Title of my entry: Femealien



 

IDEA / THOUGHTS - BEHIND THE PAINTING

When I saw the theme of this art contest I just could not resist seeing if I could come up with something.

For me, "Futuristic" means Sci-fi.
I am a huge Sci-fi fan with pretty much all films I watch being Sci-fi related.

My interest in Sci-fi began very early in life when I was given a Dan Dare annual for Christmas.
The bright colours of the aliens captured my imagination and took me into fantastical worlds in which I could escape to. Due to having severe asthma I was badly bullied at school and so when I came home I would dive into these alien worlds to help forget certain miserable days : (
         
To a fledgling artist, seeing the different coloured aliens was positively hypnotic. Funny how we often imagine alien races looking like us but with different coloured skin, also with big eyes, pointy ears and broth red lips lol.
Blue or green skin seems to be the popular choice in anything Sci-fi related.
As I grew into my teens I advanced to watching Star Trek to feed my Sci-fi addiction. Once again aliens with green or blue skin were portrayed. Even today this theme is used so perhaps it has become somewhat the norm.

Thought: Could I fall in love with an alien?

I decided to begin with this idea of aliens having blue or green skin. As a male of the species I prefer to paint women so that was decision number two. Personally, the idea of green skin is somewhat off-putting. I suppose the idea is perhaps related to the green of nature, but for me it also suggests rotting or infected meat - as in gangrene.
Sorry no, I don't believe I could fall in love with a female alien who had green skin.
Blue then?  Well it's better than green but is has a cold feel about it. Perhaps alien with blue skin live on planets similar to the antarctic?
This brought me to the next stage.

What is the alien environment like ?
I envisioned a rather colourful world that had lakes formed from unknown chemicals. Poison to drink for human-beings but not for the natives of course. Clean water instinctively looks fresh to us, but would it possible to create liquid that looked alien but still had this freshness feel to it?  
I thought about this a lot and came up with the idea of combining pinks and cyan blues. Blue is an obvious choice, but pink? Well the pink came from my love of strawberry ice-cream. There is nothing like fresh strawberry ice-cream on a hot summer day.  (Oh no, now I want one lol )

OK so the alien "water" is sorted out, but what about the landscape. Hmm tricky:
Well if the planet was rather cold and the "water" is made from various colourful chemicals, then perhaps the landscape would be rather rocky with strange algae plant-life of exaggerated colours . Perhaps right reds and fresh greens. The reds I could then match with the red lips to help combine the whole image together. This is a common trick used by artists. 

Ok back to the female-alien

Try as I might, I just could not imagine myself falling in love with an alien with blue skin. Sorry, my fem-alien has to have human-like skin. I guess skin colour as well as hair colour, is a personal preference for us all. I have always been partial to red hair. The fiery colour suggests a fiery personality, which is often true of course. I imagined that an alien that lived in a cold environment would perhaps have to keep themselves warm with having a natural high blood temperature. The red hair would be a clue to suggest this.
However, just because the blood is fiery, it does not automatically mean the personality would be. I think that an alien living on a cold planet would have a cool personality. Not cold, but cool, calm and collected. Their relationships would perhaps be one that was more spiritually based rather than physically based. They would be deep thinkers who read and wrote spiritual poems. Perhaps their internet would be driven by a kind of spiritual porn : )

OK time to get started

I only just saw the art contest today so it seems i have not got much time.
So I must work small. However, working small does not mean easier, but it seems I will have to work quickly.
I am not known to be a fast painter but here we go.
A simple design letting the colour do most of the work.
As we know the female-alien is spiritual and so thoughtful and so she sits in a thoughtful/thinking pose.
I placed a rock in the "water" above her head to represent a "big thought".

   

Using cheap watercolours the finished piece took me over 6 hours to complete. As I said, I am not a fast painter but I am rather pleased with the result. 

Here she is - Femalien - what do you think?
 

Whether or not I win a prize I give thanks to @juliakponsford for organising the contest. Such events are very positive to Steemit as they encourage active participation which is, IMO very healthy.

@arthuradamson