Realistic self portrait

Artist's statement: for this piece we were tasked with creating a self portrait. Though i do have numerous photos to work with in terms of a reference, none of them truly felt like it captured who i am as a person. so i decided to use a photo of myself in drag. in my day to day life, i often have trouble expressing myself openly. drag offers an outlet for me to express my queer identity without feeling the judged or ashamed. its my way of being myself, while being someone else.
for this piece i started with making a grid. i used the grid to begin lightly sketching out the top of my head, and slowly brought the face in little by little, finishing with my hand.