15: Scrunched Up Faces

I wanted to try another composition, and after some conceptualising I ended up with this triptych. The interesting thing is that people really like my humorous images, but I also want to express my serious side too as I feel it needs a lot of development even at the age of 45. One interesting side theme is psoriasis, something that I live with more successfully in terms of acceptance than most people with it. Doctors criticise that I do not look after it well enough, but on the other hand they do almost nothing to help people accpet it, perpetuating the background whine of 'conceal it, hide it', which does nothing to help find a cure. Instead it keeps a market going for temporary cures, a way of making us pay financially for what we have as our skin.

In terms of generating ideas, this multi-theming (psoriasis / new-groups / finding-me / humour / etc) helps in generating ideas, on any day I have a number of sources I can draw upon, non of which existed at that moment I decided to pursue this project. When we get involved in a project it is easy to run at it and assume that we already know enough at the beginning of the project, but it is much better to develop these themes as a way of solving the inevitable 'writer's block'.

6: What Mood Are You In?

I really need to get out and go somewhere, shuttling between work and home is no life if you are looking for inspiration. It is also a struggle trying to do the simplest things with a program you are as yet unsure about, such as Gimp, which would not let me draw a simple circle.

I started with a green background with just the facial parts, but then decided to dump the green and go for this cartoony image, reminiscent of the kind of drawings I have seen made by inmates of prisoner of war camps.