Introducing Harriet the Artist

Hattie's first solo exhibition! This took her weeks to do. 

Alphabet Practice

We often spend our church meetings drawing.

The Balding, the Blind, and the French

Hattie's got something for the eyes.

Rainbow Tanks

Hattie is out of town with her Momma so I welcome a few guests to the blog: Jared and Eric Chamberlain. I spent a little while hanging out with Jared (8 yrs), Eric (6 yrs) and their brothers today. We were drawing and I asked Eric what he was making. He said, "A rainbow tank." A rainbow tank? That's the funniest thing I imagined all day. So I copied Eric's idea and then Jared copied mine.

That really is funny for a little boy to want to draw a rainbow tank. Why would he want to draw a tank? Does he even understand what a tank is? Does he comprehend the many meanings of a rainbow? No. I think he wanted to draw a tank because that's what boys do. He's probably seen his older brothers/cousins/friends draw tanks so he does it too. Buy why make the tank rainbow? Because that's what he really wants to draw. He wants to see colors! He wants to be dazzled by the dreamlike movement of such colors side by side. Then he combines the colors inside a tank because he doesn't know how else to contain them. He puts the colors in what his little boy mind thinks is the appropriate container, but boy, was he wrong, in such a wonderful way.

This dichotomy is most unusual but I love it. It's very powerful. It brings to mind this iconic image: 

Why Not Throw Your Crayons?

Hattie's unique drawing techniques inspired this Jackson Pollock-esque piece. She and I (mostly me) spend quite a while tossing handfuls of crayons at the paper. Probably Hattie's least favorite drawing so far - way too tedious for her. But the end result is very cool. Check out this detail

Way to hang in there as long as you did, Hattie!

The Benefit Of Capoeira

I was making some sketches on the benefits of capoeira for a school project when Hattie decided to share the task. She began scribbling on my homework, so I went with it and this is what we turned up. This piece was particularly fun because of the interaction between Hattie and I. If I may direct your attention to the little "P" texture in the bottom left: every time I drew a "P" Hattie would be close behind with the red pen. She followed me and scribbled over all the "P"s that she could.

Circle

This is a wonderful piece because of its simplicity. My entire contribution was drawing the circle then placing the paper in front of Hattie. Hattie did everything else. Isn't it amazing how she reacts to the circle by aligning her marks to it? And the colors; she picked great ones. Does the fact that Hattie is only a year and half old suggest that all this is just the roll of the dice? Sure, not all the drawings she makes will look this good, but I'm sure she's learning from past drawings and making decisions.

Words

This one is called "Words." Hattie created the basic composition and I added the details. Hattie also provided the cheese flavored fish.

April 1, 2012

It was Sunday afternoon. Hattie and I laid on the floor and made this drawing (the middle one is the original) We spent nearly 10 mins on it. That's a long time for a 1 1/2 year old. We both used a wide variety of techniques to get the colored pencil on the paper. Hattie inspired me in the area. I stayed working on it a little while after Hattie found something else to do. Then I took the image onto the computer, into photoshop and tweaked the colors a tad.

An interesting fact about this piece of art along with art in general is that this is basically a kid drawing. A drawing like this isn't usually viewed as something worthy of posting online and shared with the world. One might keep it in a little "memories" book for the kids to look at in 10 years but I'm posting this to say that it is a serious piece of art. It's composition, colors, lines etc. are worth studying. You may be asking why does this kid drawing deserve more attention than any other "scratch paper" drawing. Because I say so. That's the thing about art; sometimes it's defined by who is looking at it.

I think I've started something great here.