Boxed Art

I went to the Stitch 'n Bitch knitting circle tonight, but I'm not going to write about it just yet. Instead I'm going to show you some art.

I was digging through some boxes of papers last night in my eternal quest for substantiating my financial aid spending when I came across several pieces of artwork. Some of them are abandoned projects, but others were sketches I thought I'd lost last year before the move to Boston.

This is a corner of an unfinished drawing in colored pencils on pastel paper. It's actually about and inch wide. It is, of course, my cat at his most charming: asleep.

Another unfinished drawing. My dad asked me to draw this. It's him, his common-law wife and Sibling #6. Sibling #6 is now sixteen so you can see I've been procrastinating on this one for a while. I'm thinking of asking my grandma to get all the other colored pencil drawings I've done for my dad photocopied so that I can show them, too.

The problem with the drawing was proportion. I was forced to erase my sister's head, and erasing usually spells the end of a drawing in my book unless I'm in a particularly determined mood. Ever since I was a thirteen I've had this thing about not erasing. I hate it. I just start over. (This may explain a little bit of my general uptightness at times.)

I thought I'd lost the next drawing. It's a sketch of my boyfriend when I first met him five years ago in Philly. We were housemates and used to sit up late at night in one of the house's kitchens drinking green tea. You can see a plastic coffee filter holder hanging behind him and a line around his head that I refused to erase. The sketched area is about three and a half inches by five. I was using a mechanical pencil on linen resume paper that I have never in my life used for actual resumes. It took me about a half hour to draw.

During one of those caffeinated evenings I did a drawing my feet to give to him. It's in colored pencils on a paper bag, and it took me about fifteen minutes. The time factor was important because I was trying to impress him. In my more neurotic moments I do this, but it's usually a portrait of whomever I am trying to impress. It's an effective introduction, but people generally have only two reactions to this kind of thing unless I'm especially charming that day: they're either highly disconcerted or turned on. When I actually intended it as a kind of pick-up I found it disconcertingly effective, so I don't do it anymore. As a result I have tons of sketchbooks filled with people I have secretly drawn and never spoken to and a rather empty social register.

And then there's this! This is me. Felt pen on vellum, about 3 inches square.