About Howard Eisman
Portrait of the Artist
I always has fun as a toddler "drawing". This changed in grade school as I was expected to follow rules. The teacher gave out gold, silver, red and green stars as an evaluation of the drawings submitted to her. I never got any stars. My greatest sin's were not drawing a sun (yellow ball with pins sticking out of it), a hole in every tree for squirrels to store nuts and not showing smoke coming out of chimneys. Not only did these omissions indicate an absence of artistic talent but, I suspect, were seen as symptoms of mental illness. My further art education in high school was also not helpful. The teacher would give long lectures on the evils of the color red and made it clear that she didn't want to see any version of red in her assignments. A one point she strode to the rear of the classroom (terra incognita) and confronted one student whom she caught using a red crayon. She whacked it out of his hand with a ruler. He was a local celebrity as he was the leader of a violent street gang. Everyone rushed over to calm him down: eventually, he was placated by a sweating assistant principal His red tinted drawing was hung in a place of honor in the school lobby and given an arcane title. I,thus, learned about the politics of the art world
As a preteen, I was impressed by Rafael Sabatini's description of his hero, Scaramouch; "He was born with a gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad." Add striking colors to this description
and you have the theme of my art.
I see life as a chaotic. challenging adventure. and I show people trying to manage it.
