The Artist as a Young Child

Pen Drawing: The Magician

Hana was invited to a birthday party yesterday, and there they had a magician. It was the highlight of the party. Listening to her, this guy must have been pulling bunnies and pigeons left and right out of bags and hats.
“No, not hats,” she corrects me. “Only bags.”

And so, inspired by the magician, I got this pen drawing this morning.

From the left to the right:
“This is a girl and she has a cat (right hand) and a dog (left hand) on a leash. That is a magician, and he has flowers in his hand. This is a swan (left shoulder) and that is a bird (right side, I think she means pigeon. It looks like a pigeon to me). And that (right side of picture) is a butterfly and a bird and a hamster (the one in the circle with the cross. Looks like a hamster wheel to me). And down here are birds and a pebble (the round object). And that is all.”

I like the magician's high hat, and the bow in the girl's hair. His assistant maybe? I forgot to ask. The magician's assistant has lovely eye lashes. I don't think I drew them like that when I was young. Must be the Middle eastern influence; women have long thick eyelashes here. The drawing is quite detailed; the cat has whiskers (she always says to her father, when he kisses her, 'you must shave your whiskers, they are prickly'.) The magician is obviously enjoying himself; he smiles quite fondly and his eyes are smiling eyes.

A Family Portrait

“This is (starting on the left) is A. (her brother), and he’s got the black cat, and this is W. (her dad) who has no hair, and down here is a squirrel and that is another squirrel, and that is the other cat, and that is C. (housekeeper) and this is me, and that is the dog.”

And who is that looming over the happy family with a flower in her hand?

“Oh, that is you.”

I adore the little fingernails with the pink polish. She does that herself.

Pink Period

All artists have a period of colors. Picasso had his famous blue period. Hana is into pink. Or was that just because there was no more white paper?
These are flower gardens.

She is learning about nature in school, and how to observe through drawing.

Recycled Structures

Hana’s teacher has been asking since the beginning of the year to send her boxes, empty rolls of toilet paper, plastic containers and the likes, so her children can build projects with it. I have been sending quite a lot of stuff lately, but as you can see, it’s coming back just as fast, albeit with the addition of a little masking tape.

This particular structure is a ‘castle’. As you can see, it is quite high (see the height of the doorknob on the right). Now we are all about recycling, so after posting this picture, I will disassemble it, put it back in the collection bag that goes school every week, filled with boxes etc, and then probably next week it will come home again, as part of some other type of project.

I recognize some of my own boxes, but I can also see other parents’ boxes. One of them is using anti wrinkle eye cream. I should tell her; the stuff doesn’t work.

Hana and the Tortoise

This post does not have much to do with Hana’s art work, but rather with an object that I hope will feature in her future work; a tortoise. We found him yesterday in the mountains. It is a bit handicapped, as it has his (her) left leg missing, and in the front the claws of his right hand are gone as well. Seems like he’s been in a bit of a ‘situation’.

Anyway, Hana’s has been scrubbing him, washing him, carrying him around, hopefully she will tire of him soon so he can get some rest and food.
Anyway, Hana said I should show this in her blog. So here he goes; Hana and the tortoise.

Rainbow

Hana is not in the mood to comment on what is obviously a rainbow. She is raving and ranting how it is not her ‘resbonspility’ to have to clean up all her toys by herself because I am not doing anything and neither is the housekeeper and we both have been looking at her while she was playing with these toys and therefore it is also our ‘resbonspility’ to help her clean up. After all, we are all living together in one ‘comtunity’ and she is not 'apposed' to do this all by herself.

Bgi words. My hat off for her teacher.

Chalk on the Balcony

A different media for a change. The weather has been absolutely gorgeous in Beirut lately, and so it is outdoor work these days. She’s re-discovered her ‘stoepkrijt’, which is ‘pavement chalk’ – thick chunks of chalk – and she drew a city, with high-rise buildings, and on top there is something that does ‘weeweeweeweeweeweewee’.

You figure that one out. It sounds like an ambulance, but what is it doing on top of the building? She's pointing at it, but I still didn't get it.