The BBB Club - Beautiful Bald Babies!!!

In celebration of the Breast Cancer Awareness Month,
To the memory of our beloved Renee,
To Karin who is bravely waging battle,
To all our friends and family members who have been through cancer,
survived it
and to some we have lost,
To those who dedicate their lives to search for the cure,
Forever we shall celebrate, remember and help:

Bella Sinclair and I collaborated in designing The Beautiful Bald Babies (BBB) Club logo. Further down below, is the original logo in pen and ink. Bella and I also started the idea of the BBB Club when we found out that we were both baldies when we were babies. I first celebrated our bald heritage with the painting of The Ivory Babies.

Two years before bisextile day, bedecked, bedizened, beautiful, bald babies and some bouncy brainiacs, badinage in the leaf mobile while a distant bagatelle play Rock-A-Bye-Baby. Sometimes they are guilty of being boisterous but never being bellicose. There are 31 BBBs in this image (so far) and our beloved Renee as the maple leaf-carrying dove . The Beautiful Bald Babies Club (BBB) is a group of artists, writers, musicians, gardeners, photographers... Pigment ink on 9"x12" smooth Bristol board.

My dearest friends,

This was an overwhelming task. For me, to draw this portrait of pediatric impressions of the BBB was a roller coaster ride of emotions and ideas. I thought what might have been had we all been coetaneous childhood friends. Imagine that! That's a lot of baldies and some of their hirsute friends. We would have had similar experiences and we would be able to assume an easy understanding and have a common bond.

On the other hand, consider the loss of our personal experiences in different times, ages and eras had it been so. Our differences and the understanding thereof, are what makes us special, after all. From Arija's photographic memoirs to Mita's introspective musings; Karin's trials and Tessa's punctuated equilibrium, Amalia's artistic evolution and Deborah's joy. In the midst of all that is happening, we live our individual lives in parallel time line, sometimes intersecting, overlapping, entangling even momentarily yet we are forever changed by the virtue that we gain from our tender, gentle even lighthearted experiences.

This is not social networking, not amassing of fans and superficial friends by the numbers. I think I counted an overwhelming number of thirty babies occupying the leafmobile. Yet, I know I have disappointed some who came late and I have already inked the spaces. Please forgive me. To exclude you is not my intention. You are welcome to join us. I just had to finish my drawing lest it fall victim to disinterest. and I need you to express interest. I can only assume for very few, Arija for one, who has no clue that I had converted her during her leave this week, into a bald toddler sharing space with Shirley in the scout pod. So many babies, surely it will sink or tear the leaf pod, but it won't. Our energy, enthusiasm and a genuine desire to establish an honest virtuous friendship and support one another through our blogs will keep us all afloat and soar.

Without further ado, please read about the origin of the BBB Club here. If you are reading this and was late in heeding the call, take heart. the ring of friendship is expandable. Come and play. Let these artists' blogs speak for themselves (links in progress):

Our beloved Renee is a maple-leaf carrying dove in this recent club picture and also on the first ever BBB Club picture. Above, L to R - bottom row: Uber-talented Vanessa Brantley-Newton (navigator); lovely mental ninja Bella Sinclair with sympathy- right eye patch (president), my favorite everything - friend, artist, brainiac; Ces with left eye patch; beautiful and gentle Deborah the midlife poet, and dancer with security blanket; Linda Cardina, the beautiful painter; Manon Doyle, ever so gorgeous and gifted and Amalia K. the beautiful gentle artist on right lower corner. On the Scout pod: Arija, beloved wise and gifted photographer painter friend and Shirley Ng-Benetiz, master watercolorist!

Clockwise from bottom left: beautiful Silke Powers with scarf, my elegant and sublime friend Janice Heppenstall with camera, fully coiffed handsome gifted Francisco Martins; Andrew Finnie the master story teller-painter-digital art wizard surfing on leaf; Steveroni, Gemini Peep, the symphony fiddle man - looking so naughty!

Left to right: Lakshmita Indira the Enigma, Julia Christie, the beautiful writer-artist being herself; Audrey my lovely quiet artist friend; Buckram and Bembo my beloved Gemini twin sister holding a plate of siopao with faces; behind her is my favorite super gifted French painter MartineAlison, Tessa Edwards, the Regal painter and writer holding a book, the multi-talented K.H. Whitaker and the acrobatic wicked multi-media artist Anne Huskey-Lockard.

On the Tea party pod: prolific artist Diana Evans the beautiful shooing the spider with a spoon; Katelen Tays, the lovely Poetic artist ducking the spider; Faerwillow the mysterious artist contemplating what to do with the spider; Caroline Soer the awesome-wicked master water colorist par excellence and Karin Bartimole, multi-media artist fighter and who inspired me to draw the first leaf mobile.

Top row: Marie Segal, the master clay artist and sisterfriend; Lisa Holtzman, painter and master-calligrapher; Jack Foster, the wonderful digital artist; Jan the fabric artist-nature lover-body builder, all around fun!