30 Days of Art for 30 Days of Quarantine

This 30-Day Art Challenge allowed me to capture the ups and downs I've experienced throughout this pandemic. This piece "Missing You" was in response to the challenge's prompt for the day "Loving from Afar."

Art by Ema Wilson

This 30-Day Art Challenge allowed me to capture the ups and downs I’ve experienced throughout this pandemic. This piece “Missing You” was in response to the challenge’s prompt for the day “Loving from Afar.”

As we are at home during quarantine, it can be a struggle to try and find something to do. Oftentimes we resort to just working on school work to keep our minds busy, but what about the creative side? That’s why the 30 Day Art For Home Challenge is a perfect way to destress and allow your creative juices to start flowing!

The 30 Day Art For Home Challenge, also known as the April Art For Home Challenge was started by tumblr user Kurisutythehero on March 20. She said that she wanted to start the challenge to “keep our minds focused” and to help artists “find inspiration”. The challenge is to draw every day, or multiple days, to get your mind moving and to allow creativity to be expressed throughout the month. So when I took on the challenge I decided to use it as a stress reducer and to express my experience of quarantine. 

Picture of the 30 Day Art From Home Challenge

 

Day 2 of the Art Challenge: “Hand Washing Song” 

For the piece “Hand Washing Song” the first thing that had come to mind was a song that was made using the sound of suds and bubbles along with the splashing and dripping of water to create a symphony of hands working to create noise. With that in mind, the piece took creative liberty of illustrating four twisted and mangled hands dripping with water as bubbles emerge from the cold, black water. Each hand also had dynamic shading using hatching to accentuate them compared to the scribbled, messy shading the water has.

Day 3 of the Art Challenge: “Missing You”

This art piece had the prompt of “Love People From Afar” so became a direct reaction to when my grandfather was in the hospital all the way across the world in Japan. I could only love from afar and could barely contact him or any other relatives there, so this piece was dedicated to nail that idea in the coffin. The two people in “Missing You” are looking in opposite directions and have a white barrier, causing neither of them to interact with each other. Both also have very different surroundings, one is in a barren room with just a window to focus on, while the other has hyper detailed and scribble shaded areas to give it more sensory and detail. However both characters are connected through a white window on both sides of the barrier, one stares into the window with a small smile, while the other looks at a small vase of flowers on the desk next to the hospital bed with a thoughtful expression. With the other having flowers behind them, it can then be assumed that they had sent the flowers to the elder as a get well soon present. 

Day 12: “Desensitized”

The piece “Desensitized” has both a foreground and background full of detail, using multiple shading methods such as hatching, scribble, and crosshatching to capture the amount of dimension and variety nature has. However the person that is the center of focus for the piece gives a small shrug with an unimpressed look, as if saying that it was no big deal to them. The prompt for this illustration was “Outside View” and while many capture it as themselves staring out a window or looking at it from afar, since the area I live in has a lot of access to trails, it is not a large deal to go out, and that is what is to be assumed for this piece as well.

Day 14 of the Art Challenge: “Stuck with a Mess”

The prompt for Day 14 was work/studies, so I took creative liberty to illustrate the subject I have the most struggles with, geometry. With school work many can empathize that they feel as if they are stuck with something they have to clean up and sort out, since I find the slides for geometry hard to follow I translated it into this piece of artwork. The large, scribbled dog is drooling everywhere and stands out compared to the hatching and thicker lined work. This contrast furthers the difference between the messy studies of geometry and the neat orderly desk and room, emphasizing the hardship of “cleaning up” the “mess” for the subject.

Day 19 of the Art Challenge: “No Hugs”

The final piece I’m showcasing is called “No Hugs” with the prompt being “No More Hugs”. When you think of hugs you often think of friends, family, and a familiar warmth, if you don’t have that, then you are left with cold isolation. To push this the character is in a blank room with only themselves pressed against the door, which we don’t know where it leads to. However, even with the warmth being stripped away, two bland dogs stick by the person to give their own shine and comfort, allowing the character to be at ease.

Overall the 30 Day Art For Home Challenge was fun and had me get my creative juices flowing like the creator had intended. The challenge also allowed me to have something to look forward to after studying and allowed me to have a place to communicate my emotions and what I was going through with corona in a way that might not have been possible with simple communication.