Toon Art

This evening we went to Hardesty Library, where a cartoonist named Steve Quinn was appearing in their new theater, Connor's Cove. He was there to show the children the basics of drawing cartoon characters. On the way in, each person was handed a ticket for a drawing (no pun intended) at the end of the performance. Mr. Quinn drew Fred Flintstone, Dino, Charlie Brown, Yogi Bear, and several other cartoons for them, and showed them how to draw some of the cartoons, step by step, from basic circles/ovals through finished product. At the end they drew tickets to give away all of the pictures that he had drawn that night, and Mikey won a poster-sized drawing of Scooby Doo drawn in black magic marker!

It was fun that Mikey won the picture of Scooby Doo, because it was actually the second artist-drawn cartoon character that Mikey had received within just a few weeks! Not too long ago we went out to Promenade Mall to see a rock & roll art show (there were vintage photos of rock stars, album art, art done by the stars themselves, etc.) and at the show was a guy named Ron Campbell. Mr. Campbell was there because he worked on the animated Beatles cartoons, including Yellow Submarine (apparently he breathed life into the main Blue Meanie, among other things), and now he spends a lot of his time creating original artwork in that style and featuring the cartoon Beatles, and selling it to fans and collectors. Well, Mikey doesn't know too much about the Beatles, but he certainly knows one of the other projects Mr. Campbell worked on... Rugrats! When we told him Mikey likes Rugrats, he immediately asked Mikey what Rugrats character he would like a picture of. Mikey chose Chuckie, and Mr. Campbell picked up a paintbrush and drew him a beautiful picture of Chuckie, right before our eyes. What a great guy!