The one drawer that is yours, pulled open and drawn from aboveDraw every layer you can see without moving a thing. What is on top, and what is hidden under it?
The wall beside your bed: every picture, ticket and scrap pinned to itCopy the real wall, gaps included. Draw each scrap as a blank shape first, then fill three.
A compass rose whose four points are the four things that guide youDraw the star with a ruler and letter a word at each point. Which one is north?
A body outline with what you love drawn where you feel itMusic at the ears, a ball at the feet, food in the middle. Leave the head empty.
A glass jar packed with twelve small things that add up to youOverlap the things so the jar looks full. Put the most important one against the glass.
A name tag that reads HELLO I AM, with a drawing where the name goesLetter the header in block capitals. One picture and no words in the white space.
A paper doll with three tabbed outfits: school, home and a celebrationLeave the doll blank and put the detail into the clothes. Which outfit fits best?
The coat hooks at home, with only yours drawn in colorPencil for everyone else's coats, color for your own. Which hook is yours, and why that one?
The one drawer that is yours, pulled open and drawn from aboveDraw every layer you can see without moving a thing. What is on top, and what is hidden under it?
The shelf above your bed, with everything on it in its real orderDraw the shelf edge to edge and leave nothing out. What would a stranger guess about you?
The snack you make when nobody is watching, drawn step by stepThree small panels: the ingredients, the making, the plate. Be honest about the mess.
The view from your window with your own things lined up on the sillDraw the sill things large and sharp and the view pale behind them. Which says more about you?
The wall beside your bed: every picture, ticket and scrap pinned to itCopy the real wall, gaps included. Draw each scrap as a blank shape first, then fill three.
Your clothes standing up with nobody inside themPose the empty sleeves the way you stand. Folds do the work a face would.
Your fingerprint enlarged to fill the sheet, a sentence along each ridgePress an inked finger, copy the loops large and write along the lines. Start with your name.
Your knees, your desk and your hands, seen from behind your own eyesDraw what you see looking down right now. The edge of the sheet is the edge of your view.
Your place at the table, seen from your own seatYour plate at the bottom edge, everyone else's across the top. No faces, only places.
Your signature written as large as the sheet will holdWrite it fast on scrap, then copy its shapes large with a brush. Keep the wobbles.
Hands and objects 15
A family recipe card held in two hands, a floury thumbprint on one cornerLetter three lines of the recipe by hand. Whose handwriting was it first?
A traced hand with a small picture of one part of your life in each fingerFive fingers, five parts: family, school, a sport, a place, a wish. The palm stays empty.
An open palm with a small object balanced on each fingertipFive fingertips, five parts of you. Put the heaviest on the thumb.
Three generations of hands on one rolling pinSmallest hands in the middle. Vary the knuckles and skin lines so each age reads.
Your hand holding a photograph of a place you rememberTilt the photo and overlap it with your thumb. Draw the place smaller than the hand.
Your hand holding your door key, the keyring charms drawn largeLet the charms hang below the fist. Each one is a clue, so draw them clearly.
Your hand mid-action with the tool of your hobbyA bow, a racket, a whisk, a controller. Draw the grip you really use, not a tidy one.
Your hands around a bowl of food your family makesThumbs over the rim, steam rising past the top edge. Name the dish in the title.
Your hands caught in the gesture your friends would know you byAsk a friend which one it is. Draw the gesture three times and keep the liveliest.
Your hands lacing the boots or gloves of your sportLaces make the rhythm, so draw every crossing. Scuffs and mud are part of the portrait.
Your hands on your instrument, with nothing else in the pictureCrop at the wrists. Draw the strings or keys straight and the fingers bent.
Your open palm with its lines redrawn as roads to places you have beenTrace your real palm lines first, then add road signs where they fork.
Your palm under your pet's paw, drawn the same sizeMatch the pads to your fingertips. Fur marks for the paw, plain line for your hand.
Your two hands cupped around the smallest thing you treasureDraw the hands large and the thing tiny. Shade the hollow between the palms darkest.
Your wrist stacked with every band and bracelet that has a storyDraw the arm as a plain tube and spend the time on the bands. Oldest nearest the hand.
Maps of a life 15
A board game track of your life so far, with a square for each big moveNumber the squares, then add two shortcuts and one square that sends you back.
A compass rose whose four points are the four things that guide youDraw the star with a ruler and letter a word at each point. Which one is north?
A door frame height chart with a small drawing beside each pencil markA tall thin sheet works best. Beside each mark, draw what you loved at that height.
A family tree drawn as a real tree, with a root for each place the family comes fromNames go on the branches and places along the roots. Draw the trunk last.
A floor plan of your home with one memory drawn in each roomRule the walls from above and keep each memory to one small picture.
A map of where your family lives, each home joined to yours by a threadDots for homes, lines for threads. Thicker lines for the people you see most.
A map of your school with a star where you feel most like yourselfDraw the building from above, in plain lines. One star, and a dotted line for your usual route.
A passport page stamped for things you have done instead of placesDesign each stamp as a simple shape with a date. Overlap two, as real pages do.
A road of your life so far, with a signpost at each age that matteredWind the road from the bottom corner to the top. Leave the last sign blank.
A suitcase lid covered in made-up stickers for every place you have sleptInvent each sticker: a shape, a color, one word. Overlap them like real ones.
An island shaped like your initial, with bays and hills named after what you loveDraw the coast wobbly, then letter the names small. Add a scale bar in your own units.
The route of one perfect Saturday, drawn as a dotted line with stopsStart and end at your bed. Mark each stop with a small picture and no words.
Your bedroom mapped as a country, with borders and a capitalThe bed might be a mountain range, the desk a port. Add a key in the corner.
Your life as a river on a map, a new stream joining for each person who came into itStart at a spring in one corner and letter a name along each stream. The river widens as it goes.
Your life drawn as tree rings, one ring for each yearStart at the center with the year you were born. Write one word in each ring.
Two halves 15
A box with the outside covered in what people see and the inside lined with what they missDraw the box open with the lid tipped back. Outside in pencil, inside in color.
A coin with two sides, each stamped with a different youDraw two circles side by side with the same rim. Heads is who you are in public.
A fruit cut in two: the skin people see and the seeds only you knowChoose the fruit for its skin. Let each seed stand for one thing you rarely say.
A house cut open: the front everyone sees and your room behind itLeft half is brick and windows, right half a cutaway. Put the most detail in your room.
A jacket split down the zipper: school clothes on one side, weekend clothes on the otherKeep one outline and change the fabric, pockets and badges. Which half took longer?
A plain hoodie unzipped to show a pattern underneathKeep the hoodie gray. The pattern inside is yours to invent: stripes, stars, a map.
A seesaw with the loud you on one end and the quiet you on the otherDraw the same figure twice, dressed alike and posed differently. Which end is on the ground today?
A small handprint set inside your handprint nowTrace your hand, then draw the small one from an old print or a photo. Then and now in one outline.
A T-shirt drawn front and back: what you say first and what people learn laterTwo shirt outlines side by side. A big simple picture on the front, small print on the back.
An iceberg: above the water what people notice, below it everything elseSmall tip, large base. Letter three words above the waterline and ten below.
Half your face from a photo, the other half built from what fills your headFold a photo down the nose and copy one side. Build the other from objects, not features.
One table set half with one home's dishes and half with the other'sFor anyone with two homes or two cultures. Draw from above, with one cloth joining both.
Two name tags: the name on the register and the one your friends useLetter the first in neat print and the second the way a friend would write it.
Two rooms you call yours, side by side, with one thing that travels between themUse the same viewpoint for both rooms. Draw the traveling thing on the line between.
Your name lettered in two styles that meet in the middleNeat on the left, wild on the right. The middle letter has to belong to both.
How it works
These identity art ideas show who you are without a mirror portrait. They are sorted by form: a self-portrait without a face, hands and objects, maps of a life, and pictures in two halves. Each note turns the idea toward your own life.
Read the full guide
Ideas for an identity art project with hands and an object
The Hands and objects group is built for that brief. Choose the object before you start, and draw the hands from life.
Identity drawing without a likeness
The other three groups leave the face out or cut it in half. A map shows where you have been. Two halves show the sides of you that rarely meet.
Choose a real thing from your own room. It says more than a symbol anyone could pick.
For a hands drawing, pose the hand you do not draw with, or work from a photo of both.
Questions and answers
What can I draw for an identity art project?
Draw your hands around a bowl of food your family makes, your life as tree rings with a word in each, a jacket split between school and weekend, or the shelf above your bed exactly as it is.
How do I show my identity without drawing my face?
Draw what stands in for you: your place at the table seen from your own seat, your clothes standing up with nobody inside, your signature as large as the sheet, or a jar packed with twelve small things.
What is a hands and object drawing for an identity project?
A drawing of your own hands holding one thing that says something about you. Crop at the wrists, draw the grip you really use, and pick an object nobody else in the class would bring.
What objects represent identity in art?
The ones you actually handle: a door key and its charms, a recipe card, a worn sports glove, a bracelet with a story, a photograph of a place.