Daily Creativity: Love Your Body – Self Portrait from memory

3/30/2014
selffrommemorysmToday I pulled out my charcoals and large newsprint, wow what a difference this makes.  Why didn’t I do that sooner?  I miss sketching with charcoal, and sadly I can’t take them with me on my two week trip.  Hopefully I will remember and break them out when I get home (I’m flying to NY for work for two weeks, so my art supplies will be limited).  From memory I tried to do a self portrait, you see there was a painting I did a week or so back, I loved the model because her stomach reminded me of mine.  I have received many comments on that painting about her stomach, so many people happy to see one like their own, and I realized mine wasn’t as uncommon as I thought, just underrepresented.  So I thought I’d try creating more art with that kind of stomach.  I think I made myself look too thin in this sketch, it’s hard to get yourself accurately.  It’s a start though.  Why did I dod this from memory instead of snapping a photo?  Simple, I wanted to see what I could produce, wanted to see what my vision of myself was.  It’s always a big risk for me to conduct self portraits, especially nudes, and then put it out there.  I always feel so vulnerable and scared, but its a beautiful kind of pain.

Daily Creativity: Circle of Love Your Body

circle-of-love-your-bodysm3/27/2014
This Love Your Body piece was inspired by this post on tumblr. I expect to use this base photo again, I just love it so much.  Love these ladies dancing in a circle with so much joy.  I drew this using the graphic pens in ArtRage on my iPad.

Daily Creativity: Love Your Body – Men need love too

love-your-body-male-sm3/25/2014
I have been trying to work in some males into the Love Your Body series, but there are a lot less images out there to work from, which makes me sad. If you have any great photos of round men please send them my way.  This one was inspired by this image.  I know it’s not perfect, it’s just a quick pastel study.

Daily Creativity: Love Your Body – Wishing for summer

love-your-body-re-sm3/24/2014
Wishing for Summer – This Love Your Body painting is a self portrait.  Last year my sister snapped a photo of me at the beach and I loved it.  I’m truly wishing for summer, missing feeling sun on my face so I painted this one in all oranges.

Painted using the watercolor settings in ArtRage on my iPad.

Daily Creativity: Rae Earl

RaeEarlsm3/21/2014
I’m obsessed with My Mad Fat Diary so I decided to try and draw Rae Earl. I love her because she’s so flawed, so much like me at that age. Also, the music and clothes are from my days in university, my days when people first started to notice I was alive.  Sometimes I want to smack her for being stupid, but I can’t blame her.  It’s so great seeing someone like her on tv.