There’s something humbling about drawing with pen. Every stroke counts. There's no undo button, no second chances just commitment, confidence, and intention. When I sat down to draw a mother and child, I knew I wanted that sense of permanence to reflect the quiet strength of their relationship.
The composition was simple, but meaningful: the mother seated, grounded and calm, while her child stood beside her, upright, leaning in slightly that moment between dependence and independence
. There’s a story in that posture alone. And I wanted to tell it using nothing but ink and patience.
I chose cross-hatching as my primary technique not only for its ability to render light and shadow, but because it mirrors the way life builds upon itself. Layer after layer. Line after line. Just like the emotional texture between a parent and child, cross-hatching creates depth through repetition and rhythm.
I started with the mother’s posture her body at rest, but not idle. Her form needed to feel anchored, so my lines were more dense here. I pressed the pen with purpose, building the folds of her clothing, the curve of her back, and the stillness in her hands resting on her lap. Her face held a quiet expression, not overly detailed, but softened with just enough cross-hatched shading to suggest peace or perhaps tiredness maybe both.
The child stood upright, a little unsteady, maybe around three or four years old. There was a beautiful contrast here: the mother seated in stability, and the child reaching for independence, yet still turning toward her. I kept the hatching on the child’s figure a bit lighter, more open. The strokes were looser, suggesting movement — the bounce of young limbs, the curiosity in their posture, the way a child is never truly still.
What struck me as I worked was how much space existed between them not just physically, but emotionally. And yet, despite that space, you can feel the connection. A subtle lean. The way the mother's eyes follow the child. The way the child's hand brushes the mother's arm, almost absentmindedly, as if saying, “I’m here, still tethered to you.”
With pen, there’s no hiding. Every choice shows. I didn’t use pencil first — that was intentional. I wanted to trust myself with each mark, and more importantly, to trust the drawing to become what it needed to be. Some lines were bold, others tentative. Just like parenting.
The background stayed minimal — I used just enough hatching to ground them in space, but left most of it open. This wasn’t about setting — it was about presence.
By the end, the image felt more than visual. It felt like memory. Like something you might glimpse in your mind years later —soft, layered, imperfect, but deeply felt.
And that’s really what I was after. Not realism, but truth told one line at a time.
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