Our Many Faces
This picture cracked me up.
Of course you can’t see it in the photo,
but while the girl was being drawn,
she kept pulling down her upper lip
(like a cartoon stereotype of a traditional ‘librarian’).
It caused her nose to get long and oval.
And her picture ended up looking like this -
so different from the face she’d see in the mirror.
So different from the face she thought was always there.
The Caricature came out so funny because I have to
keep moving at an event. I don’t really Know the people
who sit in front of me. I have to draw whatever happens
in the moment that I’m drawing each part. If the nose
is pulled long, it gets drawn long.
It amused me because I know that
this is just as much the likeness of this lovely girl
as the smiling pose in the photo is the likeness of this girl.
People might want to close their eyes
and think they’re only seeing the face that’s ’shown’ to the
world. But it’s all really there. Everything we do
is really us.
Reminds me of a story I had been told many years ago.
It described a young man named Leroy. Apparently,
Leroy had held up a liquor store at night. Even though
he was so thoughtful during the daytime. He had showered
and washed the dishes. Ran an errand for a sick friend.
Sent charity to a worthwhile organization. Yet the person
in the liquor store who faced the gun - that person knew
that Leroy was a criminal. And the person who owned the
liquor store - that person knew that Leroy was a thief.
Because Leroy was a criminal. Leroy was a thief.
In other words, just because a person does some things
that are good, it doesn’t mean she’s not a thief if she
also steals. And if a person looks calmly into the mirror
while she’s dressing, it doesn’t mean that she looks
the same way when she gets fidgety.
But it’s all okay. I like to think that I Face-Reality.
That I draw Face-Reality. That I can accept that
we all (certainly myself included) look funny.
Even when we think we’re looking glamorous.
Ever see a skull? What we all have inside?
Do we not see the shape of a table under a tablecloth?
Do we not see the skull under our muscles and makeup?
To Hire this Artist:
(516) 579-4706
optidust@gmail.com
