The Seal Beach Art Association’s 34th annual Arts & Crafts Faire will be a coming out party of sorts for artist Carla Sramek of Rossmoor.
Sramek’s art will be among dozens of artists’ work featured at the event, which will be held all day starting at 9 a.m. on Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 10 and 11 at Eisenhower Park next to the Seal Beach pier.
According to Art Association president belinda (She goes by one name with lowercase ‘b’), Sramek’s art may be considered within the challenges she has overcome to get an education and study art.
She has lived her life as a developmentally disabled person. However, she has been fighting to live a normal life since she was a student at McGaugh Elementary School in Seal Beach.
“She was in special education at McGaugh School from pre-school through second grade,” said her mother Hilda Sramek. “During her second grade we asked for her to be included in the regular classes.”
According to her mother, Sramek was the first child in the Los Alamitos Unified School District with severe disabilities to move to a regular class population.
An artist, Sramek’s second career is championing the inclusion of persons with disabilities in society. Describing the effect of her daughter’s art, Hilda Sramek said, “A lot of people who have kids with disabilities have told us it has encouraged them to move forward and try and give their children a regular life. People have told us it gives them hope.”
Indeed, Sramek’s resume of accomplishments is impressive, even for a “regular” person.
Sramek has lived on her own for the past nine years and according to her mother is “doing great.”
As a student in the Los Alamitos School District, Sramek studied drawing and painting with Julie Lusk and Steve McAdams, and ceramics with Sue Woirol.
In 2007 she traveled to Kursk, Russia to give the keynote address, “Education for All,” at the Russian-American Roundtable in Education. She then began her studies with Andrea Gabriel and in 2008 held her first One-Person Exhibit at California State University, Long Beach.
At CSULB she received art instruction from Carlos Silveira and Church. Her paintings have since been shown at the Huntington Beach Art Center (2009, 2011) and again at CSULB (2010) in a One-Person Exhibit. This year she resumed her studies with Church.
According to her mother, Sramek began to work on behalf of persons with different abilities in 1997 as a panelist at Chapman University.
In 2005 she traveled to Chicago with Marquita Grenot-Scheyer and Jennifer Coots from CSULB and Mary Falvey and Richard Rosenberg from CSULA to speak about her college experiences. She co-authored a chapter with Nat Hansuvadha in Special Education in Russia and the U.S.A. (2008). She is also a regular speaker at conferences and college classes.
Carla’s art is currently on display at the Los Alamitos-Rossmoor Library until the end of August. Her art will be on display at the Seal Beach Art Festival. For more information, see: www.ctsartist.com.
Sramek’s mother praised belinda for including her daughter’s work in the association’s show.
“She is the one giving Carla this chance,” Hilda Sramek said. “We are very thankful for her values and we think she is a great person in our community.”
