Continuing my study of how to create softness and details with a medium that’s so much less soft and versatile than pencil and paper, I lifted this image from the famous National Geographic depiction of Afghan refugee Sgarbat Gula from 1985, when she was just 12 years old. Thirty years after the picture was taken, she was finally given a permanent home in Afghanistan.

Modeled after the (award winning) photograph of the same name by Dorothy Leland, this portrait was more a study of how to create depth and detail on a grainy surface – do I use the grains or ignore them? (Some of each, it turns out). After Dorothy won an award for the photograph named “End of the World”, the community where this was taken was completely leveled in the 7.5 Thai Earthquake of 2018, making the title overwhelmingly eerie. Who knows if this spot exists today?

As Paul Papadonis, my high school art teacher, was teaching us how to draw portraits, I was becoming more and more fascinated with the people who were here before white settlers came and decimated their traditions, culture, and respect for the earth. I started using his lessons to copy portraits of Native Americans as I learned about new mediums at the same time. This one was completed with a stiff bristled paint brush and sticky brown printmaking ink. I wish I could find the original image that I plagiarized so I can give it credit for the composition!