- Today is March 15th, 2021.
A year ago tomorrow
I will have broadcast my first "Lunch Doodles".
Let's see what we can make out of this 15.
Go like that.
It's a rhino.
I made a rhino out of 15.
And put my name here,
and people will know that I drew it.
Don't have to do the date because the date's right there.
So, it's been a big year.
We've been locked down in one way or another
for a whole year.
It's a long time.
It's a different amount of time for everyone,
so if you're four years old
it's 25% of your life.
It's a long time.
If you're seven and a half years old,
13% of your life.
It's a long time.
If you happen to be 53 years old,
it's almost 2% of your life.
Still a long time.
Think a lot has happened.
We've learned a lot, we've lost a lot,
and science is going to get us out of this.
It's already starting to.
But art is gonna get us through this.
So I hope you've made a lot of art this year,
and I hope you've made a lot of drawings this year.
But first, before we do our art project for the day,
let's pause
and just remember a little bit,
people and things that happened over the last year,
how we were our best selves
and how maybe we wish we could have done better.
All right, let's play.
So, we are going to make an abstraction.
This is very exciting.
I have been making a lot of abstractions this year.
So what you're going to need,
some markers and some paper
and some tape.
I've got painter's tape.
If you don't have painter's tape just normal tape will do.
Here's the trick.
It doesn't matter which markers you use,
but it does matter what type of paper.
You wanna get a paper that this tape won't rip up
when you pull it off.
I don't know, you might even use one of those shopping bags
that you've had over the year.
A lot of those paper shopping bags.
But if you have this kind of stuff, you'll pause.
Go on, get yourself markers.
Doesn't matter which ones.
Some paper that's good.
If you have painter's tape, fancy.
If you have normal tape, that's great.
Gonna make an abstract.
Yeah, okay? Oh, yeah, I know it's hard.
Gotta test your paper. Okay, yeah, yeah.
All right, here we go. Let's play.
So I'm gonna make a frame.
I'm gonna use my painter's tape first to make a frame
so I can see where I'm drawing like this.
See, that makes a nice straight line.
Another big one.
Oh, go like this.
Doesn't have to be too exact, all right?
Do it again.
Right like this. Boop.
And like this.
So I know that I'm gonna draw
in the middle of my page.
I love abstractions.
I was doing some abstractions based on the compositions
of a man named Ludwig von Beethoven.
It's a silly name for a guy who really liked making music,
and he was one of the great music makers.
And I remember reading somebody saying,
"You know, Ludwig van Beethoven,
they didn't give him extra notes.
He got the same notes as everybody else."
And that's the same for us as artists.
We don't get extra colors.
Fancy artists don't get extra colors or extra shapes.
They get the same colors and shapes that you get.
They just put them together in a different way.
So we're gonna put shapes together in a different way,
and what we're going to do,
much like this year, we've had restrictions of one kind,
we're gonna make a restriction.
Gonna take the tape and we're gonna put it on the paper,
and I'm gonna go all wiggle-waggledy like this.
Oh, see, I'm doing this with the clear tape.
I'm gonna take this off
so you understand you can do it with clear tape,
but you're not really gonna be able to see it
on the screen.
So I'm gonna do it with this green tape,
and I'm gonna go wiggle-waggledy,
and I'm going to restrict
what the pen can do, right?
I'm gonna make it so that the pen
can make colors
and marks on the paper
but not where the tape is.
Much like there have been things
that we have wanted to do
that we've been restricted,
but that doesn't mean that we can't make fun stuff.
I'm gonna start with a red pen,
and I'm gonna just take my marker
and I'm gonna mark.
Gonna mark, get a little rhythm to it.
I'm gonna just mark.
And your name doesn't have to be Mark for you to do this.
And again, doesn't matter which markers you use.
Just get a nice
thing going on here.
Look at that. All right.
And get it all done up.
Okay, that's step one.
That was my red.
Now I'm gonna slowly, slowly
take the tape off,
one piece of tape.
And this is why it matters what type of paper you use.
Don't want it to rip the paper at this point.
But otherwise it's good. Come loose.
There we go.
Helps if you have more fingernails.
I clipped my fingernails recently,
and I shouldn't have done that.
All right, now I'm gonna do it again,
but I'm gonna do it going the other direction.
And again, just maybe
make them go off in different things.
There, see how they're making a little river?
I don't even know what I'm doing,
just feeling it.
Feeling and thinking about the shapes
that I wanna make.
All right. Let's see.
Now I'm gonna take blue pen, blue marker,
and I'm just gonna go.
And look.
The blue when it goes over the white makes one color,
and when it goes over the red it makes another color.
That's kinda interesting.
Now, there it goes.
Do it, do it, do it, do it, do it.
Get it really done.
All right.
Let's take that blue marker goes there.
Gonna pull this tape off.
All right.
Now we're getting close.
Let's see, take this off.
How's yours coming? It's good?
All right.
Now I'm gonna make lots of little tapes.
Gonna make little dots,
little remembrances
of all the little things that have happened,
the little events that I did not see coming.
Gonna think about them
as I put these little pieces here.
Just randomly,
but I'm also thinking about why I'm making this drawing.
It's making me feel things while I do it.
Take a yellow marker.
Ah, here we go. This is the fun part.
There we go, just marky mark mark.
And look.
It's changing.
My little colors there, oh.
There we go.
A piece of art
is something that changes the room that it's in,
and when you look at it,
it makes you feel or think differently,
if only for a little while.
That's why I like art so much.
I miss going to see it
because being in the room with it is very exciting.
So since I haven't been able to go to museums this year,
I decided to make a lot of paintings.
And it helps me think.
It made me feel better.
Used up a lot of tape as well,
so whoever's in charge of the tape industry
is very happy as well.
All right, so now I've got that.
I'm gonna take my big pieces of tape off.
This is the framing device, right?
Let's see what we've got.
Okay.
All right.
Let's look at that.
Or, this is the fun part, or look at that.
Or look at that.
Great thing about making abstract art
is you get to decide which side is the top.
The way you do it is you write your name
so that everybody knows
that you made it.
And then it's finished and you know what the top is.
All right, let me see yours.
Let me see what you got.
Oh yeah. Oh yeah.
I like how all the colors mix up
and made all those shapes.
It's a real work of art.
I think this one
deserves a place on the Willems Refrigerator Museum of Art.
It's where we put our really good drawings,
on the refrigerator,
so that everyone at home
can see the art that we made.
There we go.
All right, I do have one letter.
'Cause traditionally, when we did the "Lunch Doodles"
we got letters.
So here's today's letter.
Today's letter, Monday, March 15, 2021.
The letter comes from everybody everywhere,
and it says: "Why?"
I don't know.
But I do know
that now every Tuesday through Saturday
for the next three weeks,
you can go back in time to see me draw for you
to see what your drawings will be like in the future.
And maybe you will notice something
that no grown-ups did in all those episodes,
the numbers of drawings that I made upside down.
I hope to see you
outside of a box in the real world soon.
Until then,
keep creating.