Asphyxiation
2.1.22 - 2.18.22
Project Proposition:
After finishing my January project, I wanted a change in theme and technique for this month. I personally prefer making positive and happier themed pieces, but I have somehow found myself making better composed pieces when the theme is dark. So I am going to center this piece about the negative side of "Individualism." Sometimes when you follow your desires, you can feel really out of place in society and lonely. Soon you can begin to think negatively about yourself and about how you are standing out. I hope to show this lonely feeling of standing out in society, and to give some input at the end of the piece for this emotion.
I plan on using a similar technique to my last piece; a painterly style that has a lot of texture and color. But this time I am going to use a cooler gray color scheme to get a "muddy" look in this piece. I will use some highlights of color to help bring some attention to the figure. I will also experiment with unique and contrasting colors to help create a strong value. The general composition of this piece will be a slight overhead angle of a human figure, packed in a crowd of people that you can't make details out of. I hope to make the emotion of distress visible with the figure's expression and colors used. The main meaning behind Asphyxiation, is the phenomenon of people dying by asphyxiation (death by loss of air or strangulation) in the crowd crush effect. Essentially when too many humans are packed together, they create pressure against each other and their rib cage/lungs, causing the ability to not breathe. This imagery is to create the effect of an intense loneliness, that you are standing out in a crowd and dying from the amount of mental stress and pressure you are feeling. I hope this imagery will get across the idea I want to share related to feeling like an outsider in society.
The references below are a vague idea of how I want to color and compose this piece.
left by 七渡天天想幸运 on ice99, right by @athgil2 on twitter
Through these elements and techniques, I hope to share a negative theme of Individuality related to loneliness. I plan on making a mix of positive and negative viewpoints about the value of Individualism, and creating a story of emotions through these pieces. I am very passionate about this topic, as growing up independent has led me to feel a lot of sides of this idea. I hope to share a story of living a life of Individuality, and how that can affect your life greatly.
I hope you enjoy the progression of Asphyxiation.
Sketch:
Here is the general composition of this piece. I am planning on adding some extra details to the main figure; bright colors on the face, hair covering the face more, their own hands on their chest, and looking towards the viewer. I hope this will create a dramatic angle and emotion to the viewer.
I also plan on maybe fixing up some of the humans in the crowd, and making them a little more messy but still recognizable. I want the crowd to blend well into the background like right now. I will plan on changing the background shading a bit more so the "flow" of the colors are heading towards the figure.
I'm really excited to work on this piece from what I've sketched up already!
Rough Details:
I've focused on adding detail to the face and creating a focal point. Using the cool color scheme, I added red as a contrasting color into the eyes to help draw your attention to them; since they show the main emotion behind the piece. Besides this, I hope to add more shadows and definition around the eyes so they draw attention because of their lighter value compared to the rest of the piece.
Other rough details that I have drawn out are the hair and the rest of the body. I struggled to get the initial "bird eye" angle of the head of the figure, so the angling is now in a 3/4 perspective. Despite this change, I like the angel and I am sure it will still create a unique perspective.
Near the end of this piece, I will focus on defining out the hands at the front chest area of the figure. I hope to add some strong definition to the hands, as they also help express the theme of this piece.
I am really excited to keep working on Asphyxiation, and I feel confident in what I have to work on next!
Refinements:
Now I have gotten the color pallete down on the figure, and I really like how it's turning out! I am going to refine and edit some details a bit more in the piece. Once I finish that, I will be drawing some hands to the figure.
Now I've finished adding the hands, (arguably the hardest part of this piece) now I will add a few more details to this piece. I will add some more color to the surrounding back and foreground, and add just a bit more texture to everything.
Final Thoughts:
The journey of making Asphyxiation has taught me a lot of different skills related to color theory and creating composition between the foreground and background. I am really proud of how this piece turned out!
The biggest challenge I had while making this piece was drawing the hands. Drawing a basic headshot of a figure comes easily to me from practice, but I really haven't taken the time to practice hands recently. Working on this piece, that lack of skill really showed through to me. Some other general criticisms I have for this piece though are related to the eye and face style. I personally feel that the eyes are too big and are not showing the "exact" emotion I wanted to get across. I was hoping to make a more distressed piece and emotion, but this has been a small step in the right direction.
Besides the criticisms I have for this piece, I really love the whole theme and color scheme. My favorite specific parts are the figure's hair and lips, as those parts had a nice definition built. As well as that, I like the contrasting red that I put in the pupils to help draw the viewer. I really like the brushes that I used, as that made a unique streakier texture in the background. This piece has really shown my quick improvement over the past two months.
The central theme for this piece as stated in the proposition of this project, is the feeling of being an outcast in society. This intense loneliness can really get to anyone at some point in their life, and it is a hard emotion to deal with. I can not give specific advice to those who are dealing with this feeling, but a general action to take is to self reflect. Ask yourself if you want to be where you are right now. If not, take action. Talk to someone you are interested in knowing, make the drawing you've always wanted to make, dress how you really want to dress, and just follow your happiness without thought. It's hard to break the habit of rejecting happiness for an ideal image of yourself, but please self-reflect and live how you want to live.
I hope this piece gets across the emotion I wanted, as loneliness can be a negative aspect of Individuality. Take care of yourself, do not deny yourself happiness, and eventually life will work itself out.