Tales from the Theme Park #15

Here’s another in a long line of “nobody believes a theme park caricaturist does anything but theme park caricatures” story. This just happened earlier this summer when I was filling it at one of my locations in Minnesota:

A couple sits down to get their caricature done. One of them is wearing this shirt:

Me: “Hey, I did the artwork for that shirt! I do a lot of work for Jeff Dunham!”

Her: “Yeah….. Riiiiiiight.”

Me: “—-”

Okay, so it’s not much of a story. It’s just funny that so many people find it hard to believe that anyone who does live caricatures at theme parks or fairs or gigs can also be a working artist in other fields. I think it’s a preconceived notion that live caricaturists only do that kind of work because they can’t get any other work. The flip side of that are the people who can’t believe anyone can make a living doing caricatures. They ask me what I “really do for a living” and when I say I’m a full time artist they say “no… really. What do you do for a day job?”