Gouache!

I made this yesterday as a test for myself & Andrice's Gouache demo she is doing for the IPRC comics program. I have an aversion to using a brush as I am a little like a cavelord with tools. Which is why I use color pencils predominantly. I can grip em & push em in the paper real hard like! But I also love the way Gouache & water color look & function so much! So thanks to Andrice I had the opportunity to learn from a real master how to use it. Now I just need years of practice to make nice brush lines, learn more fluid control & experiment with blending techniques. Gosh! Overall I was totally pleased with this image. She told me to draw something simple that I could apply flat non modeled color to. When giving me an example off the internet of what she felt would work best she scrolled through several other artist painting examples, of which featured one unintentionally new agey humorous image of a female nude with a huge leaf she held over her head. I found it to be strangely beautiful & unfortunate at the same time as it seemed to say so many more things then its artist was aware of. It was the sort of thing that unfortunately represented so many sad contexts in contrast to what its intended meaning was. An image fighting itself. I wanted to make something based on it but I had to be quick & was thinking a lot about my recent play I did for Gridlords & this mask making African tradition that my friend Cameron Hawkeye was pumping me up about. So I made this woman who is meant to look like she is performing a theatrical piece with a leaf mask instead to a leaf wall that removes us from a feeling of soul through the eyes or expression as apposed to the original inspiration which drew most attention to the void & the naked female form with its oppressed tired posture. 

It was a lot of fun despite how I may have whined along as I got scared of the brush:) Its super fun how easy it is to make light forms on top of dark! That is something I am always wishing was easier with color pencil. Its difficult to get light forms crisp on top of dark forms outside of a limited colors palette. Also it is so easy to fix mistakes in gouache whereas you cannot in color pencil for the most part. total magic! Andrice is a great teacher!