education as one of his primary missions, and he is involved with several educational initiatives. He has a run a number of art workshops with children, including drawing and touching up the school mural which local sixth-graders paint every year, and joining with his wife Erania to illustrate while she reads aloud to children from books about topics like the Buffalo Soldiers. When working with children with autism, he employs a strategy of engaging the children's creativity in a non-judgemental setting where there is no wrong way for them to express themselves; he hopes to put their art on display at the Houston Children's Museum. He has partnered with the Tom Joyner Foundation to fund-raise for students, while "Art with a Purpose", his own nonprofit program, was awarded a federal grant to help disadvantaged students. Ellis serves together with Gregory Michael Carter as an artist-in-residence for an arts enrichment program at a Galveston, Texas charter school, "Ambassadors Preparatory Academy". The program, called "Ambassadors for Art", is led by school administrators and members of the community through the Gulf Coast Apollo Chapter of nonprofit volunteer service organization The Links, Incorporated. Ambassadors for Art also took part in painting a bust of US President Barack Obama. The bust was one of 45 painted by artists nationwide which were displayed in Detroit's Museum of African American History, part of a project supported by the Smithsonian Institution. He has also worked with other arts education programs like the Peoria Public Schools' "Artreach", in the framework of which he donated five original pieces to the schools and District 150 Foundation. Style Ted Ellis has over his career created art in a number of styles and has incorporated several primary influences. African American history and African American culture play central roles in Ellis' art, which regularly feature themes like Buffalo Soldiers, cotton fields, and Jazz music; his Jazz works especially lean towards the impressionistic. Other common themes range from fisherman to religious scenes as in Thee Baptism, My Father's Baptism, and Deacon's Door, to African ethnic scenes like Afrimage and Ashanti. The Church-related themes in his art he attributes to formative experiences with his mother at their local house of worship, "Beulah Land Church". While he is best known for his ethnic art, many of Ellis' pieces are landscapes, seascapes, and portraits. Ted Ellis is a self-taught artist. He has describes his style at times as