“Ferocious Fat Felines Fly For Free…” by Helen E. H. Madden
I have a number of small journals lying around the house and occasionally I will pick one up and doodles something in it. This particular piece was the first drawing in a journal of various colored papers that I bought 7 years ago. In 7 years, I have drawn a grand total of 6 drawings in this book, not including the artwork I pasted on the cover. It’s one of those things that I get really interested in doing a particular piece in the journal and I work on it a little bit every day, then I sort of abandon the journal for a while and drift off to do other things.
This drawing was created all in one night, or a couple of nights in a row, I’m not exactly sure which. But I can tell you what inspired it and the circumstances under which it was drawn. Hurricane Isabelle was headed our way and my family and I had evacuated to my best friend’s house to wait out the storm. Mary had a set of magnetic poetry pieces on her fridge that I started playing with while we were there and for some reason I came up with the line “Ferocious Fat Felines Fly For Free!” I decided it needed a drawing to go with it and as I just happened to have a brand new art journal and a brand new box of crayons and some brand new Micron pens, I started to work on it.
This drawing had no plan beyond illustrating that one line I had created. It ended up being a very literal interpretation of the line, with some weird random symbolism thrown in for no good reason. I like it though. I especially like the colors. The paper was actually a light greyish blue, but there’s so much green and yellow laid down, you can’t really tell.
Even though I like this piece and others I’ve created like it, I always wonder is this sort of stuff really art? Is anybody going to like it? I had fun making it, but otherwise was it a waste of time and crayons? I guess what I’m really asking is, do YOU like it? Would you buy a poster of something like this? Does the whimsical nature of this piece strike a chord within you, or do you just sort of roll your eyes after looking at it and go, “What sort of idiot would draw such nonsense?”
However you feel about it, let me know. I’m curious to see what people think.
