It is Keizer Art Association's privilege and distinct pleasure to posthumously honor Bill Aiello as our Artist of the month. Bill was an accomplished and recognized artist.

This is the story of Bill Aiello, a vibrant and exuberant man whose life was dramatically altered after a life threatening work injury left him with traumatic brain injury.

It was November 2001. A chain binder on Bill’s semi truck snapped open unexpectedly and struck him in the head. He suffered severe brain damage and the loss of his right eye and underwent reconstructive surgeries and cognitive and physical rehabilitation in Seattle’s Harborview Hospital. After a month he was released to continue his recovery with doctors and therapists in Salem.

His recuperation progressed, but the future he had envisioned seemed to slip away. His despair increased as he grappled with his new reality of career loss, inability to perform simple tasks, aphasia, ataxia, and the feeling that he was useless. At about two years from the injury the medical professionals advised Bill and his family that he was considered medically stationary with little hope of any more improvement.

His wife, Karen, had watched him fight to regain some sense of normalcy and she knew he needed a continued challenge, especially right brain exercise. Throwing caution to the wind and ignoring the doctors, Karen asked Bill how he felt about learning to draw. He flat refused! Being the good wife, she ignored his response and contacted a friend who taught art. This friend, a Masters in Art instructor and a nationally renowned watercolor artist, Carol Hauser, would be instrumental in helping to lead Bill toward a recovery he never saw coming!

In the midst of his most determined arguments, Karen enrolled him in Carol’s upcoming Drawing 101 class at Chemeketa. Despite him saying he couldn’t learn to draw and with much frustration, he began to do just that. With single vision he found a way to reflect emotions that he couldn’t express, deeply personal, cathartic, and humorous. He began to laugh again. It was a metamorphosis from despair to hope. Starting with great difficulties he emerged from beginning, intermediate, and advanced classes to discover a new joy that would redefine his path.

And after those classes, there came another challenge. Watercolor. Again he said no and again Karen ignored him. He begrudgingly enrolled in Watercolor 101 and by this time he knew there was no arguing! He started watercolor like a deer in the headlights and ended up with three successfully completed terms and a painting that sold for $450!

Not long after his watercolor classes were behind him, Bill picked up his Canon cameras and rediscovered an art he had forgotten. The challenges of drawing and watercolor created plasticity in his brain which allowed him to reconnect with photography. He began to see the world through a different lens. It was him, his single vision, and his cameras. He found solace in capturing intricate details and his photos began to tell stories of resilience and the quiet beauty that often goes unnoticed. He earned several awards with his photographs.

Bill passed away in August 2023 after multiple years fighting lung and brain cancer, Parkinson’s, and thyroid disease having been exposed to chemicals in Vietnam. Although he survived the devastation of a severe head injury, a powerful adversary beat him. If we could ask Bill today about his journey through art and photography, he would most likely say: Brain injury be damned!

You can see Bill's art in the KAA Gallery throughout the month of April.