entangled art

Abstract Entangled Art 18 Nov 2018

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Another abstract entangled drawing for today. The original art is black and white line art with grey shadows and shading. It’s been drawn on A4 acid-free paper. I used various sizes of OHTO Graphic liner pens for the line work and Chamaeleon Color Tones cool grey marker pens for the shading.

However, I’ve altered the colour from black and grey pen and ink to a gradient of blue, purple and magenta digitally, just as an experiment. I’m really surprised with how the grey shadows/shading has turned out – pleasantly surprised and really pleased.

A nice start to my Sunday, a day to be filled with art and completing the transfer of information into my new bullet journal.

Abstract Entangled Art 17 November 2018

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I’ve worked on this image over the past three days or so. Adding the shading took a surprisingly large amount of time.

I really enjoyed creating this one. I say that about all my art though, but this one was particularly enjoyable as it helped me to calm and relax after the crazyily emotionally exhausting week I’d had.

It reminds me very much of work I used to do before I had so much work to do for colouring books, not that I’m complaining about that, not one bit. I love doing the drawings for them as much, but I can’t work in this kind of detail for them. I can’t put in all the fine line shading and shadow for them, nor the teeny-tiny details in the patterns as they’d be nigh on impossible to colour the gaps individually.

In my past couple of drawings like this, I haven’t added any shadow to them in the way I have in this particular design. The shadow really helps with that sense of ‘dimension’, though I do think I could have added some deeper shadows in some places.

Though it reminds me of the kind of drawings i used to do a lot pre-coloring books, it’s also shows a change in perhaps sophistication of line but also in the variety of patterns and design elements I like to include in my designs. I’ve even left some ares not heavily patterned so they give the eye spaces to rest without being overwhelmed with pattern and design.

Now to the nitty gritty of how I drew this.

After yesterdays discussion about digital vs traditional art I’d like to say I did this digitally, but I didn’t. I used Unipin Uniball and Sakura Pigma Micron pens on an A4 sheet of Bristol Board from Daler-Rowney. Pencil lines were sometimes used, especially for the circles, which I used stencils to draw them in lightly before inking them in free-hand. I’ve noticed I’ve not erased the pencil lines before scanning the artwork in.

To add the shading I used Chameleon Color Tones and Color Tops in shades of cool grey and neutral grey.

Today, I plan to do some more drawing similar to this before my new bullet journal arrives to replace the one I wrecked by spilling mocha over it and my lovely flowery bag. Thankfully, the notes I need to keep from the media training and events this week are still readable so I can transfer them across, as well as edit them in the process.

Abstract Entangled Art 14 November 2018

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Angela Porter 14 Nov 2018small.jpg

Just a quick post today; I have a busy day with media training for Time to Change Wales at the Mind offices in Cardiff.

Feeling a bit panicked about parking somewhere I’m not familiar with and then walking to another place I’m not familiar with and doing something with people I don’t know.

It will be fine I’m sure.

Yesterday was very much a day of being kind to myself and taking care of myself. Therapy on Monday really caused some fall out and I was emotionally exhausted yesterday (and I think that is lingering today).

So, one way I take care of myself is to draw. This time, however, I lost myself in drawing detailed, abstract entangled art, like this one above. I do have another on the go which I’ll be hoping to complete tonight as part of my self-care after the training today.

I drew this using Sakura micron pens on dotgrid paper. After scanning into the ‘puter I used GiMP to remove the dot grid. Autodesk Sketchbook Pro was  used for the finals steps of adding the background and watermarks, as well as placing the artwork on a black square so the image fits nicely in Instagram posts.

World Kindness Day 2018

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Angela Porter 13 November 2018 International Kindness Day

I started drawing this yesterday when I was feeling emotional. I was even more so during and after EMDR therapy and woke this morning with an emotional ‘hangover’. Some painkillers for this headache and a couple of hours later and I finished this off with a quote about kindness from the Dalai Lama when I found out today is World Kindness Day.

Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible.

I think it needs to be World Kindness Day every single day.  I can’t find the words to express myself why I think this, I just know if everyone on this planet was kinder and had more empathy not just for friends and family, but for others, no matter of their social status or religious, ethnic, cultural background or nationality it could help to bring a better understanding which could lead to a kinder world for us all.

And of course there’s the animals and plants that we share this planet with, along with the ecosystems they co-inhabit with us. There’s too much animal cruelty, damage to the environment going on, and we are dependent on a healthy global ecosystem and need to be a lot kinder to the world around us.

There’s feelings and thoughts drifting around my head here that just can’t find their way out of the maze of the lingering pain and fuzziness from the headache that characterises my emotional ‘hangover’. Still, some words did appear.

I used Pigma micron pens, some circle stencils to draw the design on dot grid paper. That meant I needed to scan it into my Microsoft Surface Studio so I could use GiMP to remove the dot grid and create a transparent background.

My next step was to add the hand lettered quote. I used my Microsoft Surface Pen in Autodesk Sketchbook Pro to do this.

The final step was to add the watermarks and a gentle pink gradient background colour.

I can see how I could add some shading to intensify the 3D illusion of the design elements, as well as adding some more pen details. However, it will do as it is…for now.

Inktober 2018 Day 22 ‘Expensive’

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Angela Porter Inktober 2018 Day 22 Expensive

Clumsy hand lettering again, but it is practice…always practice.

The pattern is rather bare and sparse of detail today too, though some colour would help with that for sure. However, I wanted to limit my time spent on Inktober today so I have time to turn my attention to other things.

I did draw this digitally surface pen on virtual paper on the surface studio screen.

#createdonsurface #inktober #inktober2018

The peace referred to is peace of mind and having peace of mind is priceless and so important.

Part of my CPTSD is the shame and embarrassment that accompanies many, many traumatic experiences throughout the whole of my life. The emotional flashbacks cause me to relive these traumas and the shame I feel about so many events, many I can’t even remember as the mind dissociates from the event, but can’t seem to do so from the trauma that’s stored in the emotions and body.

Add to that the belief I grew up with that I was always, always to blame for everything that everyone else did, even if I had no part in it, means that I can slip into the self-blame mode quite easily where I go over and over and over something trying to find out what I did wrong and what I can do to not make that mistake again. That’s even when I did nothing wrong or even had anything at all to do with the event being picked to pieces in this way. Even when I wasn’t even present for the event. It’s the root cause of my hyperperfectionism. I worry constantly that what I do is never good enough, even when the objective evidence is to the contrary.

So, for me to let some clumsy hand lettering remain. For me to show a piece of work that I’m not entirely happy with is incredibly difficult, leaves me open to the self-blame thing and shame and embarrassment, yet still I do this.

Why? Well, it’s nice to show that along the way to a finished drawing/artwork that I have stages where things aren’t so polished, that I have things to work on, even though I do tend to work intuitively.

Although I may be hypercritical of what I create and see every tiny flaw – real or imagined – in it, having others look at my work and comment and/or like it with either positive or constructive comments helps me to get glimpses of how others see my art. This then helps to stem the hypercritical self-blame and self-criticism by providing objective evidence that the inner critic isn’t always right.

So, even though the hand lettering isn’t right. Even though the drawing is bare of colour. Even though I can see flaws with the drawing,  I’m able to put this here, on instagram, facebook, twitter so others can see what I’m doing.

I also show my imperfect work to show people that we all make mistakes, we all start as novices and have to practice, practice, practice some skills to improve them, and this can take a lot of time. Hand lettering is difficult for me at any scale other than tiny.

It’s also so I can show that even though I don’t do wonderfully well at something, I don’t give up easily with it, and neither should you.

However, that doesn’t mean I’m going to persevere with something that I have no skills at such as silver smithing, which I have tried and am an absolute nightmare at! However, the experience of silver smithing led me to trying other ways to create jewellery and led me to my experimenting with textiles, wire, beads and so on to create unusual jewellery. This is something I’ve not done for years.

However, it was part of my creative journey. It gave me some peace of mind at the time I was doing it.

Peace of mind is so important. That’s why I’ve spent years in therapy in one form or another, with EMDR providing the biggest steps forward in helping me to release the stored trauma so it doesn’t return and cause problems.

This is my past. My present is I have a choice about what I do or don’t do. I’d like to think I’d make choices that will cause me to keep my peace of mind, losing that little I’ve gained would be a price to high to pay .

 

Inktober 2018 Day 18 ‘Bottle’

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Angela Porter Inktober 2018 Day 18 Bottle

Not just one bottle, but several!

This was a fun one to draw – Faber-Castell Broad pen on paper. Scanned in to the Surface Studio to clean it up and print it out so I could colour it using Chameleon Color Tone and Color Tops marker pens.

I added some highlights with a white Sakura Gelly Roll pen.

I’m a bit later than usual posting the Inktober image today. I had quite a few errands to run today, including a slightly worrying recall to the opticians for photographs or my eyes, even though I only had them done around 4 weeks ago. It wasn’t pictures of my retina and optic nerve the optician wanted – it was images of the front of my eyes due to me having a wobbling blood vessel in one.

I had planned on popping into the opticians as I’d managed to drop one pair of distance glasses on a tarmac floor and had chipped the lenses (which I’d had for less than a week!) and so needed to have replacement lenses. That was the easy part…

They had trouble getting the camera to work to take pictures of the front of my eyes, so I have to have the process done on Saturday when I pick up my glasses with the new lenses in as the optician will have set the camera up. If it still won’t work, she’ll inspect my eyes with a ‘slit test’ I think it was.

I’ve never had such thorough eye tests/examinations before. I’m well impressed! And it’s with Specsavers! I’ve never had an optician comment on my differently pigmented eyes before either – one eye is mostly a light brownish-green with a small wedge of brown, the other is about half brown and the rest the same light brownish-green  as t’other eye.

Someone I met a long time ago described me as having ‘mutant eyes’ and asked if he could use them for a character in a sci-fi book he was writing. I didn’t have a problem with that!

Oh, they have no effect on my vision at all. It’s just a different level of pigmentation that has been, as far as I know, always there.

I also found out this time that my optic nerves are tilted a bit more upwards than is usual but it doesn’t affect my vision, just something noted of curiosity.

Perhaps this is why there’s an eyeball or two appearing in my latest drawings!

Anyways, my eyesight functions very well, apart from the need for glasses as I’ve aged. I’m sure the wobbling blood vessel isn’t anything to worry about either.

I’ve also ordered some beaded ‘chains’ to attach to my glasses so they don’t fall off my nose when I’m looking down again!

So, an unexpectedly extended visit to the opticians along with some shopping in the local town put me all out of sync today, but if nothing else I got my Inktober challenge of the day done!

Inktober 2018 Day 17 ‘Swollen’

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Angela Porter Inktober 2018 Day 17 Swollen coloured

The first thing that popped into my weird head when I read the prompt ‘swollen’ was a puffer fish! I know … weird is the right word.

So, I had to draw one of my entangled drawings incorporating a puffer fish, lots of coral reef and sea inspired images, and a few cute monsters and critters – including a white cat and a pink badger (don’t ask!).

It took a couple of hours to draw the outline using a Faber-Castell broadpen on Rhodia dot grid paper.

I scanned the drawing into GiMP, removed the dot grid and created a transparent background.

The final step, which has taken around 4 hours, is to digitally colour the image.

It’s certainly bright and colourful, though if it wasn’t an Inktober challenge I’d want to go back and add some added textures and shadows to the image. But it’ll do for now as it is.

I also would like to add some patterns in black pen to some of the more ‘flat’ areas of the design, such as the bodies of the sea anemones.

I used Autodesk Sketchbook Pro, a Microsoft Surface pen and a Microsoft Surface Studio to colour the image.

#created on surface #autodesksketchbookpro #inktober #inktober2018

Inktober 2018 Day 15 Weak

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Angela Porter Inktober 2018 Day 15 Weak

Another day in Inktober and another hand lettered and illustrated quote.

My hand lettering really does need work/practice!

I just had to include a rude little monster tucked away in the intricate pattern around the quote.

I drew this on dot grid paper using Faber Castell Broadline and Fineline pens. I then scanned it in, removed the dot grid and created a transparent background in GiMP. I then used Autodesk Sketchbook to add a colour background and my watermark.

The drawing took a couple of pleasurable hours to do; it is smaller than my previous ones,being a round 17cm x 17cm in size (the overspills make it awkward to measure!

The design reminds me of the work I used to do before I became so immersed in coloring book design. I know this creeps out from time to time, and when I get a chance to do it I really enjoy drawing this kind of detail.

One thing I’d do, perhaps, if I were to go back and do this again I would definitely pay more attention to the hand lettering and I’d add some shadows to the line art to add some more depth/dimension to the design.

 

 

Inktober 2018 Day 11 ‘Cruel’

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Angela Porter Inktober 2018 Day 11 Cruel

Another day, another drawing!

I couldn’t draw anything cruel – not in my nature to do so, it upsets me so much. So, I chose to go with a quote about ‘cruel’ that is a positive one:

‘Having a soft heart in a cruel world is courage, not weakness.’ – Katherine Henson

I see too much cruelty in this world and I really do not want to add to it.

So, I drew something pretty, with whimsically cute critters and monsters and design elements and patterns that make me smile.

I drew this design on Frisk Bristol board using Faber-Castell Broadline and Fineline pens, scanned it in and then just added a background gradient in Autodesk Sketchbook Pro. I’ll get around to colouring it in properly later, I hope…

I really do need to spend some time today on the Entangled coloring book that I’m a little more than half-way through.

Doing these Inktober challenges is helping remind me of where I think some of my drawing skills and my style or ‘voice’ lies. I hope I can translate this into some templates for the coloring book in progress. I can’t work in the cute critters/monsters as I have in this and some other previous Inktober challenges, but I can work with the other elements I’m sure.

I’m also feeling more confident with my line drawing skills after feeling distinctly wobbly and out of practice after a week away without any drawing being done.

I’m also a little less emotionally tired today. I’m surprised yet not surprised at how much the anti-stigma talk and EMDR therapy drained me this week.

 

Inktober 2018 Day 10 ‘Flowing’ and World Mental Health Day 2018 #wmhd

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Angela Porter Inktober 2018 Day 10 Flowing watermarked

Today’s #inktober2018 prompt is ‘Flowing’, so I knew I had to incorporate ripples into my art for today. I also wanted a blue-green colour scheme, so I used Distress Inks and an ink blending tool to colour an A4 piece of Bristol Board from Frisk.

After drawing pencil lines to allow me margins, I set to work with a range of Uniball Unipin pens to draw my design.

I started with the wavy lines in the bottom left corner and just let everything flow out from there quite intuitively, as is usual for myself.

It’s taken me quite a while to do; I think I started it around 7:30am and it’s now nearly 3pm. Sheesh, that’s nearly 8 hours!  Here was me at the beginning of Inktober stating I was going to do little drawings and so on.

However, there’s a dual purpose in today’s art.

Although I’m not doing anything specific for World Mental Health Day (#wmhd #worldmentalhealthday #wmhd2018) I am taking care of my own mental and emotional health by creating this drawing.

Yesterday was a tough day for me emotionally. In my role as a champion for Time to Change Wales (#ttcw) I gave an anti-stigma talk to HR people in a college, both of which triggered some quite strong emotional flashbacks for me.

A couple of hours after that talk ended, I had my weekly EMDR therapy session which resulted in some strong and painful releases of trauma stored in my body as well as some emotional flashbacks of trauma in my childhood that I’d dissociated from.

So between the two, I was emotionally exhausted yesterday evening and night and I woke up headachy and tired today.

Part of my self-care for my emotional and mental well-being is being creative and it just so happens that Inktober’s prompt was a perfect one for today, yet again.

When I get lost in my artwork I enter a state called ‘flow’. It’s a kind of meditative state of calm, peacefulness. My self-talk (which is often so very negative) is either quieted or loses it’s power over me. It’s almost like I’m outside of time and space.

So, the approx 8 hours of drawing (well more like 6 or 7 as I had a break to meditate mid-morning and took a short time out to get a veggie bacon sandwich for a late lunch) had just flown by.

I’m still tired, but there’s a peace there within me that wasn’t there when I woke.

Creating a drawing that is rather intricate is something I don’t get to do often when I’m working on coloring books, but it is definitely something that soothes my sore emotions and mind.

Not only is it time that the stigma and discrimination around mental health is brought to an end, it’s time we all looked after our mental and emotional health as much as we do our physical health.

I have a couple of chronic health problems and during my regular checkups I’m asked about my mental and emotional health as it’s known that people can develop mental ill-health when they live day to day with a chronic illness.

I know from personal experience that when I don’t take care of my emotional/mental health I become physically ill, so the state of our mental health, emotional health and physical health interact with one another, of that I’m sure.

So, try everyday to take the time to do something that lets you relax and find joy and peace in doing. There are so many things that people use for this – drawing, coloring, painting, playing music, gardening, walking, cooking, exercising, dancing, singing, meditation, mindful activities, taking a relaxing bath by candle light, a massage, a cup of tea somewhere with a beautiful view, a walk in the surf’s edge on a sunset beach, yoga, tai chi….the list goes on!

What do you do for your own mental and emotional self-care? What do you love to do where you can find yourself in ‘flow state’ or a meditative state that gives your mind a rest?