[NEWS] At Project HOME, healing homeless with art

If art comes from pain, then James Webster is Michelangelo.

He's suffered from depression, alcoholism, and stroke. He's been arrested for assault, divorced by two women, and beaten with bats by gangs, and he lived homeless in North Philadelphia for a year.

Through it all, he's painted, taken photographs, and created collages, always understanding that making art was an answer to smoothing out an unruly life.

Troubles "have been fuel for art," said Webster, 63, sounding like a blues musician who is alchemist enough to turn misery into music. "And art's something I have to do."