my journey was started out in 2014 and I
initially started off as a children’s
face painter back then when I started
out I was in University and I was
pursuing my degree in HR Human Resources
so I had a lot of friends and family
that mocked me for choosing to be a kids
face painter we would go back to class
and have assignments where a lot of my
batch mates were interning at like
Unilever
PNG and the like and I was always the
odd one out because I chose to follow an
unconventional career path such as
becoming an artist so I think it’s not
enough for me because I was really
passionate about art I enjoyed you know
colors understanding design the way
things mix on canvas versus on the human
body and that passion further grew into
me wanting to understand the science
behind makeup now I went to school for
makeup as well and I realized that there
is so much of learning and so much of
science that goes behind understanding
shadows/highlights how colors look on
film or in nature versus how they look
on a person’s face so I started
experimenting and trying makeup
transformations on my own face so if you
see on the slide the pictures on the
right is in fact me and the picture on
the left is off a famous person or a
celebrity that I was trying to imitate
so this is the former One Direction band
member Zayn Malik and that’s me on the
right and you can see how just using
makeup you can actually transform
yourself to look like another gender or
from someone from a different race or a
different nationality for that matter
and that’s something that really amazes
me about
make up and being an artist the next one
is off mrs. Indira Gandhi who was a
politician in India and this was very
interesting for me because it involved a
lot of old-age makeup and that’s a lot
of you know science behind understanding
where humans naturally tend to crease or
have wrinkles or have aged or sagging
skin so I think this was a bit of a
challenge but it was definitely
something that taught me a lot more and
if you guys follow the TV show Game of
Thrones you would know this character
Khal Drogo that’s me on the right and
this was exceptionally hard for me to
recreate because I had to actually
attach a fake beard onto my chin but I
think this was one of my most favorite
transformations really because it
involved so much of character and so
much of interest because I was following
the TV show at the time so I was really
inspired and I think the fact with with
makeup transformations I really enjoy
how I envisioned or I picture it to look
a certain way but when I’m actually done
it looks like something completely
different let me educate you a little
bit on what makeup transformations
really are so you’ve got three types of
makeup transformations
the first one is ideally beauty or
glamour which people are commonly aware
of and they are they know off so this
one is basically you’d see a half face
where she is completely completely
transformed these are usually practiced
on Brides or you know at salons and this
is by a famous beauty blogger
in the u.s. her name is Nicki and she
started a very big campaign called the
power of makeup where she encouraged
women to you know post pictures of
themselves bare face as well and embrace
both sides
and then you’ve got creative makeup
transformations that involve the use of
face and body paints this
is my personal favorite she’s a Korean
artist named Dane and she uses a lot of
illusion optical illusion styles in her
makeup and the third one is my personal
favorite it’s mimics makeup which is
basically trying to transform your face
your existing face into looking like
someone completely different so that’s
me on the right and you might be
wondering how I managed to achieve the
hairline and I mean the bald head which
I will show you in the next video
so that’s ideally how I transform myself
thank you it’s very interesting because
I look like a different person every day
when when my family comes back home they
don’t see Alicia they see someone
completely different so I think the
power of makeup is that it has the
ability for a person to express
themselves just the way they are or who
they would like to be seen as and I
think when you are an artist why would
you limit yourself to eight basic colors
or inexpensive tools to get the job done
I think it goes beyond that because it’s
art and the stereotype or the notion
that makeup is about making someone look
pretty or someone look beautiful needs
to change because in I in fact believe
that it’s purely an art form and there’s
a lot of science that goes behind
understanding makeup and how it works so
this led me to actually researching a
lot about just faces really all around
the world I was very interested to
understand how is it that we live in a
world where there are seven billion
people but we all have different faces
from one another so I think that made me
research a little more and obviously I
discovered through you know the
evolution of humans that our faces have
tend to change much more than other body
traits so for example someone who’s got
long limbs will probably have long arms
but someone who’s got a close set of
eyes will probably have a small or a
wide nose faces are a bit unpredictable
that way now I was interested to further
research and this is an example for my
personal life because my mother is one
among twins identical twins so growing
up I had a lot of friends who said oh
that’s that’s so interesting that’s so
cool can you tell the difference can you
tell apart between your mom and your
aunt and I would always say yeah of
course I can I mean they look
really different but to my friends or
just to someone else this changes they
would always get confused and they
always said they look exactly the same
so I’m going to show you in the next
slide a picture of exactly what they
look like and we’ll just go over
differences that a makeup artist would
see versus what you know Norma normal I
would see that’s a picture of my mother
she’s in the green dress and her twin
sister
that’s them when they were younger now
if you ask me they look a lot alike when
they were younger compared to now do you
agree so I think the the reason is that
nature and nurture both play a very
important role
the thing with identical twins is they
are born and they carry they carry the
same DNA the exact same DNA the only
difference is that as you grow up you
have a lot of physical changes in the
environment that change how you look so
that could be sleep patterns what you
eat sicknesses how you react to things
so I think if you if you look closely
you can see that they’ve got completely
different smiles my mum’s smile is very
very long whereas my aunt’s smile is
very wide they’ve got different noses
they’ve got a different hairline they’ve
got different foreheads they’ve got
different hair completely which is funny
because when you think of how they they
looked when they were younger it was so
similar so I think as a makeup artist
you have a lot of research and a lot of
study that goes into how faces look when
they are younger versus when they are
older how they look under you know
sunlight or how they look under shadow
and I think the best part about being a
makeup artist is envisioning what your
look is going to look like and actually
seeing what the outcome is so I think I
would like to leave you guys with a few
questions if you had the power or the
the ability to transform yourself into
anyone almost anyone who would that be
and why because I truly believe makeup
is art and art speaks where words fail
to explain as an artist I feel like you
can bend things
that most people see as a straight line
so I am an artist moreover a makeup
artist and this is my world thank you [Applause]