Books and faces, as usual...

For a change, this week... Books!

On the right is a book by Jean Hatzfeld who has written several books about the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. In this book are the stories told by the survivors of the massacres and by the killers. They're now all forced to live together by the "reconciliation" political program.

 

I couldn't put this book down and was frustrated when I finished it. It's not a nice read, of course, but it adresses essential questions about being human, living, forgiving, believing (or not)... What's frustrating is that there is no answer, only more stories, more ways of coping, more questions.
On another level, the French spoken by Rwandese people is particularly beautiful, and precise, and I enjoyed that a lot. (not sure how it comes across with the translation). All his books are available at Amazon.com in english. This one is called "the antelope strategy". There are two others about Rwanda, and I intend to read them very soon too.
On the left is a book I read a few years ago (but I didn't want a "fun" book beside the Hatzfeld one). It's a young German officer (Ernst Jünger himself) telling his life during the 14-18 war. No answers here either, but it's a powerful, essential book. There's no judgement and no propaganda there, just noise, fear, and people trying to stay human.

To keep this post very original... portraits!
A young girl from Togo, a boy from Republic Tcheque, and the last one is a girl from Liberia, all copied from photos in the book "Si tous les enfants du monde".  The third girl I saw on "Photo of the year.com" and she was called "Cambodian Princess".

I'll be at my sister's wedding this weekend (providing the airport is open since it was flooded and closed yesterday...). Will I have the courage to draw out my sketchbook and draw in public?
I'll tell you in a few days!

2 books, 12 portraits

 New books, for a change... Actually I have read another one since but haven't had the time to draw it yet.

Those two were fantastic. I'm not sure the first one has been translated in English yet. French title is Battements d'ailes, Ali di Babbo in Italian, from Milena Agus (author from Sardaigne). It's a small book, magical, poetical, funny, strange, with wonderful characters and a very original voice.

 The other one, I couldn't let go, and "ate" very fast : ) ! The third angel, by Alice Hoffman.

 I really want to read all their other books now.

I've been asked how many books I read a month, I don't know, it depends. Four, five, six, not counting those I read very slowly because they make me work, (personnal development books, for example), or the illustrated books... I read fast, and I need to read as much as I need to breath. I read a lot more when I was young - I had four library cards ^^ !

These portraits, I copied from a wonderful book called "Si tous les enfants du monde" (If all the children in the world). The girls are from Espana and Guinée Equatoriale and the boys from Haïti and Malta.

Two more children from the book, little girl from Cambodge, looking up, little boy from Ivory Coast (he's much cuter in reality, I didn't manage to get the cuteness on paper, he's very small, my version looks older...)
Men from Parker Fitzgerald and Arte te tra flickr streams.

A young woman from David Urbanke flickr stream - my version is not as beautiful as she is in the photo... For some reason, my version looks a bit like my grandmother (must be the sad expression and thin neck - my grandmother was from Flanders and not beautiful at all...)
A young girl from Kazakhtan (and I made her look older, once more...)
A woman from Tibet seen on Falsalama flickr stream, and a woman seen on Internet, random search, no name.

I find it very hard to draw the small children, and the women. The more cute and/or beautiful they are, the more difficult.
And, also, people showing their teeth! Much harder!

I haven't had the time to admire anyone's blog but I'm going to get to it now!
 This weekend I had the first year final exam for the course of Sophrology I'm following. I had a little problem with the time, almost didn't manage to finish... But I think it went well.
It's a fantastic course, I'm very glad I'm doing it. Hopefully I'll graduate next year and be able to begin practicing!