Finding a Voice with Art and the Right to Education: Niam and Nina Jain

Finding a Voice with Art and the Right to Education Through the Eyes of a Parent: Niam and Nina Jain

The Jain family is no stranger to neurodivergent advocacy. With several exhibitions and solo shows under his sleeve, 15-year-old Niam Jain is an abstract painter with minimally verbal autism who has already made a large splash in the art world. Based in Toronto, Canada, his colourful and captivating oil paintings sell all around the world for thousands of dollars and have garnered lots of critical acclaims. He is recognized not only as someone with autism but someone who is an accomplished artist in his own right. His mother, Nina Jain, is the president of Able2Learn— a leader in providing free educational resources to thousands of families with special needs. Our Creative Director, Michelle Li, sat down with Niam and Nina to get more insight into the young artist’s creative process as well as his mother’s passion for accessible education. 

Michelle: Do you remember any specific moments that led to Niam wanting to make art? What was it like when he made his first painting?

Nina: Well, his first painting wasn’t something he asked to do. We were just experimenting with different things and showing him different things that he can do... We were exposing him. We exposed him to art and not thinking that anything would come out of it, he created this really beautiful abstract art. To be honest, I was just very proud of it and just like any other mother, I put it on my refrigerator. 

My older son said ”Mom, this is really beautiful. It’s more than just a piece of art.” He was the one who said “Let’s put this out on social media. Let’s see what happens.” And we did.

That’s how he got started. We started sharing his artwork and people started calling-in and they wanted to buy it. 

Michelle: Wow, that’s so lovely. It’s so wonderful that Niam has this supportive family who can recognize the talent in his art. 

Nina: We all love him! He’s our favourite. [Laughs]

Michelle: What influences his art? Is there a certain story or message that he often wants to convey with his work? 

Nina: Yeah, he loves nature. So, most of his artwork is based on nature whether it’s the ocean or sunrises, sunsets, the sky and his feelings. I feel that his feelings are quite pure. You see the purity in his artwork; he rarely does a black or very dark painting. He will only do that if he’s very, very upset over something. But most of his paintings are quite bright. They are full of depth, love and youth. That’s how he feels and that’s what you see. 

We travel a lot too. We try to expose him to different environments… You know, a typical student might learn history or geography from a textbook. For someone like Niam, especially with his autism and because speech is limited, he learns by seeing. So, we give him experiences and then he learns from them. Whether, we go to the ocean, take him canoeing, or on a boat ride, or snorkelling— whatever we do, he’s even done shark diving— all of those experiences come out in his paintings. I think that’s the depth that you see and again, they’re all based around nature. 

Michelle: Certainly. I totally understand what you mean by the purity coming out through the colours but obviously, there’s also a level of sophistication that is so wonderful about his work. 

Nina: Yeah, sometimes he’s using colours, he’s blending, and I’m like, “Orange and green? Are you sure you want orange and green?” And he’s like “yeah.” By the time that he’s done and he’s added all the colours that he wants, the painting is gorgeous. But only he sees his vision and because of his lack of speech, he isn’t able to tell you what that vision is. So, you just kind of have to wait and see where it’s going. 

Michelle: I also noticed that there’s a lot of texture in his paintings. Does he often use tools like brushes or pallet knives? What does he prefer? 

Nina: He uses— you wouldn’t believe— not normal tools from the art store. We often go to Home Depot and he wanders around. And he picks up different tools and that’s what he uses… I’ve even seen him pick up sticks!

Michelle: How has art impacted Niam’s life? With its freedom for self-expression, does he find it to be a therapeutic process?

Nina: Well, I’m not sure if he finds it therapeutic. I’m sure all artists will say that it’s calming to be in an art room and to paint. When you’re doing a hobby or something, whether you like to work out or whatever your hobby is, it’s always therapeutic. 

But, you know, I think it’s more than that. For an artist, it’s their medium of expression. So, in his case, it’s not just his medium of expression but what he sees and how he sees the world. We may see the ocean as blue with waves and ripples but he’s seeing more than that. He’s seeing the trees sparkle. He’s seeing the fish in there. He’s seeing so many different things and that’s what you see in his paintings. It truly is an abstract of all the different colours that he sees and envisions.

...His art speaks to you. It’s his way of having a conversation with you. So, each layer is saying something and the whole painting is a conversation. It allows the viewer to have a conversation with Niam. 

Michelle: With several exhibitions and solo shows, selling paintings for thousands of dollars, and garnering lots of critical acclaims, it’s amazing how he’s already made a large splash in the art world at such a young age. As someone who is breaking the preconceived boundaries of what is possible, is there something you’d like to say to other neurodiverse youth and adults who are inspired by your story?

Nina: Well, I think it’s not just for neurodiverse adults. I think it's for all kids, and teenagers, and young adults. You can do anything. There is nothing that you can not do. Don’t think that if you’re different— whether you’re neurodiverse, you have a learning disability, you have a speech impediment, or you just don’t feel good about yourself, kids who are bullied— if you find something that you love and you’re passionate about, put your whole heart into it. 

When you put your whole heart into it, you will be successful. And success doesn’t mean how much money you make. It doesn't mean how much recognition you get. It’s really about how you feel. 

For Niam, he feels good about himself. He’s independent. He feels good, really good when someone buys his painting. And I’ll tell you, he doesn’t know the difference between five dollars, five hundred, and five thousand. He just knows that someone is buying his painting and loves it as much as he loves it. That makes him feel good. It makes him feel accomplished. It gives self-worth to somebody. 

My message as a mother, to every child and teenager and young adult out there, is that you can really do anything that you want. Never feel that you know, “I have a setback.” Put your whole heart into it. If you need help, accommodation— take it. People who run businesses don’t run them by themselves. Big businesses always have a team of people and there’s nothing wrong with having a team of people to assist and help you to get where you want. Feel good about yourself. That’s the most important thing. You have to love yourself, just the way you are. 

Michelle: Switching gears a bit, so Nina— your wonderful advocacy for the neurodivergent community has definitely extended far more than just within your own household. As the President of Able2Learn, a learning resource with ABA materials for families and professionals all across the globe, you are a leader in providing thousands of families with special needs accessible education. With a curriculum stretching from math and science to life skills and visual cooking recipes, most of which are free, it’s amazing how just many resources you and your team have produced. 

Can you tell us more about your experience with creating/growing Able2Learn as well as how important it is that there are education resources like this catered to support individuals with autism and other special needs?

Nina: When I first started on my journey when I had Niam, one of the biggest roadblocks I found was first, the lack of the materials that were available. Second, the materials that were available were quite expensive. 

For example, the first hundred cards to teach speech— you know, if you went to buy them were three hundred dollars. If you think about all the different skills that our kids need to learn— and as we all know, every child is different and every child has different skills to learn. But in most cases, we can generalize and say that most of our kids need to learn many different skills. Whether it be from speech to auditory processing, functional skills, life skills, there’s just a whole gamut of skills that our kids need to learn. If you couple the expense of the actual materials with the expense of therapy that our kids need, you’re talking in the hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars for a family. Most families can’t afford it. 

In my journey, I met families who were second mortgaging their homes. Grandparents or their parents were dipping into their RSPs and their savings to help their grandchildren. [The cost is] really unfortunate. Some kids who were lucky enough, where parents could afford, were getting treatment. Other kids, where they got some government funding and then the funding runs out— I mean, our kids really need therapy from the time that they’re young to when they are young adults. 

If you think about all the skills that a regular child learns ‘till they’re adults, they're quite tremendous. Even my older son, who’s neurotypical, [is] still learning how to cook. He’s gonna be 20 and he’s still learning. So, if he’s still learning then our kids who have autism or are neurodiverse, they’re still learning too. They just need more help learning those skills. 

I started this website and started to create an education platform to start covering some of the key things that parents would need, some of the key resources. So, if you didn’t have funding, or if you didn’t have money, or even if you do have money, it’s still hard to navigate ‘what materials do I need?,’ ‘how do I start?’ It’s an unregulated field. Some therapists are great and some are not. So, it’s a very confusing platform for parents. And then there’s all these different types of therapies. Do I do ABA? Do I do play therapy? Do I do speech? Do I do a combination? It’s very overwhelming for parents.

Instead of getting into all of that,I thought that I would start creating the materials and then parents could choose according to their child, what therapy is best for their child. So I started creating the one hundred flash cards; I mean, that’s a saving of three hundred dollars. ABA data sheets, functional skills, [I worked on] all kinds of things that parents might be creating to save money. 

...Depression and mental health amongst parents is very real. It is a very real issue that we need to talk about. Oftentimes, it is because money can become an issue. Parents are tired and overworked. They have their jobs and they still have a family to look after. It can be stressful on siblings as well. 

Some people used to say to me ‘well, if a family has a certain threshold of income, they should pay for it.’ I was never in favour of that. Because if parents can save money, save time, or save resources, they can use it for that family vacation. And why not? Because family vacation is when we all get together. We become a unit. We destress. We forget things. It doesn’t matter what your household income is because mental health doesn’t ask you what your income is. If you have a child who’s neurodiverse, or who has autism, down syndrome, or whatever they have, it’s not based on income either. Anybody can have anything. My issue was ‘what can I do to help the community?’ I am a strong believer in education. I think that the more education that kids have, the more accessible it is for parents, and the more efficient it is, the more money they can save— it helps. 

I don’t just have parents on my website. I was surprised by the amount of professionals I have on my website. The amount of speech therapists I have, occupational therapists, ABA therapists and most importantly, [I was surprised by] the amount of teachers I have using my materials. One download can be ten or fifteen kids that are accessing that. Once the download happens, that teacher is using it every year. What happens is, a teacher too, also has so many hours in a day and how many resources can she make? How much funding do they have? When I see that teachers are using it, that makes me feel good. Because that means it increases the quality of education for the kids and their learning skills. 

One of my greatest downloads actually is “Puberty.” It’s surprising because some of my puberty resources are quite visual. So it’s not just ‘how to put on deodorant’ and stuff. Some of them are actually on masturbation. My “Masturbation” [resource] has over 60,000 downloads. It has an incredible amount. It just shows you, although there are books on how to teach masturbation— so, talking to the parents or teachers on what to do— there’s not a lot of materials for the student themselves on what exactly is masturbation and how do you do masturbation? What does it mean? Where do you do it? Where do you not do it? What’s privacy? What’s not privacy? What’s good touching and what’s bad touching? 

So, when you get into all of this, you can really break it down into so many different avenues that are so important. When I look into that whole puberty section, the downloads are huge. And another big download that I have is bullying and mental health. I have a lot of downloads on that issue as well because bullying is a real issue for our kids. Our kids need to know how they feel, understand it, and what strategies [they can] use when those things happen to [them].

I’ve had a lot of feedback from therapists that are training small cooking schools and they're actually using the recipes and creating little books. So, not only are they teaching the student how to cook, but then they get to take it home. And the parents have it set already. They don’t have to make it and it becomes something for independence which is really important for our children. As parents, we’re not living forever. And that’s one of the biggest worries. So, I try to think of all the issues that Niam has had and all the issues that I'm feeling. That's how I try to think about what my next topic is. 

What was a hobby has now turned out to be the largest education resource. It’s a family. Niam is the inspiration. My husband helps me and my older son has made quite a few (he’s helped me with the Puberty, especially the male side). We just work as a family and as a team. 



Michelle: What is the most rewarding aspect of your community involvement? Do you have a memorable moment that has stood out to you since starting this organization?

Nina: One memorable moment is when I had a principal call me, out of the blue, and they said they had a sixteen year old boy who— he was functioning well. And he was ready to do a work term but couldn’t because he was masturbating everywhere. In a classroom, in a corner, [he] just didn’t understand. So, I put some books together which I thought would help and some questions and answers. The teacher called me in a week and she said that not only has he stopped and understands where he wants to do it, he can now go on his work term. So, that’s a life changer for this boy. 

The parents tried, the teachers tried, and I think it comes back down to [how] there’s not a lot of materials [overall] but there are a lot of materials on how to teach. The lack of what I find is the actual material that speaks to our kids. The visuals are already there. [There are] simple sentences. Most of my stuff is research based. What I mean by that is I went through a bunch of journal articles, ...on font size that’s good for our kids, how simple the pictures should be, [saying that] they should be on white background...So, what I did was I read through the journal articles and started making notes. Then, I took a whole bunch of those findings from different journal articles and I put them together. That’s how I created my resources. 

I think that’s one of the reasons it’s been successful. [It] was that I didn’t just make it up. I knew I wanted to do this but I wanted to make sure that if I’m going to spend the time and resources to make it, that they’re going to help our kids. Cause if they don’t help, then there’s no point. 

As we close this interview, my final question to you would be how would you encourage others to partake in the helping or advocacy of neurodiverse or autistic individuals?

Nina: I would say be proud of your child. As our kids enter into adulthood, people are less tolerant. When your child is autistic or neurodiverse and young, people tend to be more tolerant because they’re a child. As they grow into adulthood, they’re less tolerant. That’s just a fact. That’s just because they’re adults and we have different expectations of adults... 

So, my advice to everybody would be not to be afraid. Keep taking your child out. Don’t make your child suffer because of other people looking or making comments. Don’t keep your child inside...We have to take our kids out. We have to create awareness for our adults. There’s a lot of awareness for kids but not for adults. Keep advocating for them. Post what they do if you’re comfortable with social media or bring them out with your friends. Keep bringing them out in public and creating that advocacy and awareness. 

You don’t need to do much. Just be proud of who your child is and do the best that you can.