#because of my inability to art

[tea-cat-arts]

Shen Yuan getting transported into pidw isn't "the system punishing him for being a lazy internet hater," but instead representative of "step 1 of the creative process: getting so mad at something you decide to go write your own fucking book" in this essay I will

[kazelnoot]

he makes me so unbearably sad like Actually. Every time i think about him i take one gazillion psychic damage he makes me want to cry and eat drywall

[gophergal]

*squints* yeah. You all get it

[zero1qn2]

a piece that will most likely be unfinished + sketches (second one directly inspired by @indigo-constellation writing)

[whump-card]

for the prompts request: tiny whump?

You caught something!

Thank you for the prompt!

Art taglist: @angst-after-dark, @whumpsday, @flowersarefreetherapy, @rainydaywhump

[jaggedjot]

“Louis de Pointe du Lac. That's an interesting name.” “Louis of Pointe du Lac Plantation. My great-great-grandfather owned one. All that remains is the name.”

“And a sizable trust to oversee as a consequence. Capital accrued from plantations of sugar and the blood of men who looked like my great-grandfather but did not have his standing.”

When introducing himself to Daniel both in 1973 and in 2022, Louis alludes to the ways that the legacy of chattel slavery in the United States remains present through his life. The ramifications of this history will be explored further in his interviews; it is intrinsic to the racism that Louis describes experiencing, and it is built into the economic and cultural foundations of the societies that Louis has and continues to navigate through. The way that this subject is broached however, in both the past and present, specifically centres the relationship between slave plantations and Louis’ own affluence.

Daniel’s remark being prefaced by Louis offering to “Get the boy whatever he wants”, before carelessly pushing a platinum credit card between them, implicitly correlates Louis’ response with that ostentatious display of wealth. It is not an intentional association made by the characters, and Louis immediately downplays the link when he recognises it (“All that remains is the name.”). Given his reaction, it seems likely that Louis did not talk about this topic during his subsequent interview with Daniel, though, again, that does not mean it would have had no bearing on other matters discussed. By contrast in the present day, Louis broaches the subject himself and fairly openly acknowledges the correlation. It was a slave plantation and the exploitation of enslaved people that created the sizeable trust that paid for the house and lifestyle that Louis and his family enjoyed. While Louis does not state it directly, the unavoidable implication of Louis clarifying that his great-grandfather was black and had a different social status to that of slaves (“[…] the blood of men who looked like my great-grandfather but did not have his standing.”) is that several generations of Louis’ black relatives have, at least indirectly, financially profited from chattel slavery. It is unlikely that this wealth was all inherited after the fact, considering that the abolition of slavery in the United States occurred only a couple of decades before Louis was born. These pieces of information seem to contradict then the implicit suggestion of Louis’ earlier explanation in 1973, that the only direct bearing the de Pointe du Lac plantation has had on his life is a shared name.

Both the dismissal and the acknowledgement are characteristic of how Louis describes the past; factual as a basic statement but carrying additional implications whose accuracy is more questionable and or left carefully unexamined. This is a rhetorical device that aids Louis in maintaining control of the narrative and its meanings while avoiding, as much as he can, outright lies. While Louis does view Daniel as a necessity for him to revisit his story, it needs to be stated that this does not prevent Louis from consciously and unconsciously tailoring it for his audience. It is possible that Louis only acknowledges the subject at all in the second interview because he is aware that Daniel has likely done some background research on his family. Considering how insensitive to racial issues Daniel can be, as well as his deliberately combative and contrarian approach to interviewing, it may be that this is a subject that Louis does not want to explore with Daniel specifically; it is perhaps notable that the penthouse Louis shares with Armand contains at least two pieces of art (Slave Auction by Jean-Michel Basquiat, and Transformation by Ron Bechet) which are about chattel slavery. Regardless of the reason for Louis’ selectivity, this context continues to hover on the periphery of Louis’ story, adding additional layers of meaning to the events that follow.

It contextualises the contradictory feelings Louis has about his work as a landlord and pimp, roles that may step outside of the shadow of sugarcane and slavery but are only made possible through investing the profits of them. When Louis confesses to the ways he treats his workers, tellingly he invokes plantation imagery with “[…] I lie to myself, saying I'm giving them a roof and food and dollar bills in they pocket, but I look in the mirror, I know what I am; the big man in the big house, stuffing cotton in my ears so I can't hear their cries.”. This conflict then deepens the resentment Louis has towards his family for criticising how he provides for them, with Paul being the only member who even entertains the idea that they should not spend the money at all (“We should tithe that o'er to St. Augustine's 'fore this house falls in on us.”). Whereas the family judges Louis for connecting them to an industry they view as sinful and lacking respectability, contrasting it to the seemingly fondly remembered family plantation (“Daddy was here, we'd still be in sugar cane.”), Louis is troubled by the exploitative nature of that work and capitalism as a whole. Yet there are also times when Louis exhibits pride towards his business dealings (“And I was now the owner of the brightest club in the district. My club, my rules. […] It was everything I had ever wanted or wished for. […] I made a mountain of money, enough to retire and be buried like a pharaoh.”). This could be suggested to be partly because Louis has moved away from the legacy of his family’s past to create something that he can try to believe is helping his, primarily black, workers (“I paid the staff better, paid the band better, all the while helping those who had been with me down the block to better themselves.”).

Most significantly of all, this context adds an additional lens through which Louis and the audience can examine some of the overarching existential ideas that Louis has been grappling with throughout his life, and that the second interview brings to the forefront. How does the past continue to define our present? Can we be considered in any way culpable for the actions of others? What reparations can we make for the harm, deliberate and unintentional, that we do? The open-ended way that Louis approaches the link between his inherited wealth and chattel slavery, as well as the subsequent ways that these have shaped his life, is reflective of those unanswered questions. Louis is desperately trying to find, if not a definitive answer to these philosophical quandaries, an insight that can give his existence purpose and direction. It is vital to Louis that his experiences offer some greater lesson (“That's the purpose. Our book must be a warning as much as anything.”), and ideally one that he can prove that he has already learnt. The different ways that Louis approaches the subject in 1973 and 2022 then reflect how he is revaluating the past and himself (“The passage of time and the frailties that accompany it have provided me perspective.”), but despite this, critically and symbolically, Louis still does not seem to have come to any conclusions.

[anglerflsh]

guy who is handling his first time experiencing being Mad so terribly

[dodothefool]

group painting activity

[iintervallum]

and i kiss her again

edit: the finished version is here!

[kira-light0]

Trying really hard to simplify my art style because attempting realism was destroying my motivation

[maulfucker]

(based on this image)

[smimon]

Of course it is green

[somerobotvex]

Currently viewing memory file: DATA_CORRUPTED

[fantastic-nonsense]

cataloguing the various times Cass has shown an interest in and/or love of the visual and performing arts since her introduction as references for my Cass fic and it's actually kind of maddening that nothing has really ever been done with this considering how many times it's been referenced.

for those interested (and this is a non-inclusive list):

Dance is the most textually supported art form Cass has shown interest in. Pre-reboot, Cass does an acrobatic-style dance for Jean-Paul as a gift and thank you for working together in Azrael: Agent of the Bat #61 and has a TON of fun "mosh-pit dancing" while attending a rave in Batgirl Vol. 1 #63:

Meanwhile post-Flashpoint, Tynion had an entire mini arc about Cass discovering ballet (starting in Batman & Robin Eternal #7) and dance as an art form she has a major fascination with (Detective Comics #950-957 and scattered references throughout the rest of his Tec run):

She actually lives in an abandoned room at the Gotham Metropolitan Ballet in the out-of-continuity Harley Quinn and the Birds of Prey mini:

Cass does a lot of experiments with clothing, makeup, and fashion throughout her Batgirl run (particularly during the Horrocks and Gabyrch eras)...some of which has occasionally carried over to post-reboot!Cass's fashion choices, like her unicorn robe in Batgirls:

She also designed and created her own Batgirl costume using pilfered arts and crafts supplies in the Shadow of the Batgirl graphic novel:

Cass was seen acting out scenes from Shakespeare's The Tempest with Clayface in Detective Comics #958 as a form of speech therapy:

Steph mentioned that Infantino Carmini’s The Three Graces was Cass's "favorite painting in Gotham" in Catwoman (2018) #45, implying that she knows enough about painting and visual art to have a favorite:

Post-Crisis!Cass got a lot of her vocabulary from watching visual media (especially television). Many of her later pre-reboot appearances are littered with various pop culture references that she absorbs through watching tv and film (Alien and Star Wars, for example):

there was also a semi-recurring gag of Cass picking up off-color/outdated/weird expressions from tv shows she watched in order to learn about criminology and how to "talk like normal people":

Also Cass watching those awful daytime reality tv shows? unfortunately canon:

Her fighting style has also always been depicted as very fluid and acrobatic, other characters watching Cass fight have sometimes referred to her fighting "dance-like" or "poetry in motion," and artists often incorporated dance-esque choreography into her training sessions with Bruce and the Bats' VR fighting simulator:

The one art form she continually has no interest in is literature (largely because for a long time she couldn't read and had no real interest in learning how), much to ex-Head Librarian!Barbara's frustration, though I've been told she's apparently reading Edgar Allen Poe in Batgirls right now.

Looking at all of this together makes it kind of frustrating that no writer has really done the connect-the-dots between Cass's notable, recurring interest in the visual/performing arts and her longing to express herself in a way that can be easily understood by other people. Tynion got the closest with the ballet/dance obsession, but he was constrained by having to balance a fairly large ensemble cast and so didn't have the space to really give that kind of attention to her character growth.

[m4ndysk4nkovich]

you know how ive told you guys that people think im homophobic when i make gay jokes because they cant tell im a lesbian? well, maybe you dont, but it happened again and idk what to do. i made a joke that from a straight woman, would sound homophobic, and i made it in a gc with my two best friends and their other friend. we’re all gay, and the other friend knows i’m a lesbian- after i made the joke i literally clarified. but he got mad and kicked me out of the gc and i can’t join again and i’m literally so confused because i keep getting accused of being homophobic… i literally love women, i have a girlfriend

[aldebarangel]

lesley with the blorbo sweaters