Day Eighty Eight

Phew! Late post, people...apologies.

Today’s word is one that I think I don’t appreciate enough. When constantly striving to be best, first, different...whatever you may wish to be, it is hard to appreciate just how great the middle can be. Not that you should aim for mediocrity; far from it! But, I think it’s important to remember to give yourself a chance to appreciate the usual.

u-su-al  adj. Ordinary or common; regular; customary.

With today’s word, I wanted to illustrate an obviously stylish, driven, and (most likely) a workaholic character embracing the “usual” in terms of dress. I love conveying intelligent women who are serious about going out and accomplishing things without losing their femininity, grace, charm and elegance. While today’s character has a relaxed, slightly undone look, each aspect of her has still been carefully chosen to give a carefree look. In other words, I tried hard to make her look like she tried hard to look like she wasn’t trying hard. A lot for a piece of paper and a few smudged lines of pencil? I say never, but I’ll let you decide:

Thank you for reading; I hope you have a great night (or day, for those of you who retire at a decent hour).

Xx

-r

Day Twenty Nine

I took my time with today’s piece. Not intentionally, at first, but when it comes to art (or anything, I guess) it’s always a treat to sit down and really take your time doing something.

I found a lovely, smooth and bright white piece of paper to use for today’s project and, in the spirit of today’s word, I decided to change what I’d decided was getting boring...

Using a new technique I just picked up (thank you, google) I “antiqued” the paper using some old coffee and grains of salt. After what seemed like an eternity of blow drying, the paper was ready to be used:

Oh yeah, the word! Getting a little ahead of myself here...

re-bel  v.  To refuse allegiance; to resist any authority; to react with violence; to take arms against a government.

My first thought was, honestly, of Princess Lea. I can just hear Darth Vader growling “Rebel Alliance”. Okay, enough with the nerd talk...

Bored by images of punks and hippies, and inspired by the antique look of the paper, I decided to do a sketch of a woman wearing bloomers. Working from a faint memory of history class (something about a woman wearing bloomers as pants so she could run around and not be restricted by a dress) I turned to Wikipedia:

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victorian_dress_reform

Anyway, I decided to do a portrait of a brave woman deciding to rebel against the “acceptable” way to dress in order to be free. I really admire women (throughout history) who have stood up and decided to try and change things. Thanks ladies, for battling for freedom so I may sit here in my skinny jeans, with my blue hair and complain about getting an education. But seriously, thank you. 

not sure exactly what happened with the paper to the right...oh well.