Stopped into the corporate coffee station at North & Wells wherein pitched battles of chess are in heated swing and sway. The observant among you will notice the gent on the right is playing with the black chess pieces but appears to also be holding a black pawn as if he captured one of his own. The reason being the games were very rapid and would quickly conclude then these two combatants would switch pieces. So as I sketched they were alternating who opened. Anyway, their intense postures didn’t vary much throughout their set.
Fountain pen and Pitt & Artist Pens on a Stillman & Birn sketchbook.
Grabbed a sketch between bites.
Drawn at Cupitol with fountain pen and Pitt Artist Pens on a Stillman & Birn sketchbook.
“Stuart could not believe his luck. At a time when he most needed to hide (in plain sight, no less) from his enemies & the authorities (the lazier & clumsier of the two), the pandemic & the obliging mandates kept him masked up & out in public.
Unable to pull a Ted Kaczynski in a rustic hideout dug into the cleavage of some red neck mountain range, too vain to forego Michelin star meals & haute couture tailoring, & too claustrophobic to hunker down for endless months in an apartment dependent on the lowest common denominator of restaurants willing to home deliver; he would live a near normal life behind a face cape, exposed just nose bridge to brow.
Among the upscale streets of Chitown’s Gold Coast & Mag Mile, where you’re likely to trip over an august geezer draped in the showroom offerings of Armani, Tom Ford, Prada, or Zegna & topped with $2,000 Optimo fedoras, he could venture out daily. Even talk to strangers, in between sneaking sips of espresso at any of the dozen cafes he treasured.
But today, at perhaps his preferred roastery, something of note, a troubling note, occurred. He caught the eye of an artist. A capable one with a penchant for detail. Not only had Stuart been captured in his favorite fedora, standing at the marble & tile counter, thereby giving a close approximation of his height, the background drawing pegged him in the exact cafe. One head study didn’t suffice, the page contained three. Matters were made more grave as two head studies of him, a profile of his left side, & a 3/4 rear view of his right, contained explicit features. A mole just behind & beneath his right ear was cause for concern enough, though men of his age were polka dotted with warts & moles & and garlands of age spots. It was the left profile that froze Stuart. There, in the middle of his head, acting as an anchor to the black mask he depended on to protect his identity, was his large ear. The one with the lobe that had been split when a diamond earring had been ripped by a thug sent to collect on a debt. That memento to reckless behavior had been left unrepaired. As a reminder. Now, it spoke to him again.
“I don’t mean to intrude, but you are very talented.” Stuart infused his words with just enough grace.
“Oh, thank you.”
“Do you do that for a living?”
“Well, not much of one, but, yes.”
“What do you do with your drawings?”
“These? I usually just post ‘em online.”
The artist’s hand hadn’t stopped.
“Do you ever sell them? I should like to buy that one in particular. It’s quite….arresting.”
“Well, I usually don’t sell these as they’re drawn on both sides of the page.” The page was flipped to show another cafe scene. “Plus”, he said looking up from the book,”I’m going to publish these soon. So, I’m holding onto all of these till the book designer & I make the final selection.”
Stuart’s emotions were as Grey as his eyes.
Something would have to be done about the sketch, or, the sketcher. Should he post his handiwork, it would draw the unerring eye of his pursuers.
Drawn on a #stillmanandbirn sketchbook with fountain pen and Pitt Artist Pens.
