I really don't know where those characters appeared from. When they first crossed my pen, each and every one, I found them embarrassing. They seen to suggest what I did not want to suggest, what I never meant to say. And it is not that by that they uncovered some truth I was trying to conceal, they surprised me with their naive inadequacy. Going through them again after more than a year, they also seem incomplete, the artist impatient, the technique half arsed. Well, enough with that, they are what they are.

A similar idea I am trying to develop with music, with playing guitar. The equivalent skill in playing an instrument will be to be able to play at one's whim. To imagine a tune and play it, to play as if you are speaking, mastering the instrument as one masters their voice.I can't remember if I actually wanted to draw characters in the first place. This is a dilemma I have also in photography: adding a character to a scene is the surest way to solve one, and yes I do think of a composition as a puzzle waiting for a solution. So, portraits are certainly easy. The character adds drama, a story, biology and its details, style, fashion, yet at the same time, those same elements fill me with embarrassment and a complete refusal of ownership.

To be fair, neither have those characters shown any sign of wanting to come to the light. Although some are busy in some extravagant activities, they mostly are unaware of the exposure. They were born out of a sleeping mind, their improbable interrelations hold only due to being documented in pen and paper, and surely the mildest awakening would have pushed them back to the immaterial, from which they doubtedly could ever be called again.

Seen in this light, understanding the humble position they occupy, I deem it dignified to present them, and to continue communicating with this part of the world that I find hard to relate to.