For today's theme/topic, I decided to give the spotlight to the characters who are artists. I had other ideas for today's freebie but this one came along while I was doing some mouth/lips studies on my sketchpad. So here it is.

I've encountered A LOT of artistic characters through my years of reading though. I just decided to showcase these ten.. because I have these books as e-books (I do have some of these in physical copies too) and I added some quotes here. It's easier to search for said quotes (or certain words) when you're using an e-reader though lol.

" But I have to remember what else my company means to me. What it has been. How it's saved me. It was an outlet where I could be creative despite my mother's constant nagging. I used to come home, rub my abused toes from pointe shoes, and sketch on my bed, in private. I was twelve. I was thirteen. Fourteen. I found solace in fashion. I found peace and happiness."

" I get it. But I don't think of what I can do is talent or a gift. It's an escape."

"But can't you feel what it does to the people who watch you act? It's like a gift of transportation. An escape for us too."

"I'm glad it can be that for you. For anyone watching. But for me... it's all I have."

"I feel the same. Like I was a little bit lost and then Hamlet fell into my lap. To help me find my way again. That sounds all kinds of dramatic. And probably silly."

"It's not silly. Things happen for a reason, I guess."

" For a second, I have this vision of just the two of us in some anonymous hotel room somewhere dickering around, her on her cello, me on my guitar, playing this song I wrote for her. And shit, if that doesn't make me so damn happy."

" Ever since I was a kid, music has always been an escape for me. When I sing, the world disappears. It's just me and the music and the deep sense of tranquility that I've never been able to find anywhere else, no matter how hard I try."

" It had almost been four years since I'd danced in front of an audience. Four years, I tried to tell myself it wasn't a big deal; Iris and Ivy was a far cry from a big dance company. But it was a huge fucking deal. I'd begun to wonder if the dancer version of myself was gone forever, still locked up behind bars even after the drug-addict had been released.

But it's still here. Me. I'm still here."

" I thought about how excited Adrian had been after only a couple classes, how he'd thrown himself into the art. His face has been radiating when he stood in his "gallery". Jill's words also echoed through my mind, about how the art had given him something to channel his feelings into."

" Clary, you're an artist, like your mother. That means you see the world in ways that other people don't. It's your gift, to see the beauty and the horror in ordinary things. It doesn't make you crazy—just different. There's nothing wrong with being different."

" Emilia wore her weird personality like a billboard, proud and loud. From the way she dressed to how she was always covered in paint and doodled cherry blossoms everywhere."

" New experiences would give me new images and emotions to draw from for my art. I usually painted what I knew, what I'd seen in my life or in pictures. I didn't rely on emotion or pushing myself to feel or see or try new things."

" Julian had been in the dream too. She didn't know exactly what she'd dreamed, but she'd woken up with a clear picture of him in her mind—tall, slender Jules, with his dark brown curls and startling blue-green eyes. His dark lashes, and pale skin, the way he bit his nails when he was under stress, his confident handling of weapons and even more confident handling of brushes and paints."

AND THAT'S IT.
How about you, what's your theme/topic? :)