Today I have an amazing friend to share with you. Patricia first emailed me less than a month ago but I already feel like we've been friends forever. We've bonded over our brutal honesty, love for life, and need for therapeutic girl talk. She's visiting us today to tell you all about herself and because she's awesome she's giving away a custom art portrait of you or anyone you want! I might secretly enter this one... Okay, maybe not. But I'm tempted! I'm sure you'll all love Patricia as much as I do.
Edit (5/16) Patricia has had a personal problem with her online presence and changed her online status. This giveaway is still going on but I've changed it to include ways to follow me instead of her since everything she has is now private. If you've already entered all your entries still count, BUT you can also enter in the new ways. I'm sorry for any inconvenience. Thank you for supporting us both!
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First off, hello all you readers!!! If you're already following this blog I totally don't need to tell you how awesome Sue is, but I will anyway. SHE'S AWESOME. It's only slightly creepy that I feel so close to, and want to hug, a stranger from the internet who lives in Japan, right? Well, I hope so.
My name is Patricia, and I blog over at Little Red Writing Hood which is my beautifully decorated place to rant and rave and post way too many pictures of things I find beautiful! Let me introduce myself a little better.
Find me here:
This is me. I like red hair a lot. A LOT. I also like video games as you can maybe see by the Zelda tattoo. I want to be a novelist, but I also want to be a firefighter. I like storytelling and adventure. In fact I like adventure so much I go on random trips sometimes, alone, just to adventure around. My biggest adventures were the two times I visited the country I'm obsessed with: Sweden! On my blog I talk a lot about Sweden. And also my friends, and also being socially awkward, and also art.
I make a lot of art. I paint using acrylics. It's always been a hobby and deep, deep love of mine. In fact I used to get in trouble for drawing during class in school, from kindergarten right up until I graduated with honors. Teachers are cranky. I can say this because I was a teacher. I actually taught art for two years to first-graders. Seeing children have the same enthusiasm that I had was priceless. I really bonded with my students, and even other teachers, over my abilities. I am an expressive person to the few people who know me well, but I use painting to convey my feelings to the rest of the world, which I have a difficult time opening up to. My art has made its way around the world, too! I have paintings in Sweden, England, Germany, and Japan!!!
It blows my mind that people actually like my work. I consider art my "diary" and nothing more than that. I don't think I could ever make a career out of it because the pressure to create would skyrocket. Being a perfectionist, I'd probably take all the fun out of my beloved hobby. Still, I do make custom pictures here and there, and many of my paintings have been given as gifts. At the insistence of some art-inclined friends I've participated in several art shows and sold a few pieces online, though my Etsy is horribly barren due to lack of interest and deep-seated hatred of Paypal.
A little while back I wrote this little blog entry about why I painted a portrait of Rachele from The Nearsighted Owl. I had no idea how it was to paint a portrait of someone I actually knew (well, from the internet anyway) as most of my art is fantasy and has no real human influence, except the rare self-portrait. I really liked the experience of painting someone from life and have been longing to try it again. Which is where the idea of this giveaway came from!!!!
Hooray! You can enter to win a picture of you, or your boyfrand, or your doggie, or Brad Pitt, or Prince William, or whoever the heck you want to hang on your wall!! The paper I use is very sturdy and I leave the framing up to you! You can go as thrifty or as extravagant as you want... it is your custom piece of art after all.
Good luck to all who enter and thanks for supporting the Fine Arts!!! I will leave you with this:
"Are we to paint what's on the face, what's inside the face, or what's behind it?"
Pablo Picasso
