What do you see? I wonder if the features here are as obvious to the viewer as the artist.

I’ve been away from the website for a while…been preoccupied with other creative duties the past couple of months, but the big event I was working on has come and gone. It’s time to get back to focusing on my art. Even though I wasn’t taking photographs regularly, the one thing I continued to do were my self portraits on Saturdays. I’m sure I’ve said this before, but using a face (and mine is most easily accessible) as a starting point for my images is just so interesting to me. There are some features, that no matter how much you manipulate the image, always stay recognizable. It is those bits, abstracted from the whole, be it lips, eyes, chin, nose, I find myself drawn to. This piece is one such image. Seeing that, coming to that realization (again?) makes me realize that’s what I really love doing. The self portrait is often perceived a conceited effort by the artist to be recognized by others. But the truth is, I’m trying to recognize myself for myself.

I love the layers in this one, the graphic quality of the lips and chin, as well as all the other bright colors that come out of the process. It reminds me of a mixed media piece, part print, part painting. But it’s all digital, all iPhone and how cool is that?

To make it I used a number of my favorite apps, but combined them in new ways. First I took a photo of a tiled wall, doubled it onto itself with DXP (mirrored, with difference setting) and saved it. Next I added an already edited self portrait, that was cropped into the face, layered them together in DXP, adding it a couple of times until it looked right. Then the fun began when I opened that image in Decim8 and using the “veth” setting processed the image, retrying again and again, saving whenever I saw one that I liked. Finally, I opened it in Iris to make slight adjustments to color and contrast. The thing is, I get the absolutely best images when I give myself time and permission to play. Sometimes I can do that as an assignment, because I work well with a challenge, but more often than not it’s when I’m not trying to fit a set requirement that I get my best outcomes. A couple of days ago I finished Just Kids, by Patti Smith. It’s a memoir about her and Robert Mapplethorpe. I highly recommend it. A fascinating read, beautifully written and an incredible story of love, creativity and art. It was truly inspiring to me as an artist to imagine what their lives were like, and how they both branched out to become true to themselves through the creative process.