maplewozapi

[maplewozapi]

Some sketchbook pages! Damn I’ve been so busy luckily I’ve had time to draw stuff in my lil book. Currently redoing my moccasins again hopefully I’ll get them done before our hand games tournament 😆

[maplewozapi]

Magma doodles of ocs and pokemans

[maplewozapi]

It’s October so now I have to introduce everyone to my silly ass Halloween sona that may or may not have been a self insert

[maplewozapi]

Can I just dump the lore that Star Shine is a dragon amalgamation

[maplewozapi]

Silly fairy oc

[maplewozapi]

Deadliest wičhaglata, and the Miku designs I did in 2021. Btw these Mikus are Arikara and Lakota 🫶 I have a few people asssuming I’m not native as well and it hurt my heart 😔🥺🩷

Native Miku🩷😆😆😆

[maplewozapi]

Hello! I have been following you for a while and first of all I want to say that your artstyle and character designs are stunning! You have a great sense of creativity and an eye for detail like I am always happy to see a new character of yours or their redesigns when they appear on my timeline (let's say that they make me really THINK about my own character designs and inspire me to always try and redesign them with more thought than before :D). I hope one day I will gather myself up and be able to commission you because I really wish to 😭

But my main question which had been in my mind for a while: You made a little post about explaining what Wojapi is a while back and I realized that it looks really similar to a food that my country (funny enough It's Czechia where we use the ž and š which you know but still I find it as a funny coincidence) has and specifically my smaller region where I live and we call it Žahour -> which is a not too sweet, not too sour, hot sauce made out of forest blueberries that is usually served either with pancakes or a HUGE puffy dumpling with no filling and usually no strong taste! I can tell you It's really good but I think you can imagine pretty well how it could taste like :D

I don't think they are in any way connected they just became their own things sepparated from eachother in each culture but still I think It's really nice and I wanted to thank you for kinda reminding me that Žahour exists since I haven't had it in a long time and I honestly miss it. That is all from me and I hope you have a nice day! ☀️

They you so much 🥺 that’s so touching, I love character design so much I’m so happy you enjoy it. idk if I talked about the orthography I used but it is Czech actually and I believe has the same rules. It’s a big controversy because it was made and owned but a “European, White, Czech, guy who has since copyrighted his orthography of the Lakota language. There’s many orthographies for Lakota it was never a written language I personally use the Czech one because of my dyslexia and it has indicators where the sounds are supposed to go, and I know people who worked on it. So the older orthography and more popular was “wojapi” and I used the Czech “wožapi” spelling not to come up in google searches for the food Wojapi lol. Boiling berries is definitely a universal dish, but I think žahour might be the closest to wojapi in texture and taste some of the pancakes even look like fry bread

[maplewozapi]

Native Miku🩷😆😆😆

[maplewozapi]

Big fan of the way you draw the simplified version of your persona btw. Ok this isn’t a btw statement there was no previous statement. Anyways that’s all I wanted to pop in and say cuz I’ve been thinking about it for a while.

Thanks! She always has my back

[maplewozapi]

Women not being able to drum because they can already create helped me figure out what my dad meant when we were at a round dance. He's pretty traditional so he was pretty mad when a woman was at the table with the guys. I didn't understand why but your explanation makes sense for me :D

I’m so glad! There’s totally a disconnect when it comes to understanding drum protocols, the trauma of western exclusion of women needs to be addressed. Especially when explaining the drum and that the exclusion from the men drum groups isn’t anything malicious but there’s a problem with men not knowing how to explain it or just turning it into malicious exclusion and hurting peoples feelings. When the reason for exclusion is a spiritual connection that women have to their menstrual cycle. That time is the time woman had to pray and had how many days to pray with other women on their cycles but that prayer and gatherings are completely lost or not possible to because you gotta go to work. That was our space. The society we have been put into completely destroyed woman prayer and culture and most of the activities for prayer that have survived are men’s prayers. Without being able to pray the way we used to many tribes do let woman participate in traditionally men’s prayers. I don’t participate because of that traditional belief but until there’s a movement to teach and participate in women spaces and exclusive prayer I don’t see why women should be barred from spiritual rejuvenation the most accessible way they can.

💖🥺express and care for your native femininity it’s powerful prayer

[maplewozapi]

Hi, I'm currently writing a story set in the 1800s America, Oklahoma, and one of the characters is a two spirit person.

I was wondering how to best write a character like that, what I should be careful about, the details etc, despite doing extensive research on the history of it all.

I'm also questioning if I, as a non native person, should even be writing characters like that or if it's seen as offensive and it should be best for me to delete the character.

Thank youuu

I always have a hard time answering specific wide open questions because the question has so my layers it’s hard to give an answer that makes sense. Two spirit is a modern term so writing a two spirit character who is from Oklahoma in 1800 is gonna be totally different. And Oklahoma tribes during the 1800s? are you writing about the trail of tears? I’d be really careful about that territory and being mindful of that trauma. I don’t want to tell people no about writing characters because I appreciate the time and research into native history but it comes down to are you representing a people and whether your adding to the pile of negative depictions.

But when it comes to two spirit characters making it clear it’s a gender or sexual identity is important, gender back then was heavily occupational and sexuality when it came down to labels was "they like/are married to the same/opposite sex" we didn’t have "official labels" (like gay or lesbian ex.) and I am coming from a view of someone who is Arikara and Lakota, I have no idea if tribes in Oklahoma or during this time tribes who were forced out of the south had terms for gender or sexual identities. Two spirit originates from a Ojibwe term and that areas beliefs and can be very different or similar depending on how that other tribes interprets their genders or sex.

I don’t have a clear answer or advice for you because it’s hard and is a very loaded topic but when it comes to these topics leave your western ideas of gender at the door.

If theirs any miscommunication please ask or read it again or a couple times

[maplewozapi]

Playing gen 4 has been so awesome I even played through Pokémon ranger only to find out my older brothers used an action replay to get manaphy on it😔and I did not want to complete it again on a download ver. but thankfully they got other means of providing legit mystery gifts 🤲 (I don’t have Pokémon platinum physically) now it’s time to finish my copy of black 2 so I can transfer all these babies.

[maplewozapi]

I can’t be the only one who personifies the coloring process. I remember I did a piece and was showing it to my instructor and I was like yeah the purple and blue were fighting each other in this one 😁 my instructor: they were 😧

[maplewozapi]

I can now post eventually all my sketch pages of character development

I’ve made a ref sheet for ihaišaye and I am still very satisfied with it but to see the improvements I’ve made in the last year are kind crazy.

[maplewozapi]

I’ve made a ref sheet for ihaišaye and I am still very satisfied with it but to see the improvements I’ve made in the last year are kind crazy.

[maplewozapi]

Merry Bellum! Another oc that got a redesign for a more fantasy western vibe

She’s a human who’s made a pact with a demon and is on the Buffalo trail

[maplewozapi]

Horsies