Art
Transcend – Personal Art Project
Exploration of Life, Death, and the Cycle of Nature
Tools Used
Charcoal
Black Ink
Oil Pastels
Tan Paper
Challenges
- Convey a personal and philosophical concept visually without being overly literal.
- Integrate color meaningfully in an otherwise monochromatic composition.
Solutions
- Balanced symbolic elements — skull, roses, geometric triangle — with expressive ink techniques to communicate depth, contrast, and emotion.
- Selected a single blue accent in the skull’s eye, tied to the third-eye chakra, to emphasize focus, intuition, and spiritual depth while maintaining visual harmony.
My Role
Transcend is a personal art project that explores themes of life, death, and transformation. The piece depicts a skull surrounded by a bed of black roses, symbolizing the cycle of decay and renewal in nature. Geometric elements — a sharp black triangle — provide structure and contrast to the organic forms, while black ink splatters and drips add expressionistic energy.
Executed primarily in black and white on a cream-toned page, the skull is highlighted with a single blue eye, drawing inspiration from the third-eye chakra to represent intuition, self-reflection, and a bridge between the conscious and subconscious. This project reflects a personal journey of confronting and embracing mortality, while celebrating the beauty and interconnectedness of life and death.
