My journey in the art world.

I gave up my dream years ago, and I am just starting to pick up the pieces.

I used to draw a lot but I gave up art years ago. The following album is my journey through finding and loosing art. The pictures quality isn't the greatest and I rant a few times. But, if anyone is thinking about quitting art or has felt lost at some point, I want you to know you are not alone!! :)

When I was in middle school I began to collect cool pictures.

I would plaster them in this drawing book I had. I thought if I gathered all the inspiration I could find in a world and put it in one place, I would be able to create and bring to life wonderful things and somehow magically draw them into reality.

I found it therapeutic. I didn't even try drawing for months.

But eventually, I got the courage to try to draw. And the results were disappointing...

I started with anime, since it was one of my interests at the time...

This is months of hard work in and I felt very sad because my pictures didn't match the mangas I read....

So, I tried drawing my champion, my grandfather

But, I felt I couldn't capture him properly.

I tried drawing people a few more times before giving up...

Art for me a lot of times felt very defeating, and it was very hard and more difficult each time to get up.

So, I kept moving on to other things, like animals.

I drew the animals I loved the most.

The results were not as good as I had hoped either

But, I kept drawing all the animals I could think of.

I made some improvements, so I decided to retry older attempts...

I returned to anime!

I started by drawing anime/manga I read or watched...this is months into my second attempt, but I kept trying.

I would copy every scene I loved from any manga/anime I could get my hands on

(This sketch book is a collage of various sketches, the picture on the left is two years older than the one on the right, I plastered a bunch of my work throughout middle school and high school into one book).

I kept trying to improve by copying more and more.

I especially copied one manga in particular again and again. (I don't even remember it's name anymore).

I felt very confident at some point.

Because even though I obviously messed up in critical areas, I was improving a lot as well.

I tried to draw more complicated characters too.

And scenes that were tougher

(FYI, these were all colored by crayons because that was all I had).

When I tried to move onto my own drawing, the results were disappointing...

I couldn't create such wonderful characters on my own.

And when I made characters I liked, others found them too strange

I made them look too weird according to everyone, it even made my mom uncomfortable (she already hated that I liked anime but she also felt a lot of my drawings were too scary for my age....)

So, as I tried to improve realistic looking manga, I also drew obscure

I liked covering faces and drawing designs.

I liked making things that seemed normal in one aspect but were not

I experimented back and forth for years in high school.

And didn't stick with one aspect.

I tried HUNDREDS OF EYES.

And millions of faces.

I grew more and more inclined to making singular pictures and not storylines towards the end of high school.

That's when I began trying to make one drawing tell a story.

I tried to incorporate what I learned through obsessively drawing zentangles with my combination of loving to draw obscure manga faces.

I focused on this for months. These are things I would work for hours on. This one took almost two days.

I incoporated lyrics or quotes or themes I found throughout my world.

I eventually tried manga again but...

I only ever made a basic story line and only two pages of panels.

I was beginning to fall into depression more and more.

The only thing I did my last few months of high school were cartoon doodles

They relaxed me but I drew less and less each day..

Until I drew only once a while.

I eventually stopped drawing alltogether for years.

I would draw occasionally but I have never taken up drawing in full for over 4 years until today. I decided to doodle a bit today. It's been a while since I have had this much passion and I have no clue where I am in life or where I am going but I hope I never loose art ever again.

This was the picture I found that brought it all back.

I doodled this (awful) picture when I was in elementary school. Someone noted it looked like manga/anime to them and I had them explain what that was. They introduced me into one of my favorite things of all time and encouraged me to draw. Although they are no longer here, I hope I can make them proud and pick up my art again.