I was going to make a sort of calm piece, something similar to one of my previous paintings, where I’m trying to portray this sense of relief and freedom to feel. While sketching and finishing up the line work, the expression I came up with was not looking calm at all. I ended up drawing my own emotions I was going through, without any intention of doing so, but I chose to stick with it.

Self-hatred is not an easy thing to overcome. I have been struggling with it my whole life, constantly blaming myself for what I am and what I’m not. Hating myself for feeling weak.

Thing is, I’m not weak, I’m still here, breathing, trying my best, even though in the past, I tried not to be, and I’m thanking the Universe every day I failed.

I am calmer now, so let’s see how this will turn out.

My goal with this sort of “unnatural“ complexion was to make the subject look lifeless and tired, almost like a corpse. Since I already knew I wanted the background to be a shade of green I started adding green to the face, and reds that are reflecting off the red spider lilies.

I wanted to capture the anger, but also the feeling of exhaustion because of that constant feeling of anger, and finally calmness after giving up on it, accepting it and moving on.

I am really satisfied with the final result, I decided to finish the piece digitally, played with contrast and drew the flowers as only outlines. I feel as if by drawing only outlines of the spider lilies, the painting has space to breathe and the expression is the centre.

What I feel now is calmness, it’s time to move on, and put all the anger to rest.

https://opensea.io/assets/ethereum/0x3528af864d76b5a9b54325333dc1e956f435fa2c/2