THEN i need a hero

there is a lot of dialogue about my idealization of a person in my portraits of them. this is a conversation that i have been having my entire life. in my very first sketchbooks i would pay tribute to the frineds surrounding me by drawing pictures of them as they either wanted to be seen or how i saw themthrough my feelings for them. Added into that the fact thet i was an avid comic book collector for starting in second grade till my late thirties. i have no interest in dwelling on their flaws but rather i would glorify them in what i understood as them at their best. for nearly a decade a polaroid camera was my constant companion. many times i would take a picture of someone and stand there with them as the picture developed. When the picture had come into view i would flatly say "look how beautiful you are." it was their responce to that sentence that would give me an insight into how a portrait would be developed. shy, or flustered or bold and dismissing it was great insite into how the interior of the person. it also reassured them that i could be trusted with their likeness. they were not going to end up the but of a visual joke or as some sort or ironic commentary. The evidence of peoples inner like always radiates from their faces. this humanity is the glory that i want to portray.