One Hour 100 People?

That’s roughly 1.6 people per minute. Which means get just over 30 seconds per person. Which is really not that hard after all. In my case, I was drawing people this week out of the windows of a Blenz Coffee in downtown Vancouver, as I observed them at the traffic light. I didn’t get 30 seconds with them. Usually it was 10 seconds, or 15 if I was very lucky, to make the observation, and to finish drawing before they were out of sight.

So, if you can be comfortable drawing human figures in 10 or 15 seconds, you can get in a LOT of people in very little time.

Note, I didn’t set out to draw 100 people. My goal was to finish these two pages. I learned I had 100 only a day later when someone on my instagram feed counted them for me.

I have a new accordion style sketchbook. I considered some interesting ways to fill it up, and I think I want to do this one as a book full of these Tiny People! I think they will look really interesting as a full spread. If I average 100 people per double spread, I think I could reach 2000 people by the end of this. To keep things interesting, I will also try to cover various parts of Vancouver in trying to do this, so I can be sure about getting a variety of people. As close to 2000 distinct people as possible!

What makes a Tiny People drawing work?

They’re just 15 second portraits. How can they have something to say? Do they work in groups or can they exist in isolation? I think the latter works too. I think this is because a quick drawing is not a bad drawing, or a lesser drawing. It is simply more economical in the information it conveys.

I think about all my art in terms of information. What does it say, what does it show, and what does it discard or conceal? A detailed drawing of a person carries information of the type that a Tiny People drawing does not. But in itself, a good Tiny People portrait has things to say about - fashion, body types, hair-styles, pose, gait (walking style), expression, mood, activity, weather, social position. That’s quite a lot of things, isn’t it?

With every piece, I try to nail at least one distinctive feature. This is what I seek when my eyes travel over my scene, preferably a 4-point traffic intersection. At any given time, there will be some people queuing/waiting at two corners, and others walking through two sides. If you get a good seat with a view, you can actually depict people from every kind of direction. It’s a very rich scene to draw from!

Sometimes, I think all drawings are symbols. When a viewer connects with it, it isn’t just the exact object represented that they connect with. Often they connect with it as a symbol - or a placeholder - for another thing in their world. It reminds them of someone, or something, or someplace sometime. Here are the people below in slightly more detail. Take a look and tell me what you think. Is there anyone that stands out particularly? Is there anyone you “recognize”, even if you’ve never been to Vancouver?