Looking at Thalia Aguilaiar’s painting, the average viewer may only see the pleasant swirls of blue, yellow and white. But those colors represent a need, Aguilaiar said. The need of the world’s poor ...

At first glance, the act of pouring paint across a canvas looks wild. Paint drops through the air, twists with each motion of the wrist, and splashes into tangled paths that seem to follow no plan.