IDIOTS GIVE US ART WHILE GENIUSES GIVE US CRAP:

Richard Wawro (Daily Telegraph, 11/03/2006)

Richard Wawro, who has died aged 53, was a Scottish artist and autistic savant; although diagnosed as a retarded child, he earned acclaim for his landscapes and seascapes created through the unusual medium of wax oil crayons.

He produced highly detailed and dramatic images of intense depth and colour, and his work is admired and owned by people who would not consider themselves art collectors. Notable owners of Wawro originals include Lady Thatcher and the late Pope John Paul II.

Wawro was afflicted by savant syndrome, a rare condition affecting people with serious mental disabilities, including autistic disorder; but he was said to be one of only 25 recognised prodigious savants in the world. When he was three years old, his parents were told he was "moderately to severely retarded". His autistic behaviour was characterised by an obsession for sameness, withdrawal, walking in circles, endlessly spinning objects, and a preoccupation with the piano, striking a single key for hours at a time.

As a child, he needed surgery for cataracts on both eyes, and he was unable to speak normally until the age of 11. A year later, however, Professor Marian Bohusz-Szyszko of the Polish School of Art in London declared himself "thunderstruck" when he was shown the boy's drawings; he described Wawro's works as an "incredible phenomenon rendered with the precision of a mechanic and the vision of a poet".