I have been so prolific lately. One of the things I've been doing is Face Painting in Central Park on gigless Saturdays. By the Children's Zoo. It's so appreciated. Just now I'm remembering one little girl who was so surprised she happily kept saying "Oh my G-d, Oh my G--d," a boy who kept coming back to look in the mirror, the kids who PLAYED what I painted, the many people who were so amazed by their face-transformations.

I use only the best FDA approved paints - and just last Saturday, I added in my first Neon Color - Orange! I liked that!

Here are some of the faces I painted in Central Park:

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Of course, I've also been drawing Caricatures too.

Sometimes I surprised myself by drawing in different styles.
Here are some of those:

I appreciate having fun.
Can't always, of course (Today Sales Tax forms were due. And a phone problem ended up needing a whole new plan.), but I make sure to limit how much time I'll spend with that sort of stuff in any one day. In addition to drawing, Ooooh! I also want to show you a fun picture I made on the train! Here's a picture of a dour woman I saw. After I drew her picture, I decided to 'Face Paint' the picture, and I turned her into a Cat. That was fuuuun - combining my two main 'things':

Anyway, what I was saying was that I think it's important to include fun/growth in each day just as much as including work/beinggood. I did Yoga this morning and I went out Dancing this evening. I drew some pictures and I talked to some friends. One of the things I like about the Artwork that I do

is that it helps people find fun. Sometimes we need help to do that. Even though Art is fun itself, it turned to to also be 'one of the helping professions'.

Still into that brown paper.

Here I tried a little color on it. Simple colors really glow on the neutral brown background.

And here's a man I caught at the airport earlier this week ( flew down to Florida for a day):

A group of people I saw on the Subway yesterday:

And a young lady:

But, still fun to draw on white paper too. Looks so bright after all those pictures on brown. I guess I like it all. The brown paper is something newer for me. I like having the choice:

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A new thing. I have been enjoying BROWN PAPER! The best part of it is that I can quickly add the Highlights!

Here are my first two attempts:

And, still having fun with the white paper, too of course.
Here's a cute man I saw recently:

So, what have I been doing lately? I really enjoy writing here for you to read. It's already 11 pm, I drew for 4-hours at a Bar Mitzvah today, I still have to send out literature to three clients, and I have to wake up at 5 am tomorrow. Because I'm fortunate to have the experience of assisting Artist Elgin Bolling on his big mural! But here I still am, going through my folder, and scanning pictures for this blog. I love thinking of the many people who come here regularly to see what I've been drawing. And I also love rereading what I wrote, too. Being inspired by the things that inspired me previously. So here is today's entry.

One of the things I've been working on is drawing the 3-D forms of the face. To really dimensionalize it. Since I've been spending so much time with Elgin, he inspires me to try some of the things he does so well. Here's a picture of a young man I saw on the Subway:

And Exaggeration. Duh. Again. It's so much fun. I have to remember to do that. Here's a picture of a man I drew on the train:

Another fine Artist that was hanging around with us is Kenly Dillard. He was insisting that Caricature is a metaphor - that I have to see what a person looks LIKE - like, what the person reminds me OF. Kenly usually sees people as animals - mouse, elephant, things like that. But I was more comfortable finding THINGS.

Here is a picture of a woman who reminded me of a banana:

And here is a picture of a woman who reminded me of a peach:

I gotta say, it really was fun. (I also drew a girl for Kenly - she reminded me of a waterfall.) But it took me so much time to think them up. I didn't just arbitrarily assign a thing to a person. I really checked out all sorts of things 'til I could find a match. I had to be able to think two things at once - both the person I was looking at

and an item from the multitude of items in this world.
So until I develop more facility with this game, I wouldn't be able to use it at a gig. Took too much time. But it sure was fun.

I love New York. Drawing on the Subways today. Here's one that I was pleased with:

But, funny how it's a constant 'dance'. Just like a runner has to face the mile s/he's going to run freshly with each day's reality, an artist has to face each picture with all sorts of influences. Just because we usually draw well, in the zone, whatever, it doesn't mean that once we know how, it's as sure a thing as reciting the alphabet. Actually, I had been horrified by the first drawing in this group (I prefer to start with a scribble like this. But scribbling is supposed to be easy! Not agony! You can see my other scribbles still on some of the other pictures.):

As you can see, I was really struggling with trying to get that unique mouth.

When I finally decided to Keep It Simple - Just draw the mouth where it's supposed to go with no shenanagans, I finally got in da zone! It was fun. It was easy. It came out beautiful:

And here are 2 other pictures that I drew on today's excursion.
I have to draw every day. To stay in practice for the weekend's gigs.