Disabled Artist’s Works Hit The Web

By Danny Schrafel

dschrafel@longislandergroup.com

Dylan Thompson and his cousin, Natalia Caballero, have teamed up to bring e-commerce to the young artist’s website.

Admirers of a young artist who has overcome physical disability to create colorful greeting cards can now buy his works online.

Greenlawn’s Dylan Thompson, who has battled Duchene’s muscular dystrophy throughout his life, is now selling an array of his greeting cards, covered with various flowers that he drew by hand and finished in Photoshop, on dylanthompsonart.com. He began online sales at the start of this month.

“I just wanted to get my art to more people, so more people could see it,” he said.

Dylan said he’s been making art for about four years now, and got hooked after taking an art class at Harborfields High School. His assignment was to draw a flower by hand, then scan it and complete it in Photoshop. For the last three years, Dylan has sold his art on a series of blank greeting cards at events like Art in the Park. A portion of the proceeds benefits muscular dystrophy charities.

“It just took off, I guess,” he said.

His cousin, Dix Hills native Natalia Caballero, a graphic designer, helped to launch the e-commerce portion of Dylan’s website and is helping him create the next wave of products.

Caballero said she moved in with the Thompsons last month and has been hard at working building Dylan’s brand since then.

“Ever since then, we’ve been working on the design of his website. We got the ecommerce going, the shipping all figured out,” she said.

So far, sales have been sporadic, Caballero said, but she plans to ramp up online efforts this month.

In the meantime, Dylan is keeping a full schedule of art festivals.

Caballero said her hope now is to take the initial ecommerce revenues, reinvest them and expand into new products, like large prints, mugs and T-shirts, giving Dylan a chance to reach a larger audience.

Already, she said, there’s been “lots of good feedback.”

“It’s quite amazing how he can do this stuff with his disability,” she said.