katabay

[katabay]

this was a kind of test comic I did months ago that's been sitting my my drafts! and now I'm freeing it

the story (historical fiction, unrestrained violence against occupation forces, cultural trauma-horror, gritty folk heroes, some real fucked up basements) requires a lot of pretty heavy duty research that's probably gonna take awhile to finish doing, but it also is pretty action heavy. hopefully. in my heart, it's action heavy, which is also a whole visual language to learn and style to figure out and I've mostly been a melodrama genre kind of artist.

this one was drawn pretty early in the journey! lots of scribbling while I tried to pin down the vibe I was imagining and also just running through every monoline pen I've ever downloaded to see what clicked lmao

[katabay]

THE JETSET LIFE IS GONNA KILL YOU, ERIC CARTER!

my laptop charger uhhhhhh. met its end in a very permanent, very fire hazardy kind of way last week. while waiting for a replacement I decided to try and get some work done at the library and was asking around for some urban fantasy (extra points for a mystery plot of some kind) recommendations to check out while I was there

the eric carter series was mentioned a couple of times, AND had the added bonus of having a necromancer for a main character. I love necromancers. someday I'm gonna play one in a game instead of immediately defaulting to vampires.

Fire Season, Stephen Blackmoore

[katabay]

HERE WE GO I wanted to give this scene another spin after I figured out the overall vibe, but it took me a minute to find a brush that could achieve what I had in mind

so! once more! THE LEGEND OF TINAMNAN GABE

-as recorded in Negros Oriental and Siquijor Island: Legends, Beliefs and Folkways (ed. Caridad Aldecoa-Rodriguez)

[katabay]

earlier this year I started writing a comic about the siege perilous-grail quest situation after finally finishing the didot perceval, and it started circling around kay and perceval. kay as gatekeeper, taboo anxiety vs chivalry, and perceval not doing things "correctly," arthur's enduring affection for kay. that general area. also the horror of the grail quest itself.

this is comic is part of that narrative arc, so with THAT in mind: this is an abridged scene of a longer arc revolving around kay associating camelot with a cage, perceval's associations with jewelry and knighthood and the color red, and arthur's relationship with kay.

[some other scene context: perceval has injured his hand and can't participate in the tournaments, so he's craving some kind of fight. kay is disinterested in replying to this challenge, but he's not above reminding perceval of their first meeting. it's just mean enough in a weird-intimate kind of way that perceval's like, ok so we're doing the antagonistic version of court romance rituals. he picks up hunting because kay can't leave the castle.]

on the subtext of jewelry:

Clothes Make the Man: Parzival Dressed and Undressed, M.D. Amey

on the topic of kay, gatekeeping, and taboo anxiety:

Cei and the Arthurian Legend, Linda Gowans

the whole Red Knight/Perceval Shows Up In A Dead Man's Suit Of Armor transgression-situation (which kay references through red jewelry) mentioned is told in both de Troye's and Wolfram's Perceval narratives :)

anyway! to close out all this out: the transgressions. incredible! what is camelot but a bunch of transgressions stacked on top of each other tbh.

[katabay]

🎃 THE LEGEND OF SLEEPY HOLLOW 🎃

this is a redraw of last years sleepy hollow illustration! I wanted to take another stab at it, and also post it in the month of halloween, instead of in december :) tis the season for pumpkins 🎃🎃🎃

and to use the same citation from last year because it still goes hard

Troubling Our Heads about Ichabod: “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” Classic American Literature, and the Sexual Politics of Homosocial Brotherhood, David Greven

[katabay]

PIETÀ

black pean [forceps] season 2 fucked me up :')

like, I'm going to be thinking about this still they posted on instagram forever, and I haven't even started on the cher juno letter

[katabay]

I haven't played it myself, but I was watching my friend play Hades 2 and. oh boy. prometheus. wow

[katabay]

THE LEGEND OF TINAMNAN GABE

-as recorded in Negros Oriental and Siquijor Island: Legends, Beliefs and Folkways (ed. Caridad Aldecoa-Rodriguez)

I changed Eyo's name because the nature of legends and folktales is that when you retell it, you end up leaving your own fingerprints on it. altho the real reason I changed his name is that I have an idea for a longer story that spans a few centuries that starts with this legend, but I need to do some more research before I really get into it, so for now this is just a standalone comic bc I really like this story :)

[katabay]

(awolnation voice) RUN

man. alright. let's assemble the thoughts. so last year I posted some jack illustrations, mostly about the giant killing and the beanstalk stuff. on and off since then I've been reading up on jack tales, folklore scholarship, etc. as one does. I also did a full re read of j.g. ballard's novels! that was mostly for myself, tbh, but the drowned giant remains an essential piece of inspiration and reference for this.

since then, I've work shopped the original idea and started hacking away at a plot. the initial idea is mostly the same: jack finds a giant, dead, and the story spirals out of his control. & now there's a king! kings make a semi frequent appearance in jack stories!

onward! jack can be considered a kind of trickster character, other times he's an everyman, but in some stories there's a kind of economic anxiety underneath them that's really fucking compelling.

Perspectives on the Jack Tales and other North American Märchen

and ofc. to tie in my sforza family obsession to this; on power and hunger and it's inescapability

Filelfo in Milan, Diana Robin

& the collage art in the last panel is made up of Head of a King, Column Statue of a King, King Arthur (Hero Tapestries)!

[katabay]

slowly. crawling back online. the laptop I'm borrowing has a funny quirk where if the temperatures get too cold, it won't turn back on. I spent five days trying to frakenstein it back to life before finding a forum where someone had the same problem, and then spent a day. uh. warming it back up to a state where it would turn on, which was extremely harrowing. as someone who grew up working with computers: warming one up goes against every instinct that I have.

anyway. hello. technology. gotta love it!

[katabay]

some sam/sully sketches

sometimes. it's just. like--

you know???

the one panel with the lone bottle is because I was listening to valorant's playlist for chamber and some of the songs got me thinking about sam. I also just kind of like odezenne's caprice in general. it's a vibe.

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"Paint The Town Red is set against the backdrop of history’s greatest cities, from ancient Rome to depression-era New York. Cloak yourself in the trappings of depressed undead vampires and try to find pleasure in a world drenched in sorrow."

hi everyone!! I did some illustrations for the Party of the Century in the vampire ttrpg, Paint the Town Red! I had a lot of fun working on this; I got to do ancient Rome illustrations for a vampire ttrpg, and I fucking love vampires.

you can check out the full illustration of one of the pieces I did here :) (it's the one I cropped for this post!)

⭐ additionally, a link to the backerkit which has more information about the game, along the quickstart, and more art from some truly fantastic artists who worked on this project as well!! ⭐

[katabay]

Omg you like RAGAD! Do you have any opinions on the movie ? I personally have not had a day of peace since seeing Tim Roth in an earring.

LOVED LOVED LOVED the movie, there was a point where it was my go to 'put it on while working' movie, I was quoting that film from start to finish

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I'm curious about how calm and in control Crasso seems to be - where does the anger go?

at first, activism and community! he studied to become a teacher, and was on track to practice law and spends a lot of time in and around local politics.

later, that anger goes directly into a crowbar.

[katabay]

some sam drakes :)

nate's theme 4.0 came up on my playlist while I was working on commissions and oh boy. that piano line about a minute in to it still gets me emotional shshdshs

[katabay]

also to follow up my previous post: my favorite VtMB npc, Isaac Abrams :)

[katabay]

one of my friends played VtMB for the first time this year, which ofc got me thinking about VtMB and previous VtM campaigns I've played, which in turn got me redrawing some old art of my fledgling I never finished posted (I also seized the opportunity to finish fine tuning this brush into working as a multipurpose sketching/inking/painting brush and it's SO close to where I want it to be)

I am extremely obsessed with LaCroix and this. political clown circus. charade. smoke show. especially his line about clemency, considering how clemency frequently acts as a tool of violence & and a threat, and his own position in the instability. much to think about!