Momos in Neukölln

momos in Neukolln Suzanne Forbes April 2016I had a pretty rough day yesterday.

But today when I went to the bank at Hermannplatz, an incredibly handsome man was serving momos from a food truck.

I love Tibetan food second only to Mexican food in the whole food. I am a momo fiend. So when I walked along the sunny, bustling plaza to Momo Master, I was pretty excited. imagine how excited I was when I saw the beautiful man serving them!

Yeah, yeah, I’m shallow. But I’m a portraitist- human beauty is my raison d’être.

I asked if I could draw him and he said yes! It’s perspective drawing crunch time as I develop the teaching materials for my next class, Perspective for Masochists, so I made it a seriously challenging spatial drawing. It was two hours of hard-core angle-gauging to get the truck.

The momo gentleman was wearing the trifecta of boy-hotness clothes: a v-neck sweater over a button-up henley, sleeves pushed up to the elbows, and a thin necklace. Guys, you know wearing long sleeves and rolling or pushing them up make you look great, right? And that a necklace is a socially acceptable gender-fluid signifier that is as charming to women as guyliner? Whether it’s a spiritual article, like red thread or a crucifix, or just a strand of beads! With an open-neck shirt, magic.

I don’t mean to be dehumanizing by objectifying this extremely nice total stranger. I don’t know if the female gaze can operate in the theater of the historic male gaze without accruing its toxins. But I know that actually Rob, whose loss hit me again so hard yesterday, and ALL of my husbands have genuinely enjoyed my pure aesthetic delight in male beauty.

My drawing only barely suggests how great-looking this person is, but I did what I could. And the momos were delicious!

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About Suzanne Forbes

Suzanne Forbes is a traditionally trained figurative artist who makes documentary art of queer culture and Berlin life. She also works in mixed media. She is a former New Yorker who immigrated to Berlin with her third husband and their two cats. Her work is crowdfunded by the support of her Patrons on Patreon; you could help! In previous lives Suzanne was a graffiti artist in downtown NY, a courtroom artist for CBS and CNN, a penciller for DC Comics on Star Trek, and a live-drawing chronicler of Bay Area alternative culture.

1 thought on “Momos in Neukölln

  1. Pat Ketchum

    I am looking forward to eating some of these things! Very interesting descriptions about the stranger and his clothing.

    Reply

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