RACINE - When he returned from an emotionally damaging tour of duty in Vietnam, Louis McNair found one way to soothe his frayed nerves. He drew.

Now, McNair recognizes, that was art therapy. Over time, the Racine man drifted away from his sketches and relied on drugs and silence to blur the memory of 44 friends he lost in the war.

The artist inside him lay dormant for years, until he learned about an art program designed for veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. A return to it made McNair feel more in control.

"When I was doing the art, I was Louis again - the guy I knew," he said.

On Saturday, the public got its first look at some of the work by McNair and nine other artists. The "One Thousand Words" exhibition opened at the Spectrum Gallery inside the DeKoven Center, 600 21st St. Family Service of Racine organized the weekly art therapy classes after identifying a need through a partnership with Vets Place, a transitional home located on the Southern Wisconsin Center campus in Dover.

Art therapy provides veterans a creative way to access their memories and understand their feelings, said Katie Oatsvall, executive director of Family Service. Studies indicate programs like this can reduce the number of suicides brought on by PTSD, said Tammy Leverich, the agency's marketing director.

A few of the pieces depicted war themes, like a watercolor by Nita Gilbert featuring a prosthetic leg entitled "Recognition of the Price of Freedom." McNair said he didn't want to relive those days, but he found plenty of other sources of inspiration. He plans to continue with art classes.

"This is not just, 'Look at the poor veterans. Let them paint,'" McNair said. "It does something."

Michael Hobbs, who's living at Vets Place, said it's tough to say whether the program was therapeutic for him. The Vietnam veteran builds props for a local theater group and said he wanted to try out another aspect of his creativity.

He doesn't think of himself as an artist, but Hobbs said the experience helped him look at life from a different perspective. That's something counseling is helping him to do with war memories, he said, by viewing them with the emotions of an older man rather than the young adult he was at the time.

Oatsvall said Family Service welcomes donations to help the program continue.