moonlitcoyote

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everyone shut up. look at how cool shadow is

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Repost from IG: resources via MALAN

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-Star Keeper-

Another marker piece- I started this one in 2024, put the line work away for some reason, and forgot about it until 2025.

Tricolored Heron (Egretta tricolor).

Marker and technical pen 8x10 with Gold foil.

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She's going to use every hair of dem ears to continue to not listen to you.

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-Star Keeper-

Another marker piece- I started this one in 2024, put the line work away for some reason, and forgot about it until 2025.

Tricolored Heron (Egretta tricolor).

Marker and technical pen 8x10 with Gold foil.

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Anyone here like Jaguars? 🐆

This piece is all alcohol marker and technical pen, with a touch of Deleter White ink for the whiskers.

The halo behind the Jaguar has had variegated copper leaf applied- and sharp eyes folks might notice some of the same shine in the eyes as well.

8x10 inches on smooth bristol board.

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"Zen Heron" approx 12"x12" acrylic and wax pastel on reclaimed wood

Made as a gift for my parents. ❤️ It was good for me to snap back into heronland; I got pleasantly lost in those feathers. Prints!

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Anyone here like Jaguars? 🐆

This piece is all alcohol marker and technical pen, with a touch of Deleter White ink for the whiskers.

The halo behind the Jaguar has had variegated copper leaf applied- and sharp eyes folks might notice some of the same shine in the eyes as well.

8x10 inches on smooth bristol board.

[moonlitcoyote]

Anyone here like Jaguars? 🐆

This piece is all alcohol marker and technical pen, with a touch of Deleter White ink for the whiskers.

The halo behind the Jaguar has had variegated copper leaf applied- and sharp eyes folks might notice some of the same shine in the eyes as well.

8x10 inches on smooth bristol board.

[moonlitcoyote]

Snippet of my current marker WIP.

I’m working on casting out some Art Demons left over from Art School regarding my own art and medium choices.

Yes, I’m 14 years on since graduating, but man some things are hard to unpack and you don’t realize you’ve internalized the bad toxic thought process until it’s too late. Young artist, so desperately wanting to be successful- wanting to learn from people who KNEW things! Impressionable? Yep that was me.

Picking up markers again? Whooo boy, did that quickly make the Art Demons loud. I’m older and wiser now, so it’s time to mentally curb stomp the little buggers into dust. The healing part will be hard, but I’ll get there. Perhaps it’s just what I need to get out of burn out.

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I was talking with my bestie on art and so you get my musings here… buckle up for a long post!

I’ve been pretty forth coming on the fact I’m in Art Burnout. I’ve completed two pieces this year and I’ve had no want/drive/desire to do anything art related- I pick up a pencil, nothing flows, or executive dysfunction rears its ugly head and prevents art creation entirely, or everything I do create is wonky and bad. The need to create is still screaming at me, but cannot.

I’ve been poking around my markers as of late- a medium I know very well- one of teen me’s favorites-something I know very well.

And my brain went to “this isn’t Art.”

Yes, that was the ACTUAL thought that occurred to me. It stopped me dead in my tracks and I went “I need to examine this thought process and unpack it-ASAP.

Why is it not “Art?” It’s Marker, not paint. It’s also ink and that’s illustration.

And the penny dropped- this is a damaging thought process that’s left over from Art School.

Perhaps I was unlucky- but it was made clear to me very early that I was an illustrator, not an Artist, by using marker, ink and pencil. I wasn’t Avant Garde enough. I didn’t think conceptually and that was bad- I wanted to know the rules, learn the techniques and process before then bending them or experimenting.

So I abandoned the medium almost entirely and tried my damndest to do the paint thing, come up with grandiose concepts (fail- I just wanna draw wildlife and flowers and fantasy critters). I found a respite in Scientific Illustration, but the damage was done.

I have spent years arguing with painting, never being really happy with anything in create in those mediums. Being afraid it’s not “ART” enough. I jump around, trying to find that spark. Something that I won’t ultimately burn myself out on. My perception of Art in regard to my own work is heavily skewed.

I really feel The concept of “Fine Art” is a lie. WHO decides what art is Fine Art? Arbitrary societal views? Galleries? Art Dealers? People with money? Museums? Cause let me tell you, the art on my wall probably doesnt fit their arbitrary standard, but I’d call them Fine Art.

This really toxic view of what is and is not art is ingrained in me due to school. Illustration is as much an art as painting, illustrations are fine art. It shouldn’t be separated. I need to find a way to heal from this toxic view point that was drummed into me and put it to bed. For me, to create. Maybe unpacking this will help.

Illustration is Art. Illustration is Fine Art, be it marker, ink, colored pencil or watercolor, oils or acrylic.

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I finally finished something art related! Yay!

Great Blue Heron

8x8in. This is mostly marker, with some liquid watercolor, colored pencil, and technical pen. I went right back to my artistic roots. Colored pencil was my first medium, marker was my second.

I actually painted this same base drawing in gouache back in February, in the middle of my burnout, just to try to push through. They don’t even look like the same person created them. Like there’s a solid disconnect.

So? Yeah. I went back to markers and loved every second.

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Happy Solstice!

Managed to snap a few shots of Magnus, my spoiled English Springer Spaniel / Clumber Spaniel Mix, in his new bed as I’m working through figuring out some new photo gear (for work). He’s the dog that’s cool with the camera in his face, my other dog? Not so much.

I can’t believe it’s been 6 months since his blastomycosis diagnosis and the start of treatment. You can really see the damage the fungal infection and resulting secondary glaucoma did to his right eye. He’s still on medication and will be for a while yet, but he’s almost back to his old bouncy self.

Anyway, I want to get back into photography, more specifically wildlife, pets, and flowers again for art reasons. Had the joy sucked out of it and ruined by a former job and the person in charge. It’s taken me years to look at it and want to pick up a camera it again for FUN pictures.

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This weekend I was told a story which, although I’m kind of ashamed to admit it, because holy shit is it ever obvious, is kind of blowing my mind.

A friend of a friend won a free consultation with Clinton Kelly of What Not To Wear, and she was very excited, because she has a plus-size body, and wanted some tips on how to make the most of her wardrobe in a fashion culture which deliberately puts her body at a disadvantage.

Her first question for him was this: how do celebrities make a plain white t-shirt and a pair of weekend jeans look chic?  She always assumed it was because so many celebrities have, by nature or by design, very slender frames, and because they can afford very expensive clothing.  But when she watched What Not To Wear, she noticed that women of all sizes ended up in cute clothes that really fit their bodies and looked great.  She had tried to apply some guidelines from the show into her own wardrobe, but with only mixed success.  So - what gives?

His answer was that everything you will ever see on a celebrity’s body, including their outfits when they’re out and about and they just get caught by a paparazzo, has been tailored, and the same goes for everything on What Not To Wear.  Jeans, blazers, dresses - everything right down to plain t-shirts and camisoles.  He pointed out that historically, up until the last few generations, the vast majority of people either made their own clothing or had their clothing made by tailors and seamstresses.  You had your clothing made to accommodate the measurements of your individual body, and then you moved the fuck on.  Nothing on the show or in People magazine is off the rack and unaltered.  He said that what they do is ignore the actual size numbers on the tags, find something that fits an individual’s widest place, and then have it completely altered to fit.  That’s how celebrities have jeans that magically fit them all over, and the rest of us chumps can’t ever find a pair that doesn’t gape here or ride up or slouch down or have about four yards of extra fabric here and there.

I knew that having dresses and blazers altered was probably something they were doing, but to me, having alterations done generally means having my jeans hemmed and then simply living with the fact that I will always be adjusting my clothing while I’m wearing it because I have curves from here to ya-ya, some things don’t fit right, and the world is just unfair that way.  I didn’t think that having everything tailored was something that people did. 

It’s so obvious, I can’t believe I didn’t know this.  But no one ever told me.  I was told about bikini season and dieting and targeting your “problem areas” and avoiding horizontal stripes.  No one told me that Jennifer Aniston is out there wearing a bigger size of Ralph Lauren t-shirt and having it altered to fit her.

I sat there after I was told this story, and I really thought about how hard I have worked not to care about the number or the letter on the tag of my clothes, how hard I have tried to just love my body the way it is, and where I’ve succeeded and failed.  I thought about all the times I’ve stood in a fitting room and stared up at the lights and bit my lip so hard it bled, just to keep myself from crying about how nothing fits the way it’s supposed to.  No one told me that it wasn’t supposed to.  I guess I just didn’t know.  I was too busy thinking that I was the one that didn’t fit.

I thought about that, and about all the other girls and women out there whose proportions are “wrong,” who can’t find a good pair of work trousers, who can’t fill a sweater, who feel excluded and freakish and sad and frustrated because they have to go up a size, when really the size doesn’t mean anything and it never, ever did, and this is just another bullshit thing thrown in your path to make you feel shitty about yourself.

I thought about all of that, and then I thought that in elementary school, there should be a class for girls where they sit you down and tell you this stuff before you waste years of your life feeling like someone put you together wrong.

So, I have to take that and sit with it for a while.  But in the meantime, I thought perhaps I should post this, because maybe my friend, her friend, and I are the only clueless people who did not realise this, but maybe we’re not.  Maybe some of you have tried to embrace the arbitrary size you are, but still couldn’t find a cute pair of jeans, and didn’t know why.

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a handful of recent-ish wips of this wolf i started back in august and only picked up again recently

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