If I'm not painting I go mad

life has been hard and busy but the wizards are still soft and sleeping soundly in my noggin

"Spiritual Power"

Artworks by Zarina Situmorang

—Tehimely Marrufo

Annual self-portrait series

2021 - 2020

2019 - 2018

It’s that time of the year again when I decide to start working on a self portrait, so I figure it was about time I showed these in here. I’ll consider making individual posts, but for now let me present them all together.

I started painting these self-portraits in December of 2018, when I first realised I was trans and non binary. I wanted to show the world how I see myself, how I felt, how I understand my gender expression and existence within my body. It was a very cathartic, enjoyable and emotionally charged experience so the following year I decided to repeat the feat and draw another one… and here we are.

Nowadays I use these portraits as a way to check in with myself, evaluate my relationship with my own body and how it has been living within it for the past year. How I feel, what I hope for, what I dread, what I accepted… a way to record the changes, both physical and psychological. (And also as an excuse to paint, because I don’t tend to do that, ever, I like the comfort of line art too much.)

Hello Bread  -  Kayla Martel , 2022.

Irish, b. 1980s

sleepy girlfriends ♡

Tracery (Bronze, 2016)

illuminate 🌕

-

Alphonse Osbert (1857 - 1939)