Thursday Art - Teal Team Tara : Tulip Tattoo

Let me first start off by saying that alliteration is my favorite part of language structure - as made obvious by today's post title!

It's been a while since I've shared any artwork (and I want to get back into posting art on here) so I'm going to share with you a tattoo design I just recently finished. 

A cousin of mine was diagnosed with stage-two cervical cancer a few years back and passed away last year on my birthday.  Since I wasn't very close to her in recent years, I felt that I needed to do something for her.  So after her passing, I set up a donation campaign called Teal Team Tara to help raise money that would help benefit her husband and her four children. 

Her passing definitely brought my family in NY closer together as my Mom and other cousins all chipped in and did what they could for the husband and the kids on a weekly basis.  And with the one year anniversary of her passing quickly approaching, I was asked by the family to design a memorial tattoo.  

Tara's favorite flower was the tulip and her favorite color was purple.  From there, I started sketching.  It needed to have the teal ribbon (though, usually it's shown as a white and teal ribbon).  After the first sketch, my Mom asked if I could make it look like the ribbon was the leaves of the flower and to also include her names and the dates. 

Here are the stages that this tattoo underwent:

Initially, in my original sketch, I was just doodling and didn't really go off of reference.  Once I found the reference I needed, they artwork greatly improved!!  Haha!

I did throw in a few little hidden hearts, both in overall shape of the petals, as well as silhouetted by the piece itself - which you can see below:

And once I was finished with shading and the like, I added the name and dates.  And then I remembered that the ribbon is usually white & teal, but teal is also used interchangeably.  So I did some color correction and a bit of repainting and gave them a teal and white option as well.

My Mom, my Aunt, Tara's two sisters, Tara's oldest daughter and her niece would all be getting this tattoo.  I believe they're all going sometime this month or next, so I'll post photos when they're all done!

It's pretty funny, but when I sent this picture to my mother (and the group), I talked to my mother later that day and she told me that she was in tears because she was so happy!  Yay!


Also, side-note - apologies for the watermarks, I would just like for these to NOT be stolen.