Something quite funny happened today. On monday, December 5th, it’s “Sinterklaas” in the Netherlands. Sinterklaas is curious mix between a Turkish bishop and good ol’ Santa Claus from the North Pole. The festival is mostly for little children and on that day, in the early evening, they get presents and candy.
But teens still like to celebrate it too. The fun part for them is now that they can give presents instead of being only on the receiving end. These present usually get wrapped up in very creative ways, and in the case of my daughters, are not always very pleasant to unwrap (but that’s the fun part!) and are accompanied by poems, pointing out the perculiarities of the person receiving the present.
In most Dutch families, people make a list of presents they would like to receive and then draw lots and exchange lists. Not in our family. Everybody buys presents for everybody and half of the fun is trying to figure out what each family member would like to have.
My daughters have of course noticed I spend a great deal of time on the anatomy forum, heard me rant that I’m no good at all with bones and muscles and also heard me mumble something about wanting to do an oilpainting of one of the reference photo’s.
Today was shopping day. More fun, because you have to somehow manage to buy presents without the rest of the family noticing you are doing it. While we were in town, we passed THE art supplies shop and I was about to enter the shop, saying that I wanted to buy a canvas for that oilpainting (and sneek in a present for my daughters), when my youngest daughter created a diversion. To me a signal my eldest was up to something ( a canvas perhaps?), so I took the bait and wondered with glee how on earth she was going to hide a 60 by 80 centimeter canvas. They had casually quizzed me on how large I thought this painting was going to be.
We agreed to meet at 5 at the expressobar. Patricia, my eldest, had no visible canvas. When we got home, suddenly the both of them rushed out again, saying they had forgot to buy something for a friend. 15 minutes later they returned. I pretended to be very busy cooking and not to see the large rectanglar, thin packet they where trying to hide, but I saw anyway… While they manoeuvered the thing upstairs, something dropped from Patricia’s handbag. A book. Maybe I should have pretended I didn’t see that either, but ah… I guess I’m a little curious. I picked up the book at the same moment the ladies came rushing downstairs again.
It was Anatomy and Figure Drawing and Drawing the Human Head by Louis Gordon.
“Nice book, can’t recall having seen it in this house before” I said.
I half expected a fib to explain what this book was doing there, only to find it wrapped in some cotuonwool drenched in treacle on December 5. But no, they had run out of excuses and confessed that this was their present for me.
And so now I have run out of excuses too. After all this, I can’t really NOT do anatomy drawings and work from the book front to back. The price tag was still on it, it cost them 15 euro, a lot of money for them. Isn’t that just the sweetest thing of them to be so supportive of my artistic endeavours?
I like the book a lot. I like the delicate and clear drawings and I couldn’t resist starting on the first drawing right away. It’s still a WIP, and this is what ot looks like after an hour (or two).
Arrrgghhh… anyone any ideas how to solve this?
