March Art Challenge: Week One

Contemporary in Diversity - #artstackcreators

This week was a creative challenge that I enjoyed.

March 1: Self-Portrait Beyond the Mirror – Represent your identity without using a literal self-portrait

Celestial Essence (2025)

Celestial Essence
Digital Painting – Abstract Expressionism

Drifting between the cosmos and consciousness, Celestial Essence is a self-portrait that transcends the physical form, unraveling identity through color, movement, and celestial abstraction. A luminous golden sphere radiates in the upper corner, its glow merging into the deep void of electric blues and cosmic greens, embodying the duality of illumination and mystery within the self.

A sweeping ring of energy, imperfect yet whole, encircles the heart of the piece—a symbol of cycles, destiny, and the infinite nature of self-discovery. Scattered stars pulse across the expanse, like fragments of memory, dreams, and experiences that shape existence beyond the mirror. Vibrant bursts of neon pinks and radiant yellows interrupt the darkness, representing the unseen layers of identity—the emotions, the resilience, and the rebellion against definition.

This is not a portrait of what is seen but of what is felt, an exploration of self as a celestial body constantly evolving, shifting, and expanding in the vastness of possibility.

March 2: Cultural Echoes – How does heritage influence contemporary life?

Cultural Echoes (2025)

Cultural Echoes
Digital Painting – Abstract Expressionism

A rhythmic fusion of past and present, Cultural Echoes is a visual hymn to Black culture and African spirituality—an abstract representation of the ways heritage pulses through contemporary life. The bold, interwoven lines evoke ancestral drumbeats, each stroke reverberating like a call to history, while the layered patterns mirror the sacred geometry found in African textiles, masks, and spiritual symbology.

The circular motifs, resembling ancestral portals, speak to the cyclical nature of time—where tradition, memory, and identity continuously fold into the present. Red, a color of power, resistance, and spiritual vitality, weaves through the composition, embodying the fire of lineage and transformation. The layered textures distort and shift, much like culture itself—fluid, evolving, yet eternally grounded in its origins.

At the core of Cultural Echoes is the unspoken dialogue between past and future: How does the wisdom of our ancestors shape the ways we navigate the modern world? How do we carry their resilience, their artistry, their spirit, into new forms of expression? This piece is not just an homage—it is a reminder that the echoes of our roots are never lost; they are simply waiting to be heard in a new rhythm.

March 3: The Power of Names – Explore the significance of names in identity

Ashun (2025)

Ashun
Digital Painting – Abstract Typography & Symbolism

A name is more than a word—it is a vibration, a legacy, a spiritual imprint that carries the essence of one’s identity. Ashun explores the power of names as a force of self-definition and ancestral connection. Repeated in layered distortion, the name ripples like an echo through time, symbolizing how identity is spoken into existence and reinforced through generations.

The deep, cosmic purples evoke a sense of mysticism and sacred energy, while the fluid, wave-like engravings in the background suggest an unseen language—ancestral whispers guiding the present. Each repetition of Ashun is both the same and different, reflecting the way a name evolves in meaning through personal growth and cultural shifts.

Is a name simply given, or is it lived into? Does it shape the bearer, or does the bearer redefine it? Ashun invites viewers to contemplate the weight of their own names—their histories, their hidden power, and the identities they carve into existence.

March 4: Duality – The intersections of race, gender, nationality, and more.

Parallel Assassins (2025)

Parallel Assassins
Digital Collage – Surrealism & Afrofuturism

Identity exists in a constant state of flux—intersecting, conflicting, and harmonizing within the same body. Parallel Assassins visualizes the layered complexity of duality, where race, gender, power, and allegiance weave together in a relentless negotiation of self.

The composition fractures reality, splitting faces, figures, and landscapes into overlapping dimensions. A lone figure walks toward an uncertain horizon, embodying the perpetual journey of identity formation. A woman’s face, partially obscured and multiplied, signifies the tension between visibility and erasure—who gets to be seen, and who is forced to operate in the shadows? The presence of regal African adornment contrasts with contemporary imagery, reinforcing the link between ancestry and futurism, tradition and evolution.

In this world of assassins, every identity carries a mission. To exist is to navigate borders—cultural, political, and personal. The piece poses a question: Are we defined by the roles imposed upon us, or do we rewrite our own narrative across parallel realities?

Through Parallel Assassins, the viewer is invited to contemplate the ways in which identity is simultaneously a mask, a weapon, and a home.

March 5: Modern Mythologies – Reimagine folklore and personal legends in today’s context

Finaty (2018)

Finaty
Traditional Drawing – Mythological Surrealism

In the age of artificial gods and digital folklore, Finaty emerges as a modern myth—a guardian of liminality, existing between the physical and the unseen. With glowing eyes that seem to perceive beyond time and a heart illuminated from within, Finaty embodies the mythos of transformation, resilience, and the search for authenticity in a world of illusions.

Set against a cosmic-red void, the figure appears both childlike and ancient, an oracle of a new mythology where emotion is the divine language. Their asymmetrical gaze suggests dual perception—one eye tethered to the tangible world, the other seeing into the unknown. The heart emblazoned on their chest pulses like a beacon, a reminder that even in an era of cynicism, belief in oneself remains sacred.

Finaty is neither hero nor villain, but an evolving legend—one who walks the threshold of identity, carrying the myths of the past into the uncertain terrain of the future. Their story is still being written, shaped by those who dare to imagine new narratives of existence.

March 6: Unfinished Histories – What stories of identity are still untold?

Aries Fire
Digital GIF – Motion Collage & Symbolism

Some stories are never written, only felt—like fire burning through generations, like heat rising from the ashes of what was. Aries Fire is a visual reckoning with the untold, the erased, and the silenced narratives of identity that still demand to be seen. A figure engulfed in flames stands at the center, neither consumed nor extinguished, but suspended in the raw energy of transformation.

The bold, blue “X” slashes across the image—a mark of defiance, of censorship, of power reclaimed. Is it a denial or a statement? A refusal to be forgotten or an act of erasure? The fire rages on beneath it, a force that cannot be contained, embodying the Aries spirit of unrelenting will, rebirth, and destruction as a path to creation.

In a world where history often favors the victor, Aries Fire asks: Who writes the past? What identities have been set ablaze, only to rise again in flickers of memory, in whispers, in untold stories waiting for their moment to ignite?

This piece pulses with motion, refusing to be still—because history is never finished, and neither is the fire.

March 7: Invisible Borders – Language, nationality, and unseen barriers

Our Verse (2025)

Our Verse
Multimedia Digital Artwork – Abstract Cartography & Symbolism

What separates us—borders, language, culture—or what connects us? Our Verse is an exploration of invisible barriers, the unseen forces that shape identity, belonging, and movement. A chaotic web of symbols, textures, and organic forms stretch across the canvas, resembling an otherworldly map where lines are drawn not by politics, but by experience.

The layered distortions mimic the shifting nature of borders—some built, some broken, some existing only in the mind. Circular motifs pulse like portals, signifying migration, ancestry, and the way histories ripple beyond imposed divisions. A spectral hand reaches outward, grasping at something unseen, embodying the struggle to transcend restrictions, to forge connection beyond the walls placed in front of us.

Glitch-like distortions reflect the digital era, where identities move fluidly across screens, defying traditional boundaries of nationality and place. Yet, in this interconnected reality, who is still being kept out? Whose voices remain unheard?

Our Verse asks the viewer to step beyond the borders they know, to consider a world where identity is not defined by separation, but by the verses we contribute to the greater collective story.