Drown

Drown

The artwork is an emotive portrait experiment I constructed from multiple elements I found in various stock photos on Unsplash. I have been thinking about doing a simplistic painting such as this one since seeing a bathtub shoot idea on Pinterest, and I am happy to finally be able to complete this.

The artwork is a visualization of the sinking feeling my friends and I have been very open to talk about in our "safe space." It's very difficult to describe, but Drown is like sinking down but not really. Hiding, but not completely. My friends are very strong women, and I am so fortunate to be able to have their trust.

Drawing Drown

Conceptualizing the idea was difficult. One of the reasons why I liked drawing portraits from reference was because I disliked having to give birth to an image, a story, or a design. Granted, I had many ideas, but they were just too abstract that creating a pipeline on how to visualize them was mentally draining.

But this one hit me like a freight train, all I had to do was construct. First, the bathtub idea. Then the hiding. I did the messy sketch then the clean sketch and revised along the way.

I didn't deviate much from my normal process this time. I was meaning to add little flowers, but thought that the simplicity of just the light pink liquid surrounding her was enough.

The color I think turned out to be a little too pale, so I ended up adjusting curves in Photoshop.