When I was 12, I was traveling through the U.S. with my sister, staying at a friend’s house on the beach in Santa Monica.
He had an impressive art collection, and one piece in particular caught my eye, a portrait of himself, depicting how he might look in old age. The image was unsettling, and I couldn’t understand why he’d want something like that hanging on his wall.
When I asked, he explained that the idea was simple: as he aged, he would always look better than the portrait. It made sense in a strange way.
Years later, on my 30th birthday, I decided to create my own version, an artistic projection of what I might look like in my 40s.
Turns out, I was way off. I didn’t end up looking like a seafaring pirate, and I definitely should have realised that my part-Indonesian genes wouldn’t allow me to grow a proper beard.
I recently stumbled across this piece while digging through old music files I created around the same time. It’s now titled Ageing Gracefully.
The image was made in Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop CS3 using an old Wacom tablet. I also remember experimenting with Photoshop actions that, as far as I know, no longer exist—making this piece nearly impossible to replicate today.
Device: MacBook Pro 2008 Model & Wacom Tablet
Apps: Illustrator & Photoshop
