Artist Shocks Woman With Surprise Portrait Painting From Memory

I was sitting on a beach outside of Taipei city, Taiwan watching a street artist paint incredible portraits with just a simple brush and his hand. When we arrived he has just painted over his previous piece of artwork, covering the paper with black paint and starting all over again.Show more

As we sat down and started watching him a little closer, my friend felt the painting was starting to look more and more like here. I did not see it at first, because the last thing on my mind would be that this guy would be painting one of us!

There were hundreds of people watching and we had literally just sat down seconds before he started painting. He was also not looking in our direction very often and his entire face was covered. It seemed like he was painting a portrait of a woman with glasses from memory.

When the portrait was finished, after about 2 minutes of paint splashes and finger painting, we could not believe how much it looked like my friend. Could this be coincidence?

Then the anonymous painter, who does not reveal his identity nor ask for money at any stage, takes my friend by the hand, leads her to the portrait and everyone realises it's her and starts clapping and my friend laughs and takes a bow!

Such an incredible moment - so glad I had my camera out to capture it! I would love to go back some day and see who else he paints and what their reaction to his surprise portraits is!

Have you ever seen a street artist like this that can paint incredible portraits in under 2 minutes, keeps his identity a secret and doesn't even ask for payment or donations? There were not too many buskers or street artists in Asia so coming across this man was a big surprise.