Tammie is a State of Mind Peer Mentor and Platfform4YP reporter, her incredible art skills will be on display this week on our Vimeo page and she wanted to share an introduction to her work with you all here to get you all excited!
Just think about when you put a pair of wired earphones into your pocket: Do you notice that, when you take them out again, the wires are always so tangled together? That’s what my mind feels like – a tangled mess of thoughts. If I doodle these thoughts out though, it’s like unraveling those headphones until they form a straight line. It makes my headspace clearer, even if my doodles seem to be a bit chaotic.
Don’t get me wrong though – some of the doodles are just completely random. I create doodles because I find it easy to flow from one shape into another. It’s very different from other art; other art like realism can be stressful when you’re trying to get it “right”. That’s why I use a pen; it forces me to “embrace any mistakes”. For example, if I do any accidental marks or wobbly line work, I can’t rub it out, instead, I change plans and turn them into apples, or snakes, etc.
A lot of my doodles are cartoony because I like them to remain positive; I’ve done some darker doodles before, but I noticed that they didn’t help my mood as much. So, you’ll see things like cats, mountains, musical notes, coffee cups, trees, and swans within my doodles.
In the doodles shown on the Platfform4YP Vimeo page, I use the State of Mind programme to doodle each week, basing what to include as a doodle on each week’s topic. Although, not all of the content will relate to the State of Mind, because my mind might go on tangents when doodling. Enjoy seeing if you can notice when these moments happen!