{"id":94781,"date":"2025-08-25T02:07:09","date_gmt":"2025-08-25T02:07:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/94781\/"},"modified":"2025-08-25T02:07:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-25T02:07:09","slug":"amateur-artist-offers-tiny-hand-drawn-portraits-with-a-personal-touch-all-for-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/94781\/","title":{"rendered":"Amateur artist offers tiny hand-drawn portraits with a personal touch – all for $1"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Jasmine Boyd laughs with customer Tessa Naughton-Ron while drawing her portrait at Toronto’s Trinity Bellwoods Park on Aug. 10, 2025.Galit Rodan\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n

It was a typical Sunday in August at Toronto\u2019s west-end Trinity Bellwoods Park: People walked their dogs, threw frisbees and bought goodies from tented stands. And in one corner of the park, Jasmine Boyd set up shop to draw cartoon-style portraits of passersby \u2013 all for the price of one loonie.<\/p>\n

By 2 p.m., Ms. Boyd, 21, had propped up a sign that said \u201c$1 drawing of you,\u201d laid out art supplies, put music on her speaker and unfolded some lawn chairs for visitors. Finally, she was ready to draw non-stop for the next three hours. The heat warning that day didn\u2019t stop dozens from lining up, taking shelter from the sun under a tree. <\/p>\n

\u201cI really had no idea when I started that it would mean this much to people,\u201d Ms. Boyd said. <\/p>\n

\u201cI knew it would be a cute take-home thing but people really like them,\u201d she emphasized.<\/p>\n

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Customers wait in line in 30-degree heat for a $1 portrait by Ms. Boyd. Her miniature portraits have taken off after she made a TikTok video promoting her art.Galit Rodan\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n

Earlier in July, Ms. Boyd had posted a nine-second video on TikTok promoting her $1 offer. In less than a month, the video gained almost 200,000 views with hundreds of people requesting more dates and times to come see her at the park for a portrait. Since then, she has hosted seven more pop-ups, drawling well over 500 people (and a few dogs) to her eight-hour drawing sessions.<\/p>\n

She draws the sketches on stock paper the size of business cards, shading with colourful markers and decorating with hearts, stars and more. Ms. Boyd has no formal training in art but has pursued it as a hobby since she was a child when she first experimented with painting landscapes, inspired by an interest in her mother\u2019s flight attendant job. <\/p>\n

She got the idea for a park pop-up three years ago while travelling to Boston, where she saw a long line-up in front of a local artist offering small portraits for a dollar. This summer the Queen\u2019s University graduate finally gave it a try, wanting to regain her creative spark after spending most of her time focusing on her biology major. <\/p>\n

That hot August day, Ms. Boyd matched the energy of each person who sat across from her, never showing signs of a depleting social battery. Her partner, Mark Deaconu, said it\u2019s no surprise so many came out to support her, adding that it\u2019s not just her art that attracts people, but also her approachable, warm demeanour.<\/p>\n

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Ms. Boyd had the idea for the portraits after she saw a similar endeavor while travelling. She says it was a way to spark her creativity.Galit Rodan\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n

Friends Basmah Khan and Isabella Sguigna stood in line for almost an hour for their portraits.<\/p>\n

Ms. Sguigna said Ms. Boyd\u2019s inexpensive initiative is creative and stands out from the typical booths seen in places such as Trinity Bellwoods. <\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s unbelievable that she\u2019s doing it for a dollar\u2026we\u2019re all giving her more because we know her time is worth a lot more,\u201d Ms. Khan said. \u201cEven if she did it for 10 bucks I would\u2019ve come out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Collage art is surging in popularity as a crowd hungry for offline activities finds a new way to stick together<\/a><\/p>\n

Toronto local Arlys Cepero and her best friend Estelle Georges sought out Ms. Boyd to help them create a memento of their friendship. <\/p>\n

Ms. Georges has been in the country for only a year, coming from Belgium, and is set to return home soon.<\/p>\n

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Ms. Boyd draws the sketches on pocket-sized stock paper and uses colourful markers to shade in details.Galit Rodan\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n

\u201cI just don\u2019t want to leave all this,\u201d Ms. Georges said as she pointed around and toward Ms. Cepero, holding back tears. The two women embraced before walking off with their portrait in hand.<\/p>\n

Others spoke to Boyd about their day, their plans and their lives. Gaurangi Batish spent her lunch break waiting in line while Anusi Srijeyarajah \u201cfelt extra compelled\u201d to visit because she thought Ms. Boyd\u2019s main motivation was an authentic love for art rather than money. Maryam Khatib\u2019s trip to the park signified a significant first. She recently moved to the city from Oakville and her portrait will be the first piece of art she will pin up in her new home. <\/p>\n

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Gaurangi Batish holds up her finished $1 portrait.Galit Rodan\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n

Twenty minutes after walking away with her her drawing, Ms. Khatib came running back down the street. She handed Ms. Boyd a dollar, hurriedly explaining she realized on the streetcar home she\u2019d forgotten to pay. She got off on the next stop and ran back \u2013 all for a dollar. <\/p>\n

These are the connections and interactions that fuel Boyd. \u201cThe amount of kindness and generosity I\u2019ve been shown throughout this whole experience, I didn\u2019t even know it was possible.\u201d <\/p>\n

She said it has never been about the money and she does not plan to ever hike the price, even though many of her visitors have suggested it.<\/p>\n

\u201cI went into this as an artistic project for me,\u201d Boyd said. \u201cNow it\u2019s really about the people with interesting stories and who I get to connect with.\u201d <\/p>\n

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Maryam Khatib returns to Ms. Boyd\u2019s booth after getting on a streetcar and realizing she had forgotten to pay for her $1 portrait.Galit Rodan\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n

With her success, various organizations including the Toronto Humane Society, burger joint Shake Shack and even the city itself have reached out to Ms. Boyd to draw portraits at events they host.<\/p>\n

\u201cI really had to take a step back and really decide what I want to dedicate my time to,\u201d she said, adding that she prioritizes opportunities from charitable organizations that give back to the city. <\/p>\n

Although she was only planning to draw for three hours on that humid Sunday, Ms. Boyd kept at it for two more, not wanting to disappoint those who stood by in the hot, sticky weather, loonies in hand. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Jasmine Boyd laughs with customer Tessa Naughton-Ron while drawing her portrait at Toronto’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":94782,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[1397,76,354,355,49,48,356,75,28501],"class_list":["post-94781","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-appwebview","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-design","tag-entertainment","tag-lf-gr"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94781","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=94781"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94781\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/94782"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=94781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=94781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=94781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}