Throughout my childhood I was obsessed with drawing, painting, collaging, you name it - art was my thing. Since growing up, I have had little time for the hobby I so greatly enjoyed, which I have often felt sad about.
However, on the 23rd of March 2020, when Boris said what we were all fearfully anticipating, that we were entering lockdown - I was deeply upset to have been uncontrollably removed from my first year at university, separated from my friends and violently pushed into a territory of the unknown. Not knowing what the future would hold, my parents tried to make it all okay - they highlighted whilst the world sucked, we would never get an opportunity like this again to just 'be'. They rightfully stated this was a time I could focus on myself, and get back into hobbies I previously didn't have time for - including art.
That evening, I went online and ordered a new sketchbook, new paints and new drawing pencils and felt my creative juices already flowing. Over the next few weeks and months, I began to fill up my sketchbook with drawings and paintings - it became a form of escapism for me. It was time when I didn't think about how I was missing possibly the best year of my life, I couldn't see my cousins and I was separated from my boyfriend and all my friends.
Days merged into weeks, and weeks into months - this was how lockdown felt for me. I therefore often found people's birthdays creeping up on me unexpectedly. With most shops closed, buying good and thoughtful birthday gifts proved difficult, and I had the brainwave of using my art as a way of solving this problem; hence my form of escapism merged with my reality. I began a project of drawing people's homes, as a gift for them - the responses I gained were moving and it has cemented the thought that I should not lose touch with my art again.
The irony is not lost on me that I started drawing other people's homes whilst stuck in my own home - hence the title of this story: homes at home!