I am exhausted. I worked until 9:30 last night and I can barely keep my eyes open as I sit here at my desk at work. It’s pouring rain outside, the sun is nowhere to be found, and my husband is still snuggled up all warm and cozy under the covers. It’s making me a little bitter.
As I sat and looked at my two moleskine entries over the past few days, one thing I’ve come to realize is how rusty I am. Sure, I teach art lessons and I paint occasionally, but what happened to the joie de vivre I had when I was younger, when all I wanted to do was sit and draw? I would literally draw for hours and hours at a time without stopping or taking a breath of fresh air.
I distinctly remember when my first renaissance occured in the 7th grade. I loved to draw and color throughout my whole life, but I feel like I literally woke up one day with a fire in my heart and electricity in my hands to create something meaningful. I remember chalking it up to puberty at first, thinking that maybe it had something to do with my crazy hormones, until I saw a TV show on the air one day.
It’s silly, it’s random, and I absolutely refused to admit it to anyone until recently… But Sailor Moon triggered my creative rebirth. I sat through about 3 episodes before I started drawing what I saw, but cartoons have never really done it for me… After I hit the internet to research Sailor Moon a little more, I discovered something that completely inspired my little junior higher’s heart… Sailor Moon manga.
If you’re unfamiliar (or live under a rock), manga is sort of an umbrella term for japanese comic books. They usually have a very deep, well developed story line and there is usually some form of mythology and/or magic involved. Why did Sailor Moon manga appeal to me so much?
Primarily, because the artist used very simple lines, minimal coloring, and hardly any value and still managed to produce goregous work. It makes me wonder about my heavy handedness!
Be sure to click on this one so you can see it full-sized. The artist seemed to have this innate ability to evoke the desired mood with her pictures without overworking the color. She seemed to do a lot of simple color washes, very little value, and pretty simple lines and her manga has always been breathtaking to me.
The biggest thing to me that has affected my art until even today is the eyes. Their eyes are so expressive! Soft and wistful, clear and bright. 10 years later, eyes are still my primary focal point when I draw my favorite subject- people.
Google-searching Sailor Moon like I did today has brought back a lot of my first memories as a committed artist, and no doubt it will probably affect my work during the rest of the week.
Needless to say, I’ve moved on from cartoons and manga, but you never forget your first love!
