a dream is a soft place
Description: A framed portrait of a woman standing and holding flowers. A quote from “Waitress” the musical is hand-written in modern calligraphy style in mint green colour. Line drawings of flowers and leaves in white and gold are drawn on the bottom right and top left of the frame. The portrait is in a clean white frame, mounted on a plain wall. A wooden chair and a white vase with dried plant are placed on the left of the photo. A grey carpet is laid on a brown wooden flower. Sunlight and shadows hit the frame from the right creating an overall ambiance of peace and quiet.
“Dreams come and they go
But hold them and keep them
And know that you need them
When your breaking point’s all that you have
A dream is a soft place to land”
On a random day a couple weeks ago, I had this vision in my head: a portrait of a woman with calligraphy written on her hair and light flower drawings around her. Ever since I learned how to draw flowers, I’ve been wanting to draw flowers around people, surrounding and enhancing their human frame, and using calligraphy as a part of the human body, like a tattoo, but just in picture. :)
It’s been hectic (as always), but working on this portrait project little by little on a daily basis, and learning new tools to make this happen has been nothing short of therapeutic.
Turning my passion for calligraphy as a business has been great. But there were times that I missed working on a calligraphy piece just for me. Executing what’s in my head into something I can see in front of me. Something that’s not intended for sale.
It’s a good thing I asked a friend and she just had THE perfect photo for what I had in mind! Thank you @Astley for providing this photo and allowing me to use your photo for this purely creative practice!
This piece went through a lot of drafts, as I figured out the right calligraphy style that would fit her hair, and the right floral illustration to fit the vibe of the photo and quote my friend chose to adorn her hair.
The flower designs were added after. I first drew full coloured in flowers, but they overwhelmed the subject and made the look really heavy. I opted for simple line drawings instead.
The original photo was in colour, so I decided to make it black and white, with a slight vintage purple hint. This is to make the calligraphy and drawings pop out more.
I really like learning new things, so it was also great that this calligraphy portrait piece motivated me to learn more Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop to really bring to life the EXACT look I had in mind. I had a lot of fun learning how to add realistic shadows! :)
And here we go! I’m proud of this piece not because it’s the best out there (I highly doubt it), but this piece is a reminder of something I did day by day, just for me. If you know me IRL, you’d know how BUSY I am, so finding the time to work on something purely personal is close to almost a miracle. But hey, here is my finished work. My personal vision, finally out here.
Materials used:
original photo in colour provided by friend
quote chosen by friend from “Waitress” the Musical
Procreate app on 2018 Apple iPad and first generation Apple Pencil
Adobe Illustrator
Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Lightroom
If you’d like to have me do you a similar digital portrait with calligraphy and illustration, just drop me a message here. Thank you so much!