I saw this guy at the East Bay Alternative Book and Zine Fest. He was chatting with the illustrator and comic artist seated at the table beside me. The first thing I noticed was that he had a gap in his teeth, a feature that always reminds me of Chaucer’s description of the Wife of Bath (in the General Prologue of his Canterbury Tales). The second thing I noticed was that his jacket was closed at the throat with a safety pin. I didn’t hear a thing he was saying, but I sketched him discretely and quickly, and I was able to finish this picture before he walked away.
One of the things I am doing in some of these last 30 posts leading up to #500 is going back into my 1001 Black Men sketchbooks and including some of the drawings that I overlooked at the time I created them. This is one of those drawings. I drew this Robin Hood-looking brother when I was at Comic-Con 2012. I loved that he had eschewed superheroes and sci-fi icons in favor of this classic champion of the poor. Also, I have to admit that I have a particularly soft spot in my heart for the folks over 30 in full costume.
This gentleman was reading The Economist, but since I drew this figure a couple days after the inauguration, I decided to make it seem like he was reading The Federalist Papers. Since both supporters and opponents of the current present lay claim to this document, I thought it would be a perfect equal opportunity historical document to invoke the birth of our democratic republic.
I saw passed this man this afternoon as I was taking a stroll through downtown San Leandro. He and a co-worker were unloading cases of snacks onto hand carts and wheeling them into a corner grocery. His expression looks a little sad in this drawing, but it really wasn’t. Though his eyes may seem a little misty, I think what I we’re really seeing is his level of focus. I sneaked a peek into his truck, and it looked like he and his co-worker still had a lot of items to deliver. I can only imagine that his focus had a lot to do with the volume of work he had left to complete and the time he left in which to complete it. One of the things I love about strolling in downtown areas is the opportunity to see other folks doing their jobs. I like when I see in other people something that I recognize as an expression or attitude that I bring to my own job. The man in this drawing was giving his cart full of snacks the same look of serious intent that I bring to a stack of papers I need to grade. My recommendation to him: a cup of hot vanilla rooibos tea and the Glenn Gould station on Pandora. Gets me through a pile of work every time.
I think I mentioned here that I was fortunate enough to see the Jean Paul Gaultier exhibit at the DeYoung Museum in San Francisco. It was absolutely wonderful, and I think my favorite part–the aspect of the show that has stayed with me, even months later–is the focus on his use of the French sailor shirt as something of a trademark/foundation item, beginning early in his designing career. There’s something I’ve always loved about the sailor’s shirt. I know it has something to do with Jean Genet, with history (since that style of shirt dates back at least to the 1700s), and with the fun tension between the boatneck style of shirt (associated with femininity in much of the U.S.) and the iconic masculinity of the sailors who wear them.
Here’s a drawing from Comic-Con 2012 that I hadn’t had gotten around to posting yet. Any brother in a cape deserves his own blog post, even if I only had a change to see him from the back.
I was in the mood to draw a Black frankenstein, partly because when I was at 24-hour Fitness I saw several really tall men with very large hands. The design for the border and lettering was partly inspired by comic book covers and partly by old movie posters. Although it took several days to complete, this drawing as a lot of fun to make.
I’ve got a load of drawings to post in the next several days. It’s been a productive month in terms of making art, but not really in terms of posting it. I just got into a zone with doing color and design, and I couldn’t tear myself away. I hope you enjoy the next 20+ drawings. We’re edging closer and closer to #500, and I’m really excited about finishing the first half of this project and embarking upon the second.
A friend recently encouraged me to join the local gym. We signed up a couple weeks ago, and I’ve gone almost every day since then. It’s a very lively space, and there are always a lot of people working out there. Still, there’s enough space to move around and there are more than enough machines to get through your workout without having to wait very long. Just inside the front door there are a couple of stretching areas. This guy was in one of those spaces. I noticed him because he was quite large (he could easily have been a UFC heavyweight) and because he was wearing the pants from a martial arts uniform. He seemed to be doing Tai Chi forms. Other people in the area were stretching or lifting light dumbbells, and no one seemed to notice the giant doing Tai Chi in their midst. Lucky I was there to take note, and to record it on this blog for posterity.
