Envision Arts Gallery and Community Engagement Center in downtown Wichita is the first of its kind in the U.S.: a space to exhibit art for and by artists and audiences who are blind or visually impaired (BVI). On view now through November 11 in the center’s Patricia A. Peer Window Gallery is a mixed-media feast for the senses.

Wichita-based multimedia artist Lauren Bush’s installation, “A Renaissance Story,” is a quirky deep dive into the fantastical figures and themes of courtly romance. The show’s eponymous work, a mixed-media collage book with typed text and Braille, opens with the introduction: “This story is based in the medieval Italian Renaissance Era. It was inspired by the story of Cinderella. The story is about love and betrayal. It is also about bravery, strength, and friendship.”

Bush tells her tale through an eclectic assemblage of collage, ceramics, mobiles, dolls and a hand-embellished storybook that chronicles the doomed romance of Prince Luca and Anika, a baker and “determined peasant woman,” as Bush describes her protagonist. “The mixed-media pieces in the show were inspired to be like pictures to go along with the story I created,” she explains. “I have always liked the Renaissance era and the stories of King Arthur and the Round Table, princes and princesses, and the fantasy that goes along with it.”

The show’s introductory artwork is “Trinket Box,” a painted ceramic piece with ribbons and glass beads. The keepsake box holds invitations to the wedding feast for Anika and Luca. More ceramic works serve as the exhibition’s central focus. Set out on a table opulently covered in multiple layers of deep blue- and gold-colored fabrics, Bush’s ceramics feature a plate setting with patterns reminiscent of coats of arms and other heraldic designs, as well as goblets, charcuterie boards, a pie plate and casserole dish, bowl, and “Flower Vase Pitcher.”

Flowers and flower motifs in various forms recur throughout the exhibition, as do other symbols and themes taken from Renaissance tales of courtly and peasant life, both real and imaginative. “Lauren’s fascinated by this period of history,” says Sarah Kephart, director of Envision Arts Program and Envision Arts Gallery. “For this show, she really deepened her understanding by doing research into the designs, patterns, and motifs of the time period, and she embraced those in her own artistic way.”

When Bush was 13 years old, she was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa, a rare disease that affects the retina of the eye. Cells within slowly break down over time, leading to increased vision loss. When she was 14, she was introduced to Envision’s Vision Rehabilitation Center and has been involved in Envision programs — especially its arts-based programs — ever since.

“My family has always encouraged crafts and art, so that’s what made me want to continue learning and making artwork,” she says. “I can remember my grandma teaching my two sisters and me how to use pastels. I feel most comfortable painting since I have drawn and painted since I was a kid, but I don’t have a favorite medium. I like doing most media to create artwork.”

Bush says she became interested in anime when in high school and spent hours drawing anime characters. She later drew on that influence to expand her artmaking into other mediums, notably ceramics. In 2021, she participated in the Envision Your Story expressive arts workshop and exhibition at Wichita State University’s ShiftSpace Gallery, where she shared a video project and ceramic work that depicted the everyday challenges of living with vision loss. Her ceramic sculpture also received national recognition in an “InSights Art Exhibit” sponsored by the American Printing House for the Blind.

“When I entered the Envision Arts Program, Sarah helped me make the anime characters I had been drawing into ceramics and that was what won second place at the Insights show,” Bush says, adding: “As you see, my artwork has come along. I don’t draw so much anymore, but I still love making art.”

Her enjoyment is evident in her latest “A Renaissance Story” creations, including the six small glass jar mobiles each titled “Fairy Jar” and variously decorated with vinyl and filled with glitter and mixed plastic floral and moss. “Fairy Galore,” a mixed media collage with a dominant green background and cut-paper images, carries on the flowers and storybook fairy motifs. Two other collages, “Roses to Be” and “Knights in the City,” expand Bush’s mixed media narrative with images of red roses and jousting knights. She crafts these from cut paper and an array of found objects — plastic red rose petals, ribbons, feathers, bows, and sparkly, white fabric-and-net butterflies, among other things — all anchored and set off by royal gold backgrounds.

Celebratory feasting is another theme that Bush plays with in the show. A 2023 graduate of Butler Community College’s Culinary Arts and Hospitality Management School, she worked for a time as a pastry chef at Wichita State University Dining Services before leaving to focus on her art. “I like cooking and making food for my family and friends, especially birthday cakes, cookies, and such. I thought it would be a good career for me. It wasn’t easy, but I was the first legally blind person to graduate from the Redler Culinary Arts Institute at Butler.”

“Wedding Doll” and “Peasant Doll” sit on the windowsill of the gallery. They face across the gallery space and look as if they’re reading “A Love Poem” — which Bush penned, typed on paper, matted, and framed for the exhibition. Despite the tragic ending of her “A Renaissance Story” narrative, the show itself offers up an imaginative tale about making one’s own creative way through the world.

THE DETAILS

Lauren Bush: “A Renaissance Story”
October 3-November 11, 2025, in the Patricia A. Peer Window Gallery at Envision Arts Gallery, 801 E. Douglas Ave., Suite 106.

The Envision Arts Gallery hours are 10 a.m.-4 p.m., Tuesday-Friday (closed noon-1 p.m. for the lunch hour). Additional hours take place on First Fridays from 5-8 p.m.

Admission is free to the public, and the facility is accessible to people with physical disabilities.

Learn more about exhibitions at the Envision Arts Gallery.

Connie Kachel White is a writer and editor who has written about the arts in Wichita for going on three decades now. White, whose communications gigs range from book-editing to investigative reporting, is the founding and current editor of Wichita State University’s The Shocker magazine. More of her writing can be found online at theshockermagazine.com and shockerconnect.com.

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