I was going through one of my sketchbooks and decided to stick this one up.
A year or so ago while visiting family T. took me for a ride on an old Honda that he had restored. I amused myself by imagining what we must of looked like.
Motorcycles are not something I have the habit of drawing and I find this sketch funny because it ended up with some sort of subliminal link to old underground comic books, which if I think about it probably are my main references when it come to drawing them. Not that I would of thought about that without their slipping through the whole chain.
It’s interesting how the mind can do that. I remember an artist friend discussing what he called the “shorthand” artists developed to interpret whatever subject they are drawing. Trees with their branches and leaves are a good example for this, you can’t draw all of them so you pretty much have to find a way to draw their impression (if that’s the right word) using whatever means suits you: dots, lines, squiggles, blotches…. which is of course what make the drawing your own.
So even if you are drawing something for the first time if you’re someone who draws, you probably have your own vocabulary for transcribing shapes on to paper. Developed over time by your influences, trial and error, affinities…