portrait art – Page 2

Mastery

“Moments” is now complete and I’m pleased with the results since it’s been a while since I worked with a figure and used colored. So I’m happy with this one. 😊

While working on this I found myself wondering what drives me to draw especially using pointillism? For the longest I always assumed it was because, in some twisted way, I enjoyed it, I mean, some part of you has to be a little insane or off kilter to enjoy doing pointillism work…at least that’s what I like to believe. But I’ve always felt that my enjoyment of it was just a simple surface answer. There was something more to it. Upon pondering the question I realized that more was mastery. I desire mastery. Deep down I long to be good at something and drawing has been that one thing that I’m interested in enough and enjoy enough to put the time and effort into to be good at. I have difficulty imagining myself doing anything else. Even though I have skills in other things, which from time to time come in handy but I’ve never had a strong inclination to pursue them. I could have been a photographer, web programmer, graphic designer, fitness trainer, urban planner (what I eventually got my Bachelors in) or botanist, all of which I have knowledge of or experience in but they all turned out to just be interests, not passions. And that therein lied the difference for me. The desire for mastery was the difference between an interest and a passion. Granted I was interested in all of these thing but I didn’t desire to master them; to become good at them. That is essentially what drives me. And with this understanding of myself I don’t feel so guilty about all the avenues I abandoned in the past.

So the next time you find yourself torn between different interests and feel like you need to be more focused, maybe you should ask yourself “Is this something I want to spend my time and energy getting good at? Is this something I want to master?” Asking yourself that might help to narrow things down by separating those things that just stimulate your curiosity or seem cool for the time being from those things you genuinely want to dedicate yourself to and become a master at.

Halfway There

Hope everyone enjoyed their 4th of July holiday. I know it sucked that it was in the middle of the week and many had to get up and go back to work the next day. On the bright side, it broke the week up making the weekend seem not so far away.
I spent my time cooking, battling the heat and drawing. So far I’m halfway finished with “Moments” but still have a lot of ink to spill. Working in color ink requires far more layers of ink compared to when I’m working only with black ink, so it takes much longer but for my first figurative piece of the year, it’s coming along nicely. 😊

“Moments” Progress

I will never complain about inking fur ever again. In my spree of drawing adorable animals I completely forgot how much stippling goes into doing hair. My pen is nearly dry and that wasn’t even the hard part. Anyhoo, here’s a quick snapshot of my progress on my latest art card drawing, “Moments”.

What Kind Of Artist Am I

Spring is here once again as I sit here still unable to wrap my mind around how quickly time goes by. Before long Fall will be here and then the New Year where once again I’ll be saying the same thing.
The last four months have felt kind of slow art wise. I can’t say I’ve been cranking out as much as I’d like to. The greatest obstacle to being a prolific artist is oneself. I’m not trying to suggest that one should work like a machine but neither do I want to suggest that one should ignore areas that could use improvement. I have my shortcomings and it’s almost hilarious all the hoops I jump through just to try and avoid facing them. Yet despite it all I still manage to get some work achieved. Here’s one of my quarterly art round ups that I like to do every 3-4 months to showcase what I’ve accomplished so far. I’m tackling more art featuring animals which honestly has been a bit nerve racking. Stippling fur so that it actually looks like fur is a new challenge but so far I’ve been able to manage and I intent to do more. As of now my list of subject matter includes landscapes, botanicals, portraits and animals, which leaves me wondering, what kind of artist does that make me? Some artists tend to stick to a particular subject, like some just do portraits, some just do landscapes and some just do wildlife. I seem to do a little bit of it all. Maybe it’s too early for me to settle on a particular subject. What I do know is that I tend to gravitate towards doing work that involves Nature and humans the most. Where that puts me as an artist, I have yet to figure out.

Anyhoo, here’s what I’ve managed to ink so far since December. Some of these pieces are still available in store if any of you lovely followers are interested in giving one a new home. 😊

Gaze

It’s that time of the year where in my area you can get all four seasons in one day. I’ve been under the weather for a few days but a couple of bowls of chicken soup, with some Earl Grey tea and a few sugar cookies seems to have lifted my spirits to where I’m at 90% now. As a side note, I’ve never had Earl Grey tea before until now. I’m more of a Oolong lover from my frequent haunts at Chinese restaurants but a friend of mine sent me some Earl Grey and it’s been sitting in my tea drawer for a few months so I decided to give it a try. To my surprise I find it to be quite delightful. I’ve never been black tea drinker but now I see my Oolong will have to scoot over and make some room for Earl Grey.

Anyhoo, between my sour tummy and sore throat I managed to ink out a drawing, a piece I call “Gaze“. It took a bit to try and get the background stippled evenly and I can see a few spots where I could have evened it out some more but for the most part I think it looks even enough. I try not to over do things for fear of messing it up so I’m gonna leave it as is. I was also striving to get the woman to look like she was emerging out of the darkness. But because I’ve been staring at this thing for the past six days I can’t really judge as to whether I achieved that or not. Overall I think this piece came out fairly good. 😊