pickman's model

This morning on the train I took a seat behind a dignified elderly man dressed entirely in shades of gray; clothes chosen, perhaps, to complement his hair, which he wore in tight gray curls; indeed, almost all of him was gray, except for a multi-colored muffler vividly covering his ears.
He clutched several pencils in his left hand, often selecting and exchanging these with the pencil held in his right, with which he sketched his fellow passengers on large, loose sheets of paper balanced upon his knee. These drawings, exclusively faces rendered at frontal elevation and numbering three or four to a page, were arranged in various stages of incompletion, as if the artist's chosen model had sat down opposite him but then unexpectedly departed the train before my gray friend had opportunity to add detail, shading, or even the establishment of principle facial features to his basic outline. I wondered if, like Anthony Powell's Mr. Deacon, he was simply a "collector of heads and necks", since sketching on a cramped subway train must surely provide the mobile artist with many alternative and varied subjects to find inspiration in: a conflux of wedged bodies forming interesting lines and shapes, for instance; or a still life of crumpled knees and pinched feet viewed from an unusual angle; perhaps, even, a single, gracefully curved arm hanging from a steel balustrade, descending into an ocean of hunched shoulders from which the tips of the backs of bowed heads emerge like dangerous rocks to shipwreck the unwary.
I don't know. Personally, I just prefer to stare out from the train windows at the passing walls of dark tunnels.

Comments

[PJS]

I know the reference (Pickman's model)(well, so do many others, I am sure). Great story with lots of local color, so to speak. I am a great fan of HPL.