About this artwork

Coloured pencil and fineliners on A3 paper.

A single, luminous face tilts upward as if inhaling a first breath of dawn. Eyes closed, lips just parted, the expression is one of surrender and quiet awe: a moment suspended between memory and release. Rivers of colour and contour lines rise and fall like tides, so that the face seems to be both made of and dissolving into light.

Vibrant swirls of teal, cobalt, magenta and lavender travel across cheek and brow in layered, undulating ribbons. They twist into one another, sometimes sharp and filamented, sometimes soft and clouded, giving the impression of movement frozen mid-flow. Where the colours gather around the jaw and neck they thicken and drip, gravity pulled into delicate trails — tears of pigment that trace the path from something internal outward into the world.

The contrasts are tender and electric: cool blues and greens cradle warmer pinks and purples, making the highlights on the forehead, nose, and upper lip sing. Texture becomes feeling here — ridged, almost topographic strokes suggest ridges of experience, while smooth washes feel like breath across the skin. The hair, if it can be called that, is more like currents of emotion, each strand a thought or memory carried away and merging with the next.

There is a transcendent quality to the piece, an intimacy that isn’t passive but transformative. It reads like a portrait of the interior: grief, joy, longing and peace braided together. The overall effect is both calming and stirring — as if witnessing someone becoming themselves anew, or letting themselves be carried by something larger and more colourful than words.