Street drawings, 2001

The idea of going to the street to draw appeared the need to exercise the observation of the human figure. In that moment, I wanted to make a leap in my practice, leaving I was and going else with my drawing. For such, I needed constant and daily models, different human types, of different ages and in all body positions. The city was the place I found those people. For six months I have observed people in streets, squares and parks near my home, in the bus, in the subway, in live model sessions, in collective studios, in the Municipal Market of São Paulo, at the mall, on the beach and among friends.

In that experience with eyes wide open, I have also observed aspects of the relationship between model and artist, that happens as a game: when asking permission to draw people, I heard refusals and testified different reactions. In the first moment of negotiation and of observation of the model, my feeling was of invasion. With the demand of concentration in the initiated work, model and artist surrendered their individual and attentive solitudes, one posing, the other one drawing. Both with an eye on the fish and the other on the cat.