"FEELING BLUE" - COLLECTION

"Behind the scenes", planning the project, work in progress and sneak peeks.

RELEASE DATE JANUARY 2 2022, FIND THE COLLECTION HERE.

18 December 2021

"Feeling blue"

1. INSPIRATION CAN BE FOUND EVERYWHERE YOU LOOK

The spark for this series came to me when I looked through Hunter_NFTs collection and found this lovely piece:

AMERICAN HYPNOTIX by HUNTER

"ELECTION DAY 2020, USA Though Halloween just passed, this day is the true horror show. This day and the subsequent days of waiting until we "know"

The figure represents the portion of the American public that has, once again, fallen asleep at the wheel.

Our vision has been replaced with Universal Product Codes; what dogma can afford me prosperity, the new truck, an early retirement?

Our hearing is depicted stunted by a hairy mess of who says what, exaggerated ideals, and dreams being pushed ever-so-slightly out of reach again and again.

Our breath and lungs, exposed, brace for a winter encroaching on our hope for a return to the mundane."

THE PIECE CAN BE FOUND HERE.

I knew I wanted to do a collection about mental health, anxiety in particular, so when I found this piece I saw something else - I saw one of the many signs of a panic attack.

When I find that spark my head immidately starts creating images for my - symbolism and colors. Before I go asleep every night I paint at least one of these in my mind to help me fall asleep - it's also the only way I know how to deal with my own anxiety at bedtime.

2. THE SIGNS OF ANXIETY

There are many signs that you are experiencing some form of anixety and I would like to include a few of them - a racing heart, problems breathing, being unable controlling your thoughts and feelings.

Work in progress

PROCESS AND MATERIALS

Every page in this series has elements of collage with pieces glued on top of the paper before sketching or painting, a slightly different approach than I usually do.

The base for each girl is a vintage magazine page from my collection and then I use pencil (7HB usually) to draw the outlines and guides before I use waterproof ink or liner for the heavier darker lines. To "white out" parts of the paper I used I big vide tiped marker in soft blue to make bold "sweeps" across the paper.

SCANNING AND EDITING

A lot of detail and color adjusting is needed to get the look I want and I do crop and change parts. For this series I've been mixing digital and traditional - the edited versions will look slightly different from the original paper copies.

3. CONNECTING TO THE PIECES

This one is about a girl who’s never been outside of her village of seven families and how she’s never had any luxury items. The cut out pieces are from magazines from the same time (1920s) and are all ads for luxury items - machine printed fabrics and Parisian raincoats. It’s my own struggle collaged - with my anxiety painted on top. I grew up poor, but modern poor, not like the girl on the page.

29 December 2021

"Feeling blue" part 2

PLANNING OUT THE THEME AND PAGES

To keep on track I always try to make plan - What pages am I using? How do they tie into the theme? What is the theme for each page?

Since the main theme is depression and anxiety I chose pages too fit the theme - a feeling of exclusion, judgement, loneliness, nervousness and insecurities.

The illustrations have a secondary theme - anxiety symptoms. The ones I choose were:

Insomnia, problems breathing, dizziness, racing heartbeat, restlessness and worry.

Worry

Anxiety makes it hard to calm down and organize your thoughts, it affects your ability to concentrate and your thoughts quickly spiral into darkness and "worst case scenarios".

Dizzy

Getting overwhelmed makes my body unfocused and dizzy. The world trembles slightly.

Restless

Restlessness aches in your body and in your mind making your muscles tense. It can feel like growing pains when it takes hold of your limbs.

Heartbeat

The sound of anxiety is your own heartbeat drowning everything out. Drums that beat faster and faster.

Breathing

I’ve spent many years learning how to deal with anxiety attacks but I never mastered my breathing. My lungs close up and I can feel the panic spreading in my body. My chest becomes too small and my throat too narrow.

Insomnia

When I’m struggling with my mental health the stress in my body prevents me from relaxing enough to sleep. Going to bed makes my head race and I have to paint things in my head to calm down.