10 Sketches that Tell the Story of 2020
Flipping through the 3.5 sketchbooks I have completed in the course of this strange year I tried to pick the 10 drawings that really capture some key moments of 2020.
April 2020, 11 year old Isabelle is stuck at home for months. When schools, playgrounds, movie theaters, and restaurants shut down kids do everything at home. Screen time limits go out of the window. Stuffed toys replace friends, and parents have to learn to be teachers, best friends, and babysitters.
April 6, 2020. Shoppers line up 6 feet apart to enter a grocery store. The pandemic turned mundane activities on its head. Normally simple things like Grocery shopping became complicated as stores tried to protect their employees and customers from getting. Signs and directives started to dot all of our public spaces: “Stand in line before entering to maintain low number of people inside” “Maintain 6 feet of distance” “Stand on the dot” “Wear a mask”
May 26, 2020, Peninsula park. When people are Unable to travel, see family and friends, and socialize American neighborhood parks enjoy a year of renaissance. Americans flock to the parks to exercise, meditate, socialize, and catch their collective breath.
July 22, 2020. Protestors in front of the Federal Court House (Portland, OR) 2020 also saw the biggest racial justice movement in the US history. In Portland, Black Lives Matter protestors and their allies demonstration was one of the most sustained in the country. Many nights these gatherings would end in clashes with the police, use of tear gas, and arrests.
August 26, 2020. Empty beach near Trinidad, CA. Nature in general and water in particular become a place of escape and solace for many people during the pandemic.
September 2, 2020. An impromptu outdoor concert on the East Esplanade to a happy crowd of sun bathers, swimmers, and paddle boarders,
Entertainment moves outside as concert halls and bars are forced to shut down.
September 9, 2020. Wild fires spread through western United States destroying communities, forcing mass evacuations, and coating many towns and cities in a blanket of suffocating smoke.
October 5, 2020. Lincoln Monument in South Park Blocks, Portland, OR. This monument would be toppled only a week later during the day of “rage”. 2020 was a year of reevaluation, anger and unrest as many traditions and rituals were rejected.
November 3, 2020. US votes for a new president. Many cast their ballot into an official ballot box like the one I sketched sitting in the middle of the Pioneer court house square in downtown Portland.
