Final Self Portraits

For this portrait, I focused on an aspect of myself that is not easily accepted by many people. As a Christian, it can be tough to be in a community where religion is looked down on and is considered as a practice to get by in life. It is more than what people make it out to be. I chose the Iris because in the flower language it means "Faith". The hands hold onto the flower of faith and keep on striving. I think I should practice different angles of hand drawings more, but I think the way I drew it gives it a different look.

This portrait was based off a picture from my cellphone. There are plenty of funny frames that I can take photos with. I thought this would stray away from the standard frontal portrait and show another side to myself. I did not expect it to be considered humorous, but I'm glad I got good feedback from my classmates. I thought the nose was a little scary since it was so large. Unfortunately, my camera doesn't pick up on the tones and shading I did on my face. 

I wanted to show different aspects of myself, so I decided to show my cultural background. I have a mixed asian background of Chinese and Indian. I was born the year of the Horse as many are categorized who were born in 1990. I also wanted to try different mediums that I have started to use this year. I chose ink to give the effect of a Chinese ink painting. I had to reference images to see the different styles.

In this portrait, I decided to show my struggles with the space I've been put in as well as my surroundings. A lot of times, I feel like I'm trapped within a 'box'. I chose show the figure in its basic shapes as if it were breaking down as it tries to free itself from the space. I put more attention to the composition of the figure than its full appearance because I am really interested in the body's composition and how it forms its movements. I thought this style kind of relates how traditional 2D animation started out.  

This one shows my interest in cartoons and anime. I thought that it would be good to strengthen my skills in perspective and foreshortening within the space. Since there were so many objects and colors, it would have been distracting to fill the background. I would have liked to color this with smoother materials, but I am not skilled with prisma markers or paint, so I had to rely on color pencils.  

I was beginning to run out of ideas for 15 different self-portraits until this idea popped into my head. I thought about how I would look like if I were a skeleton. In this case, I guess I was a living skeleton dressed up and drinking tea. I decided to use charcoal because I thought I can show the defining features of a skull best with this material. Although, some of the features got lost in the dark areas and the paper was becoming smudged, so I had to highlight with white charcoal, which I think made it stand out more. This picture does kind of scare me, especially since I drew it, but I like it a lot as well as it shows a different aspect in my drawings. I think I should have added a candle stick and darken the background more, but I didn't have enough time.

This one is my view through my hair in a curled up position. 

I was quite scared as a child and would hide in my room in a ball. I would stare at the door in case someone was coming and I put a throw pillow between my torso and legs. It seems like another dark drawing. I thought it would be perfect in charcoal as it shows the dark and hazy tones in a stronger intensity than a pencil would.

This last one I did in acrylic paint. I wanted to show that although the world is made up of all walks of life, such as shoe prints, they can be identical. The only thing that distinguishes a person is their footprint. Mine feels very small in comparison to the other shoe prints. It felt really strange to paint my foot as well, but I think this worked out the best. I chose the primary colors to keep it simple on this single sheet and so the black would also stick out the most. But I think if I expanded on this idea, the meaning would also expand and change as well.