pink papillon

I've been meaning to do a breast cancer awareness piece for ages now, so i couldn't pass up the PiNKiTUDE contest. Nearly everyone has been touched by breast cancer in some way - for me it was my grandmother and her sister both losing a breast to cancer when they were younger.

The brief for the contest required we express the PiNKiTUDE attitude in some way. These are the attributes:

_{PiNKiTUDE is a pink attitude that says you are bold and take chances.
PiNKiTUDE is caring about body and spirit.
PiNKiTUDE is style that stands out in a sea of black and grey.
PiNKiTUDE is whimsical, sexy, intelligent and altogether fun!}

I wanted my piece to be uplifting, which is why I used the butterflies coming from the ribbon. Butterflies represent the human soul, as well as 'rebirth' after a period of transition.

The girls earrings, necklace and ring are all Pink Panther icons, because that's who Susan G. Komen for the Cure has teamed up with.

The aim of the competition is to promote early detection as the key to breast cancer prevention among young women and teens. I figured that this style of art would be more appealing to that target demographic, with the bold bright sparklie colours (like CD cover art by Jason Brooks)... and look! no outlines for once!

And why the white afro? You'd have to be bold to pull off a hairstyle like that! Plus I wanted this piece to be kind of 'ethnicity-neutral'... I didn't want to use the stereotypical 'blond haired girl with flowing locks'... that and I really wanted to do a pearlescent afro!

To those who comment or - thank you for the support, both for breast cancer awareness and my art