CALL FOR ENTRIES: The Young Muppet Fans Art Extravaganza!

I was just admiring this picture I drew of Kermit the Frog, back when I was about ten years old, and it gave me an idea. Surely I can’t be the only one who’s held onto his old work. There must be other Muppet fans whose childhood artwork was preserved for posterity after it came off the refrigerator, and I know there are some youngsters out there today with a few Muppety drawings in their tiny portfolios.

There’s something pretty wonderful about kid fan art. Just look at that Kermit drawing! I approached it with pure enthusiasm for the subject. I loved Kermit, he had given me a lot of happiness, and I wanted to return the favor by capturing that happiness in a likeness of him. The picture was drawn in pencil, but innocence was the true medium.

Or maybe that’s all a load of hooey and it’s just a chubby Kermit with tiny arms and an inexplicably white collar.

Either way, the fact remains that kid fan art is neato with a capital O. With that in mind, I’d like to announce a call for entries for a new, exciting, and extremely cute exhibition: The Young Muppet Fans Art Extravaganza! If you have any Muppet-related drawings, paintings, or sculptures created by kids, scan them or take photos of them, and e-mail them to ToughPigsRyan@yahoo.com.

Here are a few guidelines, because, let’s face it, you gotta have guidelines or you end up with pure chaos:

•Kid Muppet fan artwork must have been created by a child 13 years old or younger. Big kids’ art is tainted by the bitter, jaded worldview they inevitably develop starting on their 13th birthday.

•If you don’t have any of your own old work, you could submit some art by a kid in your life… your offspring, relatives, students, whatever. I’d love to see some contemporary Sesame Street works or some Bear in the Big Blue House art in amongst all the old Muppet Show stuff.

•If you don’t have any old work of your own, and you don’t know any children, I will allow submissions created in the style of a child for a separate exhibition category, preferably using one of these media: crayon, non-toxic markers, finger paint, or Play-Doh. For extra childlike authenticity, I recommend using your non-dominant hand. So if you’re right-handed, try drawing with your left hand, and vice versa.

•The deadline for entries is April 30, three weeks from today. That should give you plenty of time, right? I’ll post weekly reminders here until then.

Again, you can send your entries to ToughPigsRyan@yahoo.com. I’m really looking forward to seeing what kind of art comes in. I’m sure we’ll get some masterpieces, and once they’re exhibited, the art world will never be the same.

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