30SAL Challenge: Before & After

Welcome to the 30 Day Challenge

The goal of the 30 Day Challenge is to start the new year with a creative habit. The challenges are diverse, and open to all.

Before & After. We start our 30 Day Creative Challenge with two separate self portraits: one as you imagine you were on January 1, 2020, and the other are you are today, on January 1, 2021.

Materials are artist’s choice. You can draw, paint, print, photograph, collage, assemblage, or sculpt yourself in butter. Anything goes.

Set a timer for 20 minutes. When the timer chimes complete, feel free to continue if you wish, but whatever you completed in 20 minutes is a win.

Post your work to social media with the tag #30sal & #seattleartistleague, and look for others with those tags. It’s fun to see all the artworks pop up!

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Alternate 30SAL Challenge

Make a 2020 Comic

As a possible alternative to the 30sal challenge, you can make a comic book based on the year 2020. A comic is storytelling through sequential art (more about this soon). This comic could have any number of sketches, from a single page to all 30, and artists can work in teams. This is open to all levels. Stick figures and crayons welcome! The 2020 Comic will be an ongoing alternate challenge, and there will be a set of alternate prizes just for the 2020 Comics. If this interests you, please see below for a recap of 2020, or use your own events. Today’s before/after could be inspiration for your first and last page.

Here’s a recap of 2020

We have had quite a decade in the last year. We started off with Australian brush fires while the covid-19 pandemic spread in China. A helicopter crashed with Kobe in it. The president was impeached and then acquitted.  Hollywood Harvey was convicted of sexual abuse. Covid-19 spread in the United States, and the rest of the world. Social distancing was implemented, and what used to be an American standard of 18″ of space between us quickly became 6′. Not a single store in Seattle had a roll of toilet paper, or a bottle of bleach. Non-essential businesses closed. Schools shut down, or did they, yes they’re shut down, or are they, no – sorry, definitely shut down, wait… yeah no. Moms’ careers took a big hit and zooming became a thing. And we’re wearing masks now, mostly, and no one’s leaving their house. It became totally normal to pay people to shop for you, and health care workers went to war. Every single available dog and puppy in the US got adopted. Streets were empty, oceans quiet, and for about fifteen minutes the environmental movement looked optimistic. The Dow dropped the most ever points in one day. Police murdered George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, and Breonna Taylor. Then the police kept murdering more Black people, “defund the police” became a phrase people say, and white people read up on racism. Black Lives Matter became what might be the largest social movement in US history. Epstein’s Madam Maxwell was arrested on sex trafficking charges, and the president (yup, still the president) wished her well. 2” murder hornets arrived in Washington state. An accidental detonation of ammonium nitrate killed nearly 200 people in Beirut. Biden became the democratic nominee, and Kamala Harris became the Democratic VP candidate, making her the first Black woman and the first Asian woman on a major party ticket. Black Panther movie hero Chadwick Boseman died. Deadly wildfires raged California, Oregon, and Washington state. Supreme Court Justice hero Ruth Bader Ginsburg died. Trump got covid, lost the election, then staged a coup. Biden and Harris won the election (over, and over, and over, and over, and over), but there’s still a coup. Who is the beloved Alex Trebek, died of cancer. Covid-19 vaccines were released, aaaaaaand I’m sure I missed some things here.  It’s even possible you even had your own personal events in 2020. Did you???