I was recently at my publisher’s annual conference a few weeks back and whilst I was dining and drinking my way through the evening (it’s a tough job but someone’s gotta do it), there was an silhouette artist Alison Russell. She was there with a sharp pair of scissors and a small satchel of black paper, weaving her way around the room cutting the most incredible and highly accurate hand-cut silhouettes. She did this one of me in about 4 minutes, I kid you not. (The paper-cut is 5″ high). What made it all the more amazing was there was no plain background behind me, just a busy, dim-lit room of authors, and she was chatting to me the whole time.
Apparently, she is one of only 5 professional silhouette artists in the country. A dying art? Perhaps one day there’ll be guest authors weaving there way through dimly-lit dining rooms at similar corporate events with a small sacthel of real books, promoting nostalgic conversations about the good old days. Laugh if you will but hey – it could happen!
You can read more about Alison and see her in action at her website:
01/04/2011 at 2:24 pm Permalink
Sharp scissors + black paper + a snipporama-free-for-all = Yikes.