Tim and Jeremy are both waiters at a restaurant in downtown New York City. During slow times at work, to stave off boredom when it is slow, the two young men draw pictures. These pictures are made using ink and what is called the "Triple Dupe Pad," a book of paper used to place orders in the kitchen. The drawings usually take about a week to make, all the while also being used by fellow employees to take orders; this sometimes leads to other collaborators or in a couple cases, to the loss of the work. The drawings are then scanned and colored in Photoshop where they come to life in stunning technicolor! The subject matter varies from piece to piece, as they are made over a long course of time and under various moods and states of mind. They all retain a playfulness that serves as a coping mechanism after spending a night catering to the endless needs of hungry patrons.

Monday, November 21, 2011

#29 "We'll Make Great Pets" February 13, 2011

(Click on the Image to see a Larger Version)

Yes, this one got busy quickly. It started in two places, and those two figures are still the main characters, I think. I drew the guy with the rocket in his eye, and Tim drew the guy holding the bug like he's holding a baby. The rest we filled in the next couple months, I think. I seem to remember this one sitting around the Cafe Loup for a while. It's not that we have slowed down drawing these things, it's just that we spend more time on them these days. They have become more important to us, and so we work a little longer on them. Not that we have a larger audience looking at them, we simply care more now. Caring at the Loup is a funny thing. Everyone who works there cares about the place. Well, almost everyone. I feel like that just isn't the case in most people's lives. Yes, people care that they have a job, but most don't really care about their employers and vice versa. Thats what's so great about the Loup. We are a family. An extremely dysfunctional, multicultural family, but a family nonetheless. It's always been that way as far as I know. Lloyd, our boss, was the head chef at the original location in 1977 and eventually he and his wife, Ardes bought the place and run it now. Some of the people who work there have been with both sets of owners which mean that they have been working there for over 16 years; you know, since the 80's or 90's. That's pretty incredible for a restaurant. We don't always agree on some of the choices and decisions of our bosses and co-workers, but there does seem to be a bountiful abundance of caring. That is also strange because as servers, we don't really have a say in practically anything there. If we don't like something on the menu and make suggestions on changing it, we are met with silence. When we don't like our co-workerers, we have to suck it up and accept them, as practically no one gets fired. The only people who get fired are the ones who don't show up to work for a week, threatened the wrong people, or the ones who have worked there for less than a year. Everyone else who has left, has "Eighty-sixed themselves" as we say. Some have died, some have been deported, and some have gotten sick of the dysfunctional aspect of the place. So, that might be the theme pictured in this one. Probably not, but maybe.
Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)