In March of 2024, portrait artist David Lenz traveled on an artist exchange to Luxembourg in coordination with the Embassy’s celebration of World Down Syndrome Day. Lenz’s painting Sam and the Perfect World, which won the inaugural Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition organized by the National Portrait Gallery and currently hangs in the Ambassador’s Art in Embassies exhibition, is a portrait of his son Sam, who has Down syndrome.
Over the course of three days, Lenz met and engaged with a wide array of people from professional and community groups to high school art students, to people with disabilities and those who work with those communities. He led workshops, gave interviews, and sat down with the State Department’s Acting Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer, Constance Mayer. Mayer spoke to assembled Embassy staff and virtual attendees about the importance of promoting disability inclusion at the Department and how Posts can take action to overcome challenges to its implementation.
While in country, Lenz had the opportunity to speak with Tom Wagener, a Luxembourg artist with Down syndrome, at Cooperation Wiltz, an artist organization which provides artistic training and professional opportunities for people with intellectual disabilities. “Traveling throughout Luxembourg and seeing the way a different country approaches including people with disabilities in the community was personally and professionally fascinating,” said Lenz.
On World Down Syndrome Day, Lenz joined Embassy staff and individuals from Trisomie21, a local nonprofit and interest group for people with Down syndrome, for dinner at Restaurant Madame Witzeg. The restaurant provides professional opportunities for those with intellectual disabilities and serves as a gallery space where Wagener had an exhibition showing. “The wonderful thing about my artist exchange is that it was cultural diplomacy where the only thing on the agenda was seeking to understand and learn. That’s the genius of the exchange program: the first step in any productive relationship, whether on a personal level or between countries, is to take time to try and understand each other.”
