As the Butler Institute of American Art celebrates Black History Month, there is a special project going on. 

A tribute to Kobe Bryant, which is being "scribbled" by the amazing Bill Dotson.

Bill agreed to work in front of our visitors and particularly the school groups that come through," said Lou Zona, Executive Director of the Butler. "Many hundreds and hundreds of children come through the museum on a regular basis on school tours, and they are stopping at Bill, and Bill is talking about his special approach to making art."

Dotson's special approach is called scribbling. With just the simple swish of an ink pen, figure eights, for the most part, Dotson can create some amazing works of art.

His Kobe Bryant piece is being created live in front of visitors and school groups. 

 

"They have a chance to see a live artist do it in front of them with an ink pen you can get from Family Dollar," Dotson said. "As far as black history is concerned, they know Kobe; this is Kobe, Kobe is the thing now. Doing it in front of the kids it made me feel young like all over again."

"His art, what he does, the figure eights, all he uses is a black Bic pen, I love that," said Chaz Sandie. 

Dotson's unique style of scribbling came about almost out of necessity. He joined the Marine Corps, but before going to Vietnam, he was seriously injured in a car accident. He was hospitalized for a couple of years. 

"The only thing I could move was my right hand," Dotson said. " They had taped an ink pen to it, so I started scribbling on tablets. I got to a place where I had about 500 tablets."

Dotson says the art almost draws itself now.

"I see everything in scribbles and my hand doing it. So, if I can look at it, it does it unconsciously, so it's like a mirroring effect," Dotson said. 

"To me, he's one of the finest artists in the country," said Sandie. 

Dotson says his inspiration right now are the kids coming to see him and hopefully inspiring them to see that they can do great things, even with a simple ink pen. 

"They are in a place now if it's not on an iPhone, not on an iPad, if it's not tech, then they don't believe it," Dotson said. "So they take it for granted other than writing their name or signing checks, they take it for granted. For me, it's my life; at one time, this is all I had."

You can see Dotson's work and great work from other African-American artists at the Butler Institute of American Art in Youngstown.