ultramarine

Inspired by Ultramarine《群青》by YOASOBI and the Blue Period animated series illustrated by Tsubasa Yamaguchi.

“This road I chose for myself
In the dark nights when I wipe my eyelids
The blue oath I held on to, never letting go
Continue doing what I’ve always liked doing
It isn’t as ‘fun’ as I thought
”Can I really do it?”

—Ultramarine 《群青》 by YOASOBI

I recall hearing this song while I was half asleep, as my partner looped through a j-pop playlist. Without knowing its meaning, I was moved by the vocals and music composition; then I became wide awake. Without understanding a single word, we watched the music video; and teared up a little.

In this piece are portraits referencing me (left) and my elder brother when he was performing on stage at 22 (right). Years ago, my brother shared: “Sometimes on my way to work, when the train enters the tunnel, I will sing out loud because no one can hear properly hahahaha...”—my brother and I shared the love for singing and used to join singing competitions together; I wanted to fuse this memory into this song and anime that has moved me deeply.

Process
To speed up the workflow, I adopted a different creation process for this piece. I took photos of all the different elements (train and people), traced over them and piecing them together.

In this piece of artwork, I want to remind myself the many ways of creating and on days when I am racing towards a deadline, if I can reduce the stress with a therapeutic tracing session while bringing my vision to life, what’s there to frown upon?