Truly Outrageous ♥

hey dolls! I'm back AGAIN! what's going on?! two blog posts in one week!!! EXCITING!

anyway I have some new stuff to share with you all. I've been working on commissions and other projects recently so it has been a while since I drew a new member of the Candy Doll Club. But I got a day off last week so I started doodling and the next thing I knew it was 2am and I'd finally cleaned up the linework enough to start adding colour.

 this was the result...

now if you grew up in the eighties or early nineties you might remember the animated show Jem and the Holograms. Personally I LOVED it! Mainly because of the wacky outfits and candy coloured hairstyles, but also the cheesy songs and general air of Girl Power that the show was all about.



well a few months ago someone left a comment on my Instagram asking if i'd ever do a Jem fanart. My first thought was ABSOLUTELY YES, but then I sort of forgot about it and drew other stuff instead. So this week I started drawing a girl in denim shorts and a leather jacket, gave her some retro styled hair and it wasn't until I began adding colour that she magically transformed into Jem aka Jerrica Benton before my eyes!

So as you can probably tell, my take on Jem is a little different to the original cartoon. For a start mine's a bit curvier and gone is the 80's hair, with some retro candy pink curls and a ribbon bow instead. The make-up is pretty much the same + she's still wearing her hologram projector earrings.

This doll doesn't have any visible tattoos, mainly because her arms are covered. Oh and if you're wondering what's going on with her super bright outfit,  the wacky pastel leather jacket is actually based on a real one that I always see online and secretly LOVE! I'd never be able to wear it myself but I like the sweet sugary colours so it definitely inspired this Candy Doll's retro style!

the original jacket via DOLLS KILL

my version of the jacket

 Naturally she's showing off her band with a 'Jem' crop top! I like to draw women of all shapes and sizes but I do sometimes come under flack online from people accusing me of only drawing 'skinny girls'. First of all, I draw skinny girls AND curvy girls, I don't always have a specific plan in mind when I sit down to draw so sometimes they might turn out skinny sometimes not, it all depends on how the image develops in my mind. When I drew the lineart for this I didn't know it was going to end up a Jem fanart piece. It was fun to draw a girl with more curves but it wasn't until I added colour that I realised it reminded me so much of 'Jem and the Holograms' that it couldn't be anyone else!

now 'my' Jem is inspired by the cartoon I watched as a child, but if you're a fan of it as well then you'll probably know that there's also a Live Action 'Jem and the Holograms' movie coming out later this month. Now I haven't seen it yet, obviously, but I didn't really want to base my drawing off the trailers for it...

so instead it's a sort of mix of the original cartoon AND the amazing comic series brought out earlier this year! The artwork is BRILLIANT and so are the stories, it's a new take on the classic series but also a whole new take on the characters. Definitely worth a read if you're into comics, especially ones about kick-ass female characters. Read more about the comics HERE.

so yeah, there you have it. Another new Candy Doll and fanart piece. I'm not sure what i'll draw next, I kind of want to try a few more fanarts based on some of my fave female characters so we'll see!

and on that note i'll sign off. I just got home from another lovely Christening (the cake was AMAZING) but I didn't eat much (other than cake) and i'm pecking so i'm going to rustle up some dinner.

until next time, thanks for reading, come and visit again soon!

Time for a Selfie?!

Hello my dears, i've spent the last few days pondering what to write about on here and I wasn't really planning on posting anything this week but yesterday and today I worked on a new Candy Doll illustration, so I figured I might as well post that.

So, meet the latest Candy Doll...

Yes she's a candy coloured girl with pastel pretty hair and a princess dress but you may also notice that her pose is that of someone taking a 'selfie'. (in fact, it's based on THIS selfie by the very gorgeous Missi Mouse)

Now i'm going to assume that when I say 'selfie' you all know what I mean. In today's world it's difficult not to pick up on trends flying around the internet and selfies are a phenomenon that i'm guessing you'll have heard of or seen on many occasions, or at least once or twice.

For example, here is a 'selfie' from my own instagram profile, note the camera phone clutched in my hand. (I should warn you, you're going to see a lot of my face throughout this post so if you are personally offended by my face, then bugger off. Leave now if you want, either way it's happening)

In simple terms a 'selfie' is a picture someone takes of themselves, usually reflected in a mirror or by dangling their phone/tablet in front of their face. You don't have to be alone in a selfie, you could snap a photo with your pet, spouse, family or whichever random celeb you've managed to corner, but i'm pretty sure for it to qualify as a selfie YOU have to be in the picture as well.

Now i'm not a big selfie poster but I do occasionally partake in the odd one when i'm feeling happy. I recently spoke to some people i'd never met who had heard of my work (it's a small island) they commented on the content of my instagram and one of them said 'I went to follow you but it's all pictures of you!'. This got me thinking because A) it is so NOT all pictures of me and B) so what if it was?!

Like many artists and creative types, I use social media to promote and sell my work but sometimes it can be good to remind people of the person behind the drawings, I follow so many incredible artists on Instagram and you can guarantee that every so often they'll post a snap of themselves. I also follow dozens of people who work in so many other areas and they ALL post regular photos of themselves, sometimes alone, sometimes with friends and family. In an age where people can share photos of anything and everything, whose to say it's wrong for them to share a photo of themselves.

There are mixed opinions about the torrents of selfies now populating the pages of virtually all the social media sites but personally I think they're a great idea! Hardly new or novel in existence, people have been taking selfies since cameras were invented (see for yourself HERE), so why should they come under fire now for snapping the odd shot of themselves.

As someone who really dislikes having her photo taken, I seem to have no trouble snapping ten pictures of myself posing and pouting in my bathroom mirror. Which is what makes selfies such an appealing form of expression, you are in complete control of the outcome, so it's a very personal thing to stand there and scrutinize yourself and snap a photo of what you see.

Instagram is a great platform for sharing things with the world, i regularly share snaps of my products and creations, books i'm reading, lovely scenery or my friends and family. but I don't think there should be any shame in posting pictures of myself.

For me selfies are a way of sharing my face with the world, or inflicting it upon it, either way sometimes it can be nice to post a shot of the face behind the online profile. If i'm having a particularly bad day, i'm more likely to shun social media but if it's been a lovely day and i've had a smile on my face then sometimes I like to share that smile.

I have low enough self esteem as it is so I think in some ways posting the occasional photo of myself on my instagram or twitter gives me a little boost in the confidence department, which is something I think most of us could do with from time to time. Even if nobody even sees it, just knowing that i've had the courage to share a photo of myself with the world is enough of a boost. Obviously it's even nicer when friends or family (or strangers!) post positive comments or hit the 'like' button.

I don't have many days where I feel truly good about myself, so you can guarantee that I must be having a brilliant day if it warrants a spontaneous selfie!

I first joined instagram in late October 2012 (when I got my iPhone). The very first picture I ever posted was related to Ghostbusters (obviously) but the third photo I shared was a selfie. My first ever proper phone selfie to tell the truth. I took it the Saturday before Halloween, standing in a toilet cubicle at Tesco, because as you know I live a very glamourous and exotic life.

Now I can't remember exactly how I felt or what I was thinking at the time but i'd just been to the cinema with my best friends to watch Ghostbusters so I was probably fizzing over with happiness. I'd dressed up in a big red polka dot swing dress with red lipstick to match + sparkly devil horns (because I fail spectacularly at all Halloween costumes) since that weekend lost of people were dressing up to walk around Douglas, so that was my contribution. And obviously, I felt that I needed to share that with the world, hence the selfie.

I remember getting teased a bit by some friends online, nothing bad but people seemed amused that i'd taken the time to post a picture of myself. So now (all this time later, I know...) it got me wondering why we make such a big deal of it?! It's not a crime, feeling good enough to post a picture of yourself smiling like a dork.

There shouldn't be anything negative about trying to boost your own self esteem from time to time so i'm not sure why so many people feel bad about posting a snap of themselves. You should just do it! Feeling bored? Go ahead and pull a daft pose in the mirror. Do you love your new outfit? Share a pic. Are you having a good day? Share your smile. Did your hair look amazing today? Share a photo so everyone can see how strong your hair game is! Don't be ashamed of yourself, show the world how awesome you are.

This is the most recent 'selfie' from my instagram. I'd had a really nice day out with my family, i'd worn my favourite red lipstick all day and when I got home I was trying to find a new home for my Betty Boop figurines. My lipstick was still neat so I decided to have a go at imitating Betty's famous pout. It's a silly picture, it was frivolous and totally unnecessary but it was FUN. So I posted it.

Now I know what you're probably thinking, crikey Jade you're posting a LOT of photos of your face, you must really love yourself and i'll stop you right there because NO. As i've mentioned, I have a lot of issues with self confidence and self esteem, I tend to have a very low opinion of myself but I am occasionally granted days when I don't feel so self depreciating, these days are few and far between so when they do appear I have to grasp hold of them and ride the wave of confidence. If that results in my shamelessly posting a photo of my own face then so be it, it's better than hating myself constantly, which I usually seem to do.

Anyway you'll be glad to know that that is the last snap i'll share today (hallelujah!) I seem to have forgotten the point I was trying to make but I think essentially what i wanted to say was don't be ashamed of sharing photos of yourself, if you feel good about yourself then let the world know.


I can't help but wonder though, do YOU post a lot of selfies or are you utterly camera shy? If you have access to a camera phone or tablet with a camera, I think you should go and post a selfie. Maybe not right now, maybe not tomorrow, but soon. DO IT! No regrets.

and on that sickeningly positive and upbeat note, i'll bid you all adieu.

If any of you do feel brave enough to post a selfie, please do link me to it in the comments below, I would literally LOVE to see your faces. It would fill my tiny shriveled heart with eternal joy.

So until next time, that's all folks. Thanks for making it to the end of the post, that means you managed to wade through my garrulous ramblings. WELL DONE!

One Year Later...

Hello again, wow i'm really starting to get back into this blogging malarkey, here's hoping the enthusiasm lasts! This one will be kind of a personal post but hey, I never said it would all be fun and games and delicious cakes! Before you start reading the rest I feel I should probably warn you that this post is rather heavy on the old parentheses. (enjoy)

Okay so yesterday morning I got a rather groovy email from a chap I haven't spoken to in over a year (hence the title of the post) but it's nothing overly dramatic or particularly too exciting (at least probably not to you, I mean obviously it is to me or I wouldn't be blogging about it would I) it's just that he bought some big ol' paintings from me last summer and wanted to send me an update on their current whereabouts.

For those of you that follow me on my various social media accounts such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or Pinterest (shameless plugs I know but this is a blog after all!) you might remember that around this time last year I was just wrapping up my BA degree in Fine Art and showing my work in the degree exhibition. 

Although I took a lot of progress shots for my degree file (and for Instagram) I was going through my prolonged 'no blogging' spell so I never actually documented the process on here. Obviously i'm not about to regale you with a whole start-to-finish essay about something I did a year ago, but I am going to at least explain a bit about what I did.

For my final pieces, I produced four large scale acrylic and posca paintings for the show on 1819 x 607mm (about 6 x 2 foot each) boards and in case you missed it last year, this is what they looked like up on the wall in the exhibition space.

 

The paintings were pretty big, a real pain in the patootie to move anywhere and even more fun to actually put up on the wall. But once they were up in the space they were kind of striking enough that people paused to look at them, which is all I could ask for really! If you can't quite visualise the sizes mentioned, here's a snap of one of the exhibition visitors gazing up in adoring wonder at one of the paintings (actually she's my friend Porscha but I did NOT pay her to pose for the photo, honest!).

Followed by the only photo of me with the paintings in existence, a slightly blurred farce of a photo. Unfortunately i'm blinking like a total moron in the pic, but ignore the fact that I look like a bewildered sloth and focus instead on the paintings in comparison to my height (i'm wearing heels by the way). Now you'll understand why they were such a chore to lug about and why they took me so ruddy long to paint (a full week on each board from start to finish in case you were wondering).

Well, since the degree show was held during the TT festival (more about that HERE) in a public space (a local shopping centre) we got all sorts of wonderful visitors from all over the world and as luck would have it, one afternoon I got a call saying that someone had been in to the exhibition requesting to buy my work.

Initially I didn't think much of this since i've had people ask to buy my work before and then I never hear from them again. I mean I was kind of attached the paintings at this point, i'd spent the last month huddled over my kitchen table slaving away at them night and day. I drank so much Red Bull through curly straws during the painting process that I now can't even look at a can without shuddering or immediately thinking of Lana Del Rey (her music set on repeat pretty much fueled the entire month of painting).

I'd coated aforementioned table in spatters of paint and for a solid month my flatmate couldn't actually use the table at all because it was so covered in pots of paint, brushes and massive flipping wooden boards! They were the biggest paintings i'd ever attempted and I wasn't even sure that I wanted to actually sell them. They were, and still are, incredibly personal pieces of work.

Then I began to realise that if I didn't sell them I would no doubt be stuck with them forever. Which means I would probably either damage them by accident or get really angry one night and set fire to one, or all, of them while screaming insults at the flames. 

I have a strange relationship with my work but these paintings were 'my girls' and however much I loved them (and I did) I knew it would be easier if they weren't cluttering up the place. I was undeniably flattered that someone had even momentarily considered buying my work so I got in touch with the prospective buyer and quickly realised that he was actually serious!

Obviously I was SUPER excited by this news, it's nice to know that someone likes your work enough to want to actually pay money for it! A few emails later and the deal was secured (as it were) and a few weeks after that, I shipped the paintings over to England and met the buyer off the boat (yes it was as thrilling as it sounds). Anyway, at the time when I sold the paintings I genuinely didn't know what was going to happen to them. The buyer said he planned to hang them in his house and that he'd send me a photo, but months went by and I had other things to think about so I just sort of began to forget about 'my girls'. 

The last time I saw them all together side by side was about a fortnight after the exhibition came down, stacked in my kitchen the day I packaged them up for their trip overseas. I bought a funk-load of parcel paper as well as 100m of bubble wrap (possibly the best purchase i've ever made in my life as there are literally hours of fun to be had with a roll of bubble wrap that is 100m long) and I carefully wrapped up the paintings ready to set sail for Heysham.

When we docked in England I met the guy that was buying the paintings and just over a month after i'd first set brush to board I handed them all over and they were no longer my responsibility. Which is probably a good thing since they'd have undoubtedly ended up stacked next to my fridge if i'd have kept them, or more likely plonked behind the sofa gathering dust.

Anyway since then I haven't thought much about them, like I said i've had other things to think about. But over the past few days i've found myself pondering over their sale and wondering whatever became of them in their new home in Cambridgeshire. Did they get put up in a house, did they get sold on, were they shoved away in a garage? So in true nosy-parker style I messaged the buyer just to try and find out what happened to them.

 Well as luck would have it, as I said at the start of the post (before I started wittering on uncontrollably) I received an email from the chap that bought them and he sent me this...

and this - "Hello Jade, I'm sorry that I never got around to sending you pictures before so here you go. As you can see they are hanging on the wall in my house. Have had no problems with them, they been very well behaved! I'm very fond of them and will not be selling them."

So now I know, and now YOU know as well. They're safe and sound in a hallway hanging above a staircase. Which is frankly pretty awesome to know! I like the idea of them keeping watch over the stairs, no doubt intimidating people with their candy coloured ferocity (at least I like to think that's what they do). It's kind of brilliant knowing that my paintings are still being displayed, now all I need to do is crack on and start painting some NEW ones.

 And on that sentimental note I think I shall draw this post to a close. Mostly because i've exhausted the '( )' buttons and I can't really think of anything else to say. Lucky you.

It's not really a great ending to a blog, it's not even a very good ending, but it's an ending all the same.

So until next time, that's all folks!

thanks for reading (or if you just looked at the pictures, thanks for that too)

bye for now...