Daily Creativity: Love Your BodyThe Love Your Body series is near and dear to my heart. This sketch is done from a photograph taken for the Fat Naked Art Project by Durham photographer Heather Kolaya, and you should click that link to see the original image and explore their site for some inspiring photos. I love her energy and her smile.
5×7 colored charcoal on paper.
Daily Creativity: Love Your Stretch MarksThanks to a discussion I had today about the idea of painting stretch marks with glitter as a new fashion trend, I was inspired to draw this. Another piece in the Love Your Body series.
Over the last few years I have learned to love my stretch marks. I have them and have had some since I was in grade school. For years I stopped looking at them and recently I’m noticing them again, but this time with affection. The marks on the small of my back look like vines growing up to my spine, and I think it’s gorgeous. I can’t really capture myself but I can be inspired by myself. This drawing is me, and so many other women. I’ve used pieces of myself and pieces of other to make this statement. I drew this using both my micron pens for the black and a quill with ink for the purple.
5×7 Mixed inks on paper
Daily Creativity: MaaiMaai is the distance you set up in aikido before performing techniques. It’s very important to start at maai because at that distance neither party can do anything to the other party without moving closer, but it’s close enough that you don’t have to cross much distance to start.
I think this concept is interesting and it’s something that can be carried into life. When you start anything you want to start it with proper perspective and distance. You want to be prepared but not over prepared, you want to consciously start something before you are already in it. With the proper distance almost any challenge can be handled.
I painted this in Art Rage using the oil painting settings. I was originally going for my blob people look but there are just too many angles in aikido so they took on their own form.
Love Your Body: Victory!This painting symbolizes victory to me. I don’t know where the idea came from but I just love the idea.This is part of the “Love Your Body” series. I painted this in the new Art Rage app on my iPad, taking advantage of that extra resolution.
Nutty Snuggles Rory.Welcome to Lent! This is the first of my lenten Daily Creativities. In this drawing it’s me, snuggling Rory. Colored pencils on paper.