"28 Years" - New Work in Progress

I'm starting a new 22"x30" colored pencil drawing on black paper, to act as a companion to my recently completed "30 Days" drawing. This new piece will be called "28 Years."

Similarities Between "28 Years" & "30 Days" -

1. Both are 22"x30" and on black paper with Prismacolor pencils.
2. Both are using a similar "grid" structure, with one-to-one symbolism (one box = one day, in the case of "30 Days" or one box = one year, in the case of "28 Years")

For the "30 Days" drawing, I divided the 22"x30" space into thirty equal-sized boxes (five rows of six boxes each), and within each box drew a rose to represent a single day. I erased the penciled grid, so there aren't actual grid lines, but the structure is pretty obvious even without them. Flowers don't naturally grow that way, where each rose takes up an equal amount of space and fits nicely into an organized calendar-like display.

Similarly, this "28 Years" drawing is going to be in a grid of 4 rows of 7 boxes. The grid lines will not be visible in the end, but the grid-like structure will still be evident. Just as each of the 30 roses stood for one day, each of these 28 spaces will stand for one year.

Differences Between "28 Years" & "30 Days" -

1. To divide the 22"x30" paper into 28 instead of 30, the grid is 4x7 instead of 5x6. This means that each area representing one year is a little taller and a little skinnier than the areas I had representing one day in my "30 Days" piece. They're rectangles, instead of squares.
2. Each year will be represented by two types of flowers, instead of just one specimen of one type of flower. I also tried not to repeat types of flowers too often, though there is a bit of overlap (i.e. "yellow carnation" one year, and "pink carnation" a different year). So the variety of flowers used is much greater.
3. "28 Years" does not have ANY roses. (I figured I'd done enough with roses in my "30 Days" drawing.)

Why "28 Years"?

"30 Days" represented thirty consecutive days in a woman's life. I chose features like color, shape, openness, and background surroundings for each rose to symbolize specifics about that day. I based my decisions on data I kept from my actual life for 30 days in the summertime last year - how I was feeling, what I'd done that day, if I'd had any bad dreams or bad experiences, if I'd had any good experiences, etc. I considered physical changes to my body as it went through a 30 day cycle, but also emotional changes and day-to-day changes. Though I pulled ideas from my own life, the goal was not so much to truly represent me - I wanted it to be relatable and broad enough that it could apply to almost anyone's life, if they were to look at the changes they go through within 30 days.

"28 Years" is similar - it looks at 28 years in a woman's life. Specifically, my life. I chose these flowers based on events that happened in my life over the course of my first 28 years - but a lot of those events are relatable, and similar to what anyone might go through. These include moments of growing up (physically, emotionally, mentally, socially, psychologically, spiritually). My specifics are different from anyone else's specifics, but in general they are the same.

I chose 28 because I just turned 28 years old in December, and so have been alive for 28 years. The first box will represent my first year of life (from age 0-1), the second box will represent my second year of life (from age 1-2), the third box my third year (from age 2-3), and so on.

Botanical illustration of anemone I found online

Flower Symbolism

I looked up the symbolism of different types of flowers to decide what to use for each year. Often, I was torn between two different ideas. A lot can happen in a year, and it felt weird to choose a flower that meant "hope" and "cheerfulness" when parts of the year were bad, with little to no hope or cheer. So I chose two types of flowers for each year, and then made a little "mini bouquet" in each rectangle that intertwined the two ideas I wanted to use to represent that year.

Much of this "flower symbolism" comes from the Victorian era, although other areas of the world and other historical eras have also given symbolism to flowers. I searched online to get some ideas, came up with a list of common flowers and what each flower "means" and then decided which flowers were applicable to which year of my life.

Like my "30 Days" drawing, the symbolism might not be obvious. What I was thinking when I made a rose pink vs. orange vs. purple might not be clear to anyone else. And that's okay. My goal isn't to make my specific experience clear - it's to represent my experiences in a way that makes sense to me, but also in a way that allows room for different interpretations by different people, so that they can see themselves and their lives in my work.

I used botanical illustrations (often historical ones, but really just whatever I found easily on Google images) as a basis for these drawings, to try to accurately represent the flowers for those who would want to know exactly what flower I am using. To people who know a lot about botany or gardening, they should (theoretically) be able to look at my drawing, identify the plant, and look it up to see what it symbolizes. (Or you could just read the individual blog posts I will be writing about each year, to see what the flowers are and what they symbolize.) 

Still, even knowing what the flowers are and what they supposedly symbolize leaves room for interpretation. Many of the flowers symbolize more than one thing, or even contradictory things. Though the grid structure of this drawing might make it seem very organized and clear, it isn't really. The grid is a structure I impose over a complicated set of symbols - symbols which change throughout time and in different parts of the world, symbols that might mean something differently to me than they do to you. The world isn't black and white, ours lives aren't black and white, MY life isn't black and white, and I don't want my art to be either.