Autistic Artist Stephen Wiltshire Draws NYC from Memory

Got This from Juxtapoz.com

Autism is a neurological disorder characterized by impaired social interaction and communication, but often autistic individuals will posses amazing skills in other areas, such as music, memory, mathematic computation, etc. Artist Stephen Wiltshire is autistic and has an incredible memory and hand, as he was able to create a spellbinding 18-foot drawing of New York City from memory after only a 20-minute helicopter ride over the city.


“The unbelievably intricate picture was drawn at Brooklyn’s prestigious Pratt Institute from Stephen’s memory, with details of every building sketched in to scale,” reports the UK’s Daily Mail. “Landmarks including the Empire State Building and the Chrysler Building can be seen towering above smaller buildings after just three days in his spellbinding creation.”

Listening intently to his ipod throughout the artistic process - because music helps him - London-born Stephen uses only graphic pens as he commits his photographic memory to the high-grade paper.


“Invited by top U.S. television network CBS to display his talents to the American public in a new screen appearance this week, Stephen has dumbfounded art lovers around the globe with sketches of Tokyo, Rome and Hong Kong.”

“Using his drawings to help him learn and encouraged by his family, Stephen created a series of 26 coded pictures to help him speak, all of which corresponded to a letter in the alphabet.


“Going through up to 12 pens during his sketches which can take a week to finish, Stephen also draws heavily on music which he carries everywhere.”