Every year, MossRehab adorns its walls with hundreds of new artworks by artists with physical disabilities in an exhibition called All About Art at MossRehab. Begun in 1979 by MossRehab and the Friends of Moss Auxiliary, the show was the first of its type in the eastern United States. The hope then, as it is today, was to heighten awareness of the many talents and abilities of people who have physical limitations. Since its inception, All About Art at MossRehab has served as a catalyst for many similar shows in the Philadelphia region and throughout the country.

“All About Art provides a showcase and a marketplace for artists with physical disabilities, as well as a bona fide museum experience with the hospital. Wheelchair uses don’t have the ease of getting in and out of inaccessible galleries,” said show organizer Julie Hensler-Cullen, RN, MSN, director of education and quality at MossRehab. “Every year, our staff, patients and visitors recognize the amazing contributions that the featured artists are making despite their own physical limitations.”

The Susan S. Beneman Permanent Collection feature more than 220 pieces, including watercolors, oil paintings, sculptures, collages, and other media. These pieces are displayed year-round throughout MossRehab’s many locations. Some of the artists represented are former MossRehab patients. Others have also experienced physical disability, whether as a result of a stroke, traumatic brain injury, loss of a limb or a disabling illness. Art exhibition principles focus on quality work created by professional artists. This message resounds in the hospital’s mail halls as viewers are amazed by the talent on display. The art speaks to observers on many levels—emotional, creative and even financial, for those who recognize some pieces as sound investments.

Works enter the permanent collection through a variety of ways: through the generosity of patrons, contributions by artists, or from direct purchases by either the hospital or members of the medical staff.

These exhibitions have helped foster a new understanding of—and appreciation for—the talents of people who face physical challenges. Many of the artists are professionals who work fulltime in the arts. Others pursue the visual arts as an avocation. The Susan S. Beneman Permanent Collection contains art from nearly every state in the U.S., as well as from Germany, Nepal, Israel and Zimbabwe, to name a few.

All About Art at MossRehab was a proud recipient of the 2006 Philadelphia Mayor’s Commission on People with Disabilities Access Achievement Award.

The 2009 Best in Show Award went to artist Jolanta Kokot for her drawing entitled In the Heat of the Sun, pictured here. Ms. Kokot, a resident of Mebane, North Carolina, was born in Poland and is self-taught. She began to draw and paint after an unsuccessful surgery intended to lengthen a leg damaged by childhood tuberculosis resulted instead in constant pain and disability. Art helped Ms. Kokot make sense of her life and soon became a passion. The artist finds drawing people both challenging and very exciting, and believes that faces and hands are the most expressive subjects. “Drawing is my love and best therapy,” she said.