FINAL PIECE

 THE FINAL OUTCOME

Before starting my final piece, I wanted to create more work inspired by Yofukuro mixed with Jimmy Monsoon as both artists focus on body and face distortions. 

Joey Monsoon:

Joey Monsoons work has an uncomfortable feeling to it due to the way he extends, enlarges, shrinks & shortens different aspects of the faces he paints. The long necks & small chins are a strong feature in his pieces, along with the very straight & jagged lines he uses. He makes the people look doll like, a bit like bobble heads. He defines and exaggerates key features of peoples faces & bodies, such as collar bones & eye bags which works really well to create discomfort in the viewer. The expressions of the people are quite emotionless, which is similar to all the drawings I have created so far in this project. They all look curious or slightly empty, almost like they're disconnected from reality, in an idle state.  

Yofukuro:

Yofukuros work varies a lot in shapes, colours & techniques used, however they have a clear style & way of making faces look distorted. They enhance features that already stand out, such as the eyes, nose or mouth. I think Yofukuros focus on the eyes is a really important aspect of his work, as the eyes show the most emotion. All the people have straight faces, but their eyes always give a different feeling to the piece. The top image for example, looks intimidating & mysterious, whereas the second one looks confused & slightly goofy due to the eyes directions.

I wanted to mix both these styles, using the long neck with directional lines from Monsoons work & the style of face presented in Yofukuros work with naturally enhanced features. On top of this, I added my own style using thin lined shapes on the highlights of the face & open spaces. I also added some downwards directional lines for shading in certain areas to stop the piece from looking too flat.

I ended up blacking out the hair & some rectangular shapes in the neck to balance out the piece.

Process:

Outcome:

This piece is not my usual style, however I am happy with the outcome & feel it links well with the ideas I'm trying to push forward in my work. In my opinion, the face looks slightly fed up & tired & like the others, has a very dull expression. I like the sinister feel to it & the different sized lines give the piece some variation which works well. It gives balance to the large dark section of the hair & ear. The face looks cracked in places too, continuing the doll-like feel to Monsoons work.

I want my final piece to continue the enlarged & enhanced features inspired by these artists as they highlight the different things we notice about ourselves that others don't. The things we see as 'ugly' or 'too big' or 'too small' normally aren't so noticeable to other people, but we are so used to comparing & looking at ourselves that we see them as bigger issues than they actually are.

To begin my final piece, I searched for some reference images which included unique hair styles or features that stand out. I ended up choosing image 3 as I liked the positioning & features.

Inspo Images:

Chosen Reference:

I decided to add a background first to see if a red circle would work well, however after looking it for a while I decided it didn't fit well with the piece. The circle wasn't actually a circle & the red looked splotchy & wasn't thick enough. The colour was also too dark, which didn't look good against the charcoal. I also decided the top of the head looked too flat, so I raised it slightly to round it off more.

In the photo below I wasn't quite finished with the piece. I wanted to add detail to the clothes & put some directional lines to darken some areas. Because I didn't like the background, I decided to cut out the drawing with a Stanley knife and place it on a new background as the red was too dark to go over with a lighter colour. This would also mean the drawing is slightly raised from the background & I could also play with different backgrounds & decide what's best.

Tested images to try colours:

1

2

3

4

These are some trial backgrounds mostly to see what shade colour works best. I wanted to go with a cream/light pink colour as it would compliment the subtle red tones in the face. I was thinking about adding eyes that connect around the background but I didn't think it would compliment the foreground. However, the pink was definitely the colour I was going to go with.

Final Outcome:

When doing the background, I wanted to keep a white boarder as I was layering the image on top, so I felt this would draw you to the central image even more. The white stripes going towards the centre of the piece were for decoration but I think they merge the white boarder into the central area of the piece & stop the colour from looking boring & boxy. 

The shapes on the womans body & face are similar to the ones I used in my fine liner piece inspired by Joey Monsoon but I used less of them in this piece as I wanted the overall feel of the piece to be a lot softer & more delicate. 

I continued the original idea by keeping the blank face, however she looks like she's in a daze, or listening in a conversation. To show 'distortion' I did play with features of her face, such as exaggerating curves in her nose that weren't in the image, enlarging the eyes & making the ears a lot bigger too. I also made the neck longer & defined the bump a bit more. The changes weren't as exaggerated as Monsoon & Yofukuros work, however they are still present.

In my opinion, this piece has a Japanese art feel to it due to the soft colours, smooth face & frilly high neck shirt. I really like the subtle colours in the face & clothing too, the watercolour ended up working really well with the charcoal. The flow of the hair looks good too. I am surprised with the way the hair turned out as I didn't think I would be able to get the charcoal to look so smooth & detailed. I also went over parts with a fine rubber to get smaller highlighted strands of hair to help show movement, as if there's a breeze.

I think this piece gets across the idea of face distortion in a more subtle way to my other pieces. As for the overall intention to show 'how we see ourselves', I think it could have been shown more clearly if i had played with the sizing of features even more. I didn't want to do too much & end up disliking it, but for future I should take more of a risk with my final outcome to further present the message or intention I set out to show through my work. Another thing I could've done with this piece is make the pupil melt down the face as this would've linked to the piece I did where the eyes connected.

This would have made the piece stronger in it's message, however I think the enlarged eyes & ears still push forward this idea well & carry on the idea of us seeing ourselves a different way to how others do. Our features to us are more prominent & exaggerated & can often be an insecurity, but it doesn't make them ugly. Anyone can be art, and everyone is beautiful in a unique way; especially to an artist, as normally someone with prominent features is more interesting to draw & can help keep the artists artwork creative & stylised.