Well, I'm sure kids are great for lots of reasons, but seeing how I don't have any, this is my rationale behind their being great:
I've had some fabric printed up at Spoonflower from one of my doll drawings, and I've been selling a combo of the fabric panels and simple cushiony-type-dolls made with the print, and they haven't been very popular with adults, who can see over the table, I've had them leaning up against stuff, sort of towards the back... and kids couldn't really get a glimpse.
At Finders Keepers however I had to put them towards the front just because I had a smaller space than normal, and I noticed a strange phenomenon where girls between the age of about 3 and 5 NEEDED them, liked crying, pointing NEEDED them, and I always find situations like this really awkward because I want to sell stuff to people, but I really don't want to bully parents into buying stuff for a million different reasons, and so this kept happening over and over again.
The tantrums weren't great, in fact I'm inclined to say that tantrums are a very strong reason for children not being wonderful, but I'm nearly 30 and I chuck tantrums too from time to time... the greatness came from their ability to consistently understand my illustrations... this happened with my little doll earrings too. I kept hearing parents and grandparents query what things were with Claire up there, and with the earrings, and the little girls would simply explain, 'it's a doll', and many other fascinating things, like when I heard one woman say but what's the red on her face for, and a little girl matter-of-factly explained 'she has rosy cheeks'. It was amazing too see and hear! I'm not sure if it's because kids watch so many cartoons or look at picture books, or if their little minds just haven't been bent out of shape yet like all us adults, but I'm sure many people have written papers about such things, I think maybe it's because they still draw and colour in and are still very connected with these types of representations. I noticed it happened a couple of times at Bondi on Sunday too, which is probably why its still floating around in my mind.
So yay for kids!
B.
2 comments:
Kids are pretty great, and sometimes not so great, and that's speaking from direct experience. :)
I can't believe adults don't "get" your stuff, though. It's very clear to me. So either they're a little daft or I'm very childlike. Either way, I suppose. Ha!
I agree!!! Kids have the most beautiful minds. And you'll be glad to hear that my 21 month old just saw this picture as I read the post and shouted "OOOOH OOOH!" pointing at your beautiful image. I said "Do you like her do you?" She said "Yeah!". So there you have it. It's not just 3-5 year olds.
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