FEATURE OF THE WEEK (15/02/12): caricatures

inspiration. it is a wonderful thing isn't it? i hope that by being out here in rome, i am inspiring some of you lot. perhaps to do something similar (ie. up sticks and go and live in a foreign country da sola); or at least i hope i am inspiring those in my tour groups and encouraging them to go home and intellectually plunge themselves deep into the abyss that is history/art.

i love to be inspired and i can tell you, having my aunt out in rome for a week inspired me to do many things. i now struggle through il messagero as often as i can, i greet strangers with a friendly smile and a 'come stai!' as if they should know who i am, and bingo, i've got another friend. but more than anything, i was inspired by her love for caricatures. her first day in rome involved a 4 minute/10 euro solo sitting in piazza navona resulting in the most fantastic cartoon portrait i have ever seen. leaving me with a gift of 10 euros, i followed in her footsteps and did exactly the same. being a caricature virgin, i was unsure what to expect, and nothing could have prepared me for the gypsy-come-prostitute i was depicted as:

how could he have interpreted me like that when i was wearing a woolley hat and a thick sheepskin coat?? a stock caricature for any female under the age of 25 me thinks...
the arrival of a friend in rome called for another caricature but this time a double. and the second artist got us BANG on (although needless to say neither of us were posing topless...)

so not only was i inspired by my aunt to have a caricature done with every visitor that comes to see me in rome, but the artists bestowed on me a desire to learn how to create my own. what a talent it would be to turn all of your best friends into topless cartoons in 4 minutes? bring on the youtube tuition i say...