January - Week 2

Written 13/01/2025

Sketches based on her work

So I did some loose sketches based on a few of her paintings (I used pen so that I had to focus on the shapes rather than worrying about the details)

Sketch of 'Diego and I' done with orange felt tip
Tiny Diego!
Sketch of 'Roots' done with blue felt tip
I made her look a bit too happy (and didn't leave enough space with the background)
Sketch of 'Me and my parrots' done with green felt tip
The composition is pretty good, not sure about the birds...
Sketch of 'Self portrait with Cropped Hair' done with purple felt tip
Hell yeah, sapphic Frida!
Sketch of 'The Broken Column' done with blue felt tip
I like her expression but I think her proportions are too cartoony
Sketch of 'Viva la Vida watermelons' done with blue felt tip
Kinda look like Electrode and Togepi more than watermelons...
Sketch of 'Without Hope' done with blue felt tip
I REALLY like this composition (but if I had to do a more detailed version my hands would break)

I also had some notes!

Notes written in red felt tip - listed in caption
    Always looks directly to audience
    Imperfection is also very prevelant
    Often surrealist backgrounds
Notes written in red felt tip - listed in caption
    Background is NEVER a monotone
    Her expression is VERY important
Notes written in red felt tip - listed in caption
    Often a small amount of text
    Her art reflected a specific moment in her life
    Maybe have a theme of pseudo-motherhood?

Here is the whole page!

Entire page composed of all the above images

I started with this exercise so that I could get a FEEL of her artwork before focusing on the artwork I want to take more direct inspiration from for my final piece. I will admit for this month I had a good idea what I wanted to do already (but this isn't always going to be the case in the following months!)

Specific artwork I will be focusing on

Self Portrait with Necklace of Thorns, 1940

Self Portrait with Necklace of Thorns

Why this one?

I must admit, there isn't a particularly 'deep' reason for this one. It visually appealed to me as a painting and I felt like I could directly adapt it to fit myself. I am used to staring stoicly - though for me it's due to autistic masking rather than chronic pain, I have two cats, I can use a daffodil for the flower, the self-portrait can be of myself etc.

Sketches based on specific artwork

I decided to do two sketches based on this one, firstly a pen sketch to get the basic 'form' of the piece (with a bit more detail than my previous sketches) and then a pencil sketch to get some more of the details - particularly of her face

Sketch Self Portrait with Necklace of Thorns done with red felt tip
I found this helpful with getting the right composition of the painting, though this does show that I need to practise drawing cats...
Sketch Self Portrait with Necklace of Thorns done with pencil
This isn't very visible but I was glad I did this as getting more detail on her face was helpful, though the monkey kinda looks like Homer Simpson XD