Art and body image
I don't like to talk about myself on LJ, but I don't know how else to approach this subject, so here goes.
It used to be that one of the most common critiques I got on the girls I drew was "you need to make her thinner." This was often targeted, such as "make her thinner in the waist and legs," and occasionally accompanied with "you should make her boobs a little bigger." These were occasionally on-point anatomy critiques. I did my best to see why people thought my ladies were thick when I thought they were perfectly thin, but I was also pretty resistant to changing it.
When I drew, my own body was my usual point of reference. Looking back at the pictures now I can say that my image of my body was distorted - the parts of me I found too big or too small tended to be bigger or smaller on average than they would be in reality when they showed up in my art. It wasn't really a self-loathing kind of distortion, though. Seeing myself reflected, even in my own art, even if it was actually an inaccurate representation of me, was very comforting and satisfying. I was a teen girl at the time. Being constantly told that my girls didn't have thin enough legs and big enough boobs was discouraging on multiple levels, even when it was true. So much of how I saw and felt about myself was wrapped up in it, and people passing judgment on my art were passing judgment on my body, or that's what it felt like.
So, I resented this criticism, not only because I had started to unpack the personal associations because it felt unjust that I should always be told my women should be skinnier. I felt on some level that it would be irresponsible to try to change it. Meaty thighs were the symbol of my defiance, so to speak, and far more often than not, the shapes (and shapelessness) that I had initially chosen survived my editing process.
As I got older, I first lost weight and then gained weight. The losing weight part simultaneously made me very pleased at being a size 2-4 and made me wonder if maybe my body would finally take on a nicer and more idealized shape if I could get to 0-2. The gaining weight part I mostly attribute to hitting adulthood and stress eating through the first few years of uni, but despite the gain I shed a lot of insecurity. My art got better, too, needless to say. My girls also got skinnier and bustier. Again, part of this has to do strictly with an improved understanding of proportion and anatomy... But I still think that it has a lot to do with me, personally. Feeling better about myself made it less important to see myself in my own work, though the shapes I default to are still similar.
Despite this, though, the critique keeps coming. I submitted one of my pieces for critique and stopped working on it when the well-meaning analyst told me "boobs bigger, thighs smaller," complete with a bunch of reference pictures of girls with legs that look nothing like mine. Objectively, she was at least sort of right, and both those areas needed adjustment. I couldn't bring myself to change it. Last year I asked a friend for critique on one of my portrait pictures. She drew me a redline that must have cut 20 inches off the waistline I drew. I compromised at 10. I still worry people will think it looks fat when the person being represented is no such thing.
So. My principles and self-image are caught up in my art, and sometimes my art is wrong because of it, but other times my art is "wrong" because of it. I don't know how to navigate this. Do other artists struggle with this? Is it obvious to people who look at my art? Do most people think my girls are too fat/skinny to be acceptable? Is anyone else as grateful as I am when they run into Ladies With Thighs? Or fanart where body shapes you're already familiar with are rounded up rather than down? I don't really know. And I don't really know what I'm doing about it when I'm drawing.
I do, however, know that I am investing a lot of thought into whether or not my ladies are thin enough, and that I have been consciously reshaping things into something more "acceptable." I don't know if I'm feeling shamed and anxious enough to start trimming everyone down or if I'm just getting more flexible as an artist and happy enough with myself to compromise, but it disturbs me that I can't seem to figure out the difference.
It used to be that one of the most common critiques I got on the girls I drew was "you need to make her thinner." This was often targeted, such as "make her thinner in the waist and legs," and occasionally accompanied with "you should make her boobs a little bigger." These were occasionally on-point anatomy critiques. I did my best to see why people thought my ladies were thick when I thought they were perfectly thin, but I was also pretty resistant to changing it.
When I drew, my own body was my usual point of reference. Looking back at the pictures now I can say that my image of my body was distorted - the parts of me I found too big or too small tended to be bigger or smaller on average than they would be in reality when they showed up in my art. It wasn't really a self-loathing kind of distortion, though. Seeing myself reflected, even in my own art, even if it was actually an inaccurate representation of me, was very comforting and satisfying. I was a teen girl at the time. Being constantly told that my girls didn't have thin enough legs and big enough boobs was discouraging on multiple levels, even when it was true. So much of how I saw and felt about myself was wrapped up in it, and people passing judgment on my art were passing judgment on my body, or that's what it felt like.
So, I resented this criticism, not only because I had started to unpack the personal associations because it felt unjust that I should always be told my women should be skinnier. I felt on some level that it would be irresponsible to try to change it. Meaty thighs were the symbol of my defiance, so to speak, and far more often than not, the shapes (and shapelessness) that I had initially chosen survived my editing process.
As I got older, I first lost weight and then gained weight. The losing weight part simultaneously made me very pleased at being a size 2-4 and made me wonder if maybe my body would finally take on a nicer and more idealized shape if I could get to 0-2. The gaining weight part I mostly attribute to hitting adulthood and stress eating through the first few years of uni, but despite the gain I shed a lot of insecurity. My art got better, too, needless to say. My girls also got skinnier and bustier. Again, part of this has to do strictly with an improved understanding of proportion and anatomy... But I still think that it has a lot to do with me, personally. Feeling better about myself made it less important to see myself in my own work, though the shapes I default to are still similar.
Despite this, though, the critique keeps coming. I submitted one of my pieces for critique and stopped working on it when the well-meaning analyst told me "boobs bigger, thighs smaller," complete with a bunch of reference pictures of girls with legs that look nothing like mine. Objectively, she was at least sort of right, and both those areas needed adjustment. I couldn't bring myself to change it. Last year I asked a friend for critique on one of my portrait pictures. She drew me a redline that must have cut 20 inches off the waistline I drew. I compromised at 10. I still worry people will think it looks fat when the person being represented is no such thing.
So. My principles and self-image are caught up in my art, and sometimes my art is wrong because of it, but other times my art is "wrong" because of it. I don't know how to navigate this. Do other artists struggle with this? Is it obvious to people who look at my art? Do most people think my girls are too fat/skinny to be acceptable? Is anyone else as grateful as I am when they run into Ladies With Thighs? Or fanart where body shapes you're already familiar with are rounded up rather than down? I don't really know. And I don't really know what I'm doing about it when I'm drawing.
I do, however, know that I am investing a lot of thought into whether or not my ladies are thin enough, and that I have been consciously reshaping things into something more "acceptable." I don't know if I'm feeling shamed and anxious enough to start trimming everyone down or if I'm just getting more flexible as an artist and happy enough with myself to compromise, but it disturbs me that I can't seem to figure out the difference.