Author Archives: soniaboue

Slick as a seal, I rise – making autistic empowerment visible

I can’t talk about my new work yet, but it makes my pulse race and spurs me on even as we face the tipping point of winter (my life long nemesis!) What I do want to do is offer encouragement to others, wherever you may be in your journey to congruence.

You have even seen my autism as it is.

You will see my joy and my rage. You will also see my freedom. You have even seen my autism as it is. Dynamic, rhythmic, capable of control (for I have stayed within the picture frame and given you a harmonious dancing surface to gaze at.)

I want to show you more.

A little bowl of love and kindness – taking the strain out of caring.

Extreme old age isn’t easy, not one bit. Mum carries it with great dignity but these few days without a bed rail have taught me so much humility. We will all at some point need adaptations (if we’re lucky) and should probably plan ahead. I’m chastened by the unravelling that can take place for want of one simple adaptation.

Convoy – una respuesta artística al convoy de los 927.

Hola, soy Sonia Boué, hija de un exiliado español (llamado José María García Lora), viviendo en gran bretaña. Soy arista visual, y desde 2013 mi trabajo trata con el tema del exilio español y la respuesta cultural a la guerra civil española en gran bretaña.

Tengo un nuevo proyecto sobre El convoy de los 927, busco

Convoy – responding to the Convoy of 927.

This new work is entitled ‘Convoy’, because the roundup has become known as El convoy de los 927 (927 being the number of Spanish exiles taken that day). Almost overnight the tiny sketch evolved into a big idea with unexpected mathematical underpinnings. Through this exploration I’ve become compelled by the idea that a number (repeated) becomes a pattern, and that this can in a powerful visual form tell us something about the inability to ‘see’ dehumanisation in the face of number.

Congruence in the making – how to live autistically in a socially hostile world?

It wasn’t until I was home again and took off my handmade brooch (pictured above) that I made the connection between the powerful congruence I felt at #InsideOutAutism and wearing it on both days. I’m still processing why this act of making and wearing felt significant. I’ve never been one to wear text on my body in any form, perhaps because my identity has been at times uncertain and under siege.

But my self-fashioned brooch was different. Here was an artefact, crafted over time and without conscious purpose, redolent of my journey as an autistic woman in reclaiming the language used about me, and my people. So antiquated is the text that I am unfamiliar with some of the words, and it acts as a curio, or something I could have inherited. I feel I have. It holds a familial feeling, and when I peer at its loveliness I hear the ancestral whisper – we were once like you. If an object can be joyful and witty, it has those qualities. Have you ever bounced on a trampoline? My brooch is the rebound which tosses your heart in the air. It gives me abnormous joy. It trumpets confidence. That zing-a-ling feeling that I’m A-okay.

Masking and caring – an #actuallyautistic perspective.

What I do have is a complex relationship with masking – which I want to be honest and hopefully nuanced about.  Stigma exists, often we don’t have a choice (those of us who’ve learned masking as an adaptation).  For myself as a bilingual person, I have come to think of masking as a bilingualism wrought by the necessity of living between worlds with different cultures.

I hope to write more about masking and caring as my situation evolves. 

Out of office reply, Ole!

I’m out of office and in a new country, but I’m not on holiday. This is because I’m helping care for my 93 year old mother who needs 24/7 at home, after a sudden acute infection and a two week hospital stay. My sister and I kept a constant vigil at her bedside and herContinue reading “Out of office reply, Ole!”

Where is the love? A report from an NHS hospital ward.

I’m writing in snatches. This blog post is a report from the field. It’s 2019 and my 92 year old mum is currently an in-patient at a major National Health Service (NHS) hospital in the UK. My sibling and I are taking it in turns (with some overlap) to stay with our mother 24/7. She’sContinue reading “Where is the love? A report from an NHS hospital ward.”