sentences if he does at all. You would be forgiven for thinking that his intellect and cognition levels are very low. But the more he paints and the content and titles he comes up with the more we see just how smart he really is.
 
Max doesn't really have much interest in science, we don't read through biology books together or watch videos that may have shown him an image like this for him to recall. This image came right from his own brain.
 
And I didn't even know that he knew the WORD brain!
 
He has a natural painterly gift; that much has always been true; but the older he gets and the more he hones his craft the more we see that he is clearly expressing through his art.
 
Whether he intends for each to be for an audience I don't know but certainly he is always happy to part with his paintings when they sell so I know he doesn't want to hold on to any of them.
 
I think this is important to say as I've had a couple of messages from people saying they'd like to buy his paintings but worry about Max missing them. I promise you, he doesn't. For Max, it's all about the process of creating. Once it's finished it's finished and he parts happily with all of them.
If that ever changes and he wants to keep one obviously we'd keep it.