An autistic artist took a look at Manhattan from a helicopter and drew it in all its details from memory

British artist Stephen Wiltshire is known for being able to reproduce in detail urban landscapes seen only once from memory. He flew over New York in a helicopter for 45 minutes, and after that he spent five days trying to draw an accurate panorama of Manhattan.

Wiltshire started painting on October 11 and worked for five days almost without a break. The experiment ended on the evening of October 16 with the signing ceremony of the work in the Empire State Building.

The finished work turned out to be the size of a gallery wall. Although it is drawn on a plane, the level of detail and the breadth of the panorama allow the viewer to imagine that he is looking at the city from a helicopter.

Press release by Anthony Malkin, CEO of Empire State Realty Trust, which owns the skyscraper

When Wiltshire was three years old, he was diagnosed with Savant syndrome, a condition where people with developmental disabilities (for example, autism or Asperger's syndrome) show amazing abilities in one or more fields of knowledge. At the age of five, the boy was enrolled in the Queensmill school for children with special needs, where teachers discovered his talent.

The child did not speak, was withdrawn and often fell into hysterical states. Stephen said his first word — "paper" — at the age of nine: the teachers took away the boy's drawing supplies, and he had to ask for them back.

At the age of eight, Stephen sold his first work: British Prime Minister Edward Heath wanted him to paint Salisbury Cathedral. And in 1987, a BBC documentary about Savant syndrome was released, and there was an episode about a 12-year-old Wiltshire, which amazingly accurately reproduced London architecture on paper. The former president of the Royal Academy of Arts called him the best child artist in the UK.

As an adult, Wiltshire painted panoramas of cities around the world: Tokyo, Madrid, Dubai, Jerusalem, Sydney, Shanghai, Istanbul, Mexico City and Rome. He does all the work with a pencil and a pen.

But the artist's favorite kind (except for his native London) — this is New York.

In 2006, Queen Elizabeth II made Wiltshire a Knight of the Order of the British Empire for his services to the arts. In the same year, he founded a gallery in London's oldest shopping mall, the Royal Opera Arcade.