Drawings

(February 2020)
"A woman: The driving force of chaos and the primary source of order in our lives. She is a type of pain that carries pleasure. She poses our biggest danger, yet makes us feel the safest. She is despair, and she is rapture; usually at different times, and often all at once. A woman is an embodied paradox, a breathing contradiction, and she walks the earth ununderstood, and unloved, for we've been taught to dismiss, or hate, that which we do not understand. I, too, used to be bothered by paradoxes, but I've learnt to love, and make love, to the paradoxes that bother me, because I've realized, we do not always have to understand something, in order to love it."
Done with graphite, black ink, red ink, and watercolour pencils on A4 paper.

(August 2021)
"In this lifetime, men die a thousand times before we rest in peace. We are not corpses, yet still away we rot, unexcited, ununderstood, unloved and unremembered. As walking museums of fear, chaos, and heartbreak , we make our way through reality by escaping it every chance we get. But tell me, what is stronger than the heart that was ripped apart ´ a thousand times, and still it defiantly beats? What is stronger than the heart that was shattered, sodomized and stepped on a thousand times, and against all odds it continues to thrive with purpose? So, perhaps a man's purpose in this world isn't to be happy, but to be strong; strong enough to withstand the next battle, strong enough to carry those who can fight no longer, and strong enough to create a world where our children do not have to be as strong to survive. Or, perhaps these are just the asinine insomniac rumblings of a disturbed writer trying to find meaning in his suffering. Oh look, the sun is up again ... "
Done with charcoal, black ink, and graphite on A2 paper.

(April 2021)

(November 2021)
..They put chains on our hearts and painted them with the dismissive colour of 'privilege'...

(June 2019)

(Jan 2021)
I had gone through a period where you could say I was a bit lost and had to find myself again. I found it funny that, now as adults, most of 'finding ourselves', and finding our happiness, is often just getting back to who we were and what we loved as children, like drawing or playing with animals. Like being in nature. Like entertaining a light-hearted imagination rather than dark consuming thoughts, and having a wondrous curiosity and excitement about the world instead of existential hopelessness and apathy. Getting back to things like not caring about mistakes or fear, and just feeling free; free from regrets, from the world's expectations, free from uninvited and intolerable responsibilities, free from insecurities, free from anxious uncertainties of the future. We should embrace adulthood, and use it to be whatever we want, but I think we should always remain children at heart. I was planning on shading the bottom part of the heart too, but halfway through I decided to leave it unfinished. I wasn't lazy, I just thought this 'unfinished work-in-progress' look further symbolizes the still developing heart of a child. All shading was done using only 2 pens.