Sugar Skull

My latest work is a commission for someone who loves sugar skulls. 

Sugar skulls are brightly decorated skulls given and displayed during the celebrations of el Día de Los Muertos and All Souls' Day. 

I began with a sketch to get a feel for what I colors I'd like to use.

I traced my sketch onto a separate piece of paper to make sure I got the shape how I wanted it.

I filled in the main details, starting with the eyes, nose, and teeth, then adding more colorful details.

I knew I wanted to add flowers, and started with some cutouts from scrapbook paper. I then added some roses into the mix.

I found the perfect paper to use as the background for the sugar skull. I adhered the skull and added some leaves around the flowers.

I was nearly done, but  had been contemplating changing the eyes, and then also determined that the rest of the skull should be filled in, so I began that process.

I was so nervous about this part, because I loved how it looked before, and I knew if I didn't like how this came out, or if I wasn't able to fill in the tricky sections, I would have to start the whole thing over from scratch.

I managed to fill it all in, and I do think it looks great! I changed the eyes by replacing the original pupil color to bring more contrast between that and the iris color.

Filling in the skull made it feel as though the rose in the bottom flower group was too close in color. It didn't stand out as much as it did from the stark white, so I changed that up too. I tried a pink rose, in a shade lighter than the ones used in the top group.

Ultimately, I decided to make a blue rose to fit with the other flowers in the grouping. So this is the final version, framed and ready to ship out!