Palo Alto Festival of the Arts, August 23-24, 2014

There is a story to every image (although some stories are better than others), and this image was a special one. The Palo Alto Festival of the Arts is a "Hometown" festival for us. Cheryl grew up in the neighboring city of Los Altos and many friends and family come to watch us draw.

Last year we drew something complicated and finished the image late in the day. We were not able to spend as much time goofing off and visiting with friends and family as we wanted. So we vowed to draw something simple this next year. Simple, like a stick. Or a box. A stick in a box! This became the germ of an idea that evolved into our image.

Wayne draws the box
A stick and a box? Sounds like the standard tiger trap. And who was the most famous tiger hunter of our time? Calvin.

Wayne draws the box from the side
The trap was simple enough: One box, one stick, one length of string.

Cheryl draws Keenan's leg
And, of course, there is the hunter himself: Calvin. The role of Calvin was played by Cheryl's cousin's son, Keenan. No tigers were harmed in the filming of this episode.

Cheryl paints Keenan's arm
Little known fact: this Calvin rarely wears shoes (we were lucky he was willing to wear the striped shirt!).

Closeup of the tunafish sandwich bait
Tiger traps are baited with tuna fish sandwiches. Tigers will do anything for a tuna fish sandwich. They are kind of stupid that way.