Q1 Project - Artist Statement

My self-portrait communicates my identities. One side of my self-portrait communicates the American side of me. America is where I was born and raised. The other side of my self-portrait communicates my African side. I am a proud full Fulani and Sierra Leonean. The theme of the portrait was cultural identity. To portray my cultural identity I drew myself in the center of the page with certain items that identity with me.

The drawing of my portrait consists of an outline of my upper body, my face and hijab. The materials I used to outline my body is a pencil. I used the pencil to draw lines in my hijab to give it a realistic look, representing the folds in it. After that, I went over the outline with a fine point black pen to give it boldness. Next, I went on to the color the inside of my hijab. I colored the top of  my hijab with the colors of the Sierra Leone flag, green,white, and blue. The sides of my hijab has the American flag colors (red and white stripes with the blue part with the stars) from the top to the bottom of the hijab. The materials I  used for color, are colored pencils. When using the color pencils, a technique I learned is using the lightness of pencil to create shading. I also learned how to use the pen to make lines in my hijab to show flowness in it. The thing I’m most proud of is the process I went through.

Through this process of learning the shading technique a failure I encountered was using the shading and coloring inside the hijab, the wrapping part of on my face. I wanted the shading and coloring on the hijab to look my flowy, realistic appeal when I colored the Sierra Leone flag on top of my head and the American flag around sides of the hijab. The lines I drew came out too strong. However, learning from that mistake the bottom end of my hijab had the flowy,realistic look to it.

When you look at my picture you will see that I chose not to draw features on my face. Instead, I drew what identifies me on the sides of . One side I drew all of the Africans things I like. I drew my favorite  traditional African pot where they make an African dish called fufu. Using a brown coloring pencil and drew the little tribal prints that are usually engraved into them. Next I drew an African woman with a pot on her head. I drew this, because when I visited Africa during the summer that's what the norm of traveling their goods to sell to then come home to feed their family. I also, drew things like a beach and palm trees. When I first landed in Sierra Leone the first thing I noticed were the swaying ;palm trees exiting out the airport. Later, driving around I saw the big beautiful beaches there. On the right side of my picture I drew all the things I love in America. I drew a chipotle burrito because I love chipotle, a photo frame to represent my family, a pizza box to represent a food I  eat here in America, my house to represent where I grew up atand school to represent my education and learning. All the materials I used for that was coloring pencils and a black fine point pen to bold it around the outlines of each mini drawing.

If I could, somethings I would change are, to balance out the colors of the Sierra Leone and American flag on my hijab. I would change this because the American flag takes up more of my hijab, I wanted a balance of it. I would change the blank white background of my portrait, I could have colored it to make everything on page more bold. Overall, my portrait represented my culture, my nationality, and religion. To get to what I wanted to portray I asked myself, “Who am I? It portrayed throw my picture.