Tag: pencil

Depression Draws

Suffice it to say this post is about some of my struggles with mental health. If you’re not in the mood for that, enjoy the pretty pencil drawing of a giant bird behind a tree and a sinister apple. Skip my ramblings below and laugh at the tree blocking most of the bird’s body, or enjoy the lines of the apple’s “shadow” instead – I won’t fault you. Not that I’ll know, anyway!

shadow apple-abnormal bird

I have depression and anxiety. Anxiety is the part of me that is constantly deluded and fighting everything around me. Depression is the part that sticks me right into the ground and boxes me inside thick walls. However, sometimes my anxiety freezes me and my depression makes me commit desperate, irrational acts. After all of these years I am able to understand and identify the subtleties of it all; it’s actually quite complicated and based on past events as well as my own body chemistry.

My mental health does not drive all of my art. None of my art is drawn in the worst depressive or anxious phases. Those are times when making art feels so impossible, even though I may want to. So I draw a lot when I am feeling “well” and scan them to post here.

Being in a bad mental place, or in the downswing of the cycle, isn’t the only time depression and anxiety show themselves. Constantly dealing with those mind states simply forces my hand; being yet another place of inspiration. Many of my drawings include ideas related to paranoia and irrationality as a result, even the bird and apples above.

When we look at the history of art, we see almost a glorification of artists who are stifled with poor mental health. Such troubled people created such beautiful work, right? I think that this is a result of academics who do not understand psychiatric struggles writing about that which they do not know with unnecessary wistfulness.

I’m not thankful for the negativity my mental health brings to myself and others around me, but I recognise how much it influences me. But so what if my depression and anxiety give me stuff to work with? The toll is often extremely high. I’d rather not make them the center of my universe.

Informal Training

I have only a little formal training, in the form of visual arts classes taken while studying for undergrad. I pursued a degree in art history that included drawing and ceramics classes.

lezar

Studying art history was one of the most intellectually thrilling times of my life, not because of the rote memorization (which is required, in any case so I had to deal with it – and I did) but because of the deep understanding of humanity that comes from analysing the creative process and the final product.

I think I always wanted to create, but never really knew how to do so.The drawing and ceramics classes instilled in me a great understanding of what it means to think like an artist – and that’s really when I knew that I was not a historian, but a creator. I knew I’d find a way to find my footing and create, someday.

So welcome to someday, little lizard!

 

 

Scare

I love horror. Gory, funny, dark, demented, all of it really.

Behold Scare:

 

farm life

This drawing is meant to have undertones of the mystery and paranoia that come wrapped up in the “occult” or “horror” themes. The sinister feeling in your body, the uncertainty of knowing and not knowing, etc. all inspire me often when I doodle or draw.

The eye I doodle constantly makes an appearance as a major character this time. The floating eye and mixed messages coming from it hang authoritatively over the structure below; all existing in a cold white space. I used the structure and environment of a farm because it was a wholesome setting where our sustenance grows.

To me, no place is safe. I have to deal with that reality. Basically, I wanted to show somewhere vulnerable.

 

the “feminine”-I

Personally, my spirituality has blossomed out of what most societies call “feminine” ideals. The binary hasn’t impressed me since I was little and called tomboy, which didn’t bother me but nonetheless was based on silliness. However, sometimes the language of masculine and feminine is useful, and for the time being it’s what we have as a society.

moquee

When it comes to art, I tend to create things that some may view as “sexless” – sexuality and gender expression are not a huge part of what ends up being expressed. Since I do things so intuitively, I just let those aspects of my identity show themselves as needed. It just so happens that it is rare. *shrug*

I decided to draw in pencil again the other day, and when I looked at it I could immediately see the “feminine” aspects of what I had drawn. I wasn’t surprised, or upset, but instead viewed it as merely interesting.

I’m content with that.

God Egg

A title? A work in…pencil?! It’s powerful and rare to feel successful in newness, so I’m going to revel just a little.

god egg

A mechanical pencil isn’t too different from a pen, not until you start trying to draw and the line feels totally wrong at first.

I had to figure out a way to work with something thinner but also softer, while being varying in tone based on pressure. With a pen, being bold feels easier and the directness of the ink worked to make the art I feel represents me.

With a pencil, being bold needed to be more decisive. I attempted to escape the “refined” details such thin lead is good at producing, but that couldn’t be further from what I’m like. However, mixing thick lines with thinner details changed my way of thinking about creation.

“God Egg” is my own heart’s creation and using the new medium made me feel stronger about my work. This newness has turned bountiful.