“I shut my eyes in order to see.”
When I was a young man of about twelve, most of my made-up, cool stories in my head (starring me, of course), involved a girl, a fast motorcycle, and my imagination. I could go anywhere I wanted to go and be anyone I wanted to be. Like my friend, Cyrus, I was the king of my castle more than a couple of times. When you look at the drawing and the title you may think they are getting away from something and that’s the escape aspect, but if you look at his face, you see, they’re going somewhere wonderful and that’s the real escape. The quote from Paul Gauguin is regarding imagination and I thought it appropriate. Since early April of this year, I have exercised my imagination every day. I am constantly thinking about drawing and what’s the story I want to tell today. I can go anywhere and do anything. Oh, and thank you by the way for taking this journey with me.
My plan is to do this for a year and see where it goes. So far, my imagination has taken me back many years to remember what motivated me to draw all day in my room in the middle of summer and figure out how to get that passion back. It also allowed me to really dream of the future and remember that anything is possible. Not bad for the first year.
The emphasis in this sketch is motion. Even my signature is getting into the action. The long lines of the background tend to flatten, ideal for creating this type of effect. I “erased in” very few highlights, thus preserving the illusion of dusk.