#talking about painting

[flowersandspacestuff]

Painting limbo..

I made a beautiful painting and now it's ready for me to do a little touch work, but the problem is, as an artist, I paint with feeling, and that painting is so full of feeling, I am terrified of it. I love it, and it is beautiful, and it reflects depths of my soul, but oh how I am terrified of it. It lays on my desk waiting and I am sometimes tempted to look at it, and it is beautiful, but oh how it pains my heart.

Now I do also wish ardently to paint more and more and to finish this piece, it calls me and calls me to do so, but at the thought of going close, I tremble.

There is only one solution for it of course, but it turns me cold. I have to go back to it, to that feeling that terrifies me so, and finish and make it beautiful and whole.

When you're a painter though, all of life is limbo. There is only the inspiration, and the work. When the work is finished, all that's left is waiting for the inspiration to ignite again, so that the work may continue.

Whether I am painting or waiting, it always calls to me, wherever I go. When I am dreaming and sleeping, I see visions and I am asked to paint and I wake and I'm told to go go paint and do the work. And if I complete a piece, the moments before the final touches are more joyful than the finished work, though when it is done I love it and it is beautiful. But then I am empty like the blank canvas, like my apartment is slowly emptying of canvas and what will I do for this? All I can feel is to paint and so little canvas is left for it.

When I am away, working picking trash, witnessing the tender terror of the world, sharing meals with friends and fools, making conversation with fellow firesouls, I am always thinking, what next my painting calls for, what piece, what vision fills my head?

When I play guitar, it is a calling to the world, it is a calling of my soul, to that inspiration, go paint go paint go paint, go. But of course we have to wait have to wait have to wait for wet to dry, for walls to break, for new canvas, for new white paint. All of life is limbo.

I'll get to that painting I'm sure though. You could call it my will, but that would not be quite justice, for I am impelled, there is no other way for me, there is no other being. I simply must do just so.

[hinamie]

morning glory

[chimchiri]

gideon & harrow OR rd and sf as cowboys please please please

It's the cowgirl necro and her gunslinger cav! Who is so damn extra she's got three guns: one left, one right, and one in pole position! (She swears the ladies love it!)

[mafuyuakgae]

how long will you dream for?

[inkskinned]

the thing about art is that it was always supposed to be about us, about the human-ness of us, the impossible and beautiful reality that we (for centuries) have stood still, transfixed by music. that we can close our eyes and cry about the same book passage; the events of which aren't real and never happened. theatre in shakespeare's time was as real as it is now; we all laugh at the same cue (pursued by bear), separated hundreds of years apart.

three years ago my housemates were jamming outdoors, just messing around with their instruments, mostly just making noise. our neighbors - shy, cautious, a little sheepish - sat down and started playing. i don't really know how it happened; i was somehow in charge of dancing, barefoot and laughing - but i looked up, and our yard was full of people. kids stacked on the shoulders of parents. old couples holding hands. someone had brought sidewalk chalk; our front walk became a riot of color. someone ran in with a flute and played the most astounding solo i've ever heard in my life, upright and wiggling, skipping as she did so. she only paused because the violin player was kicking his heels up and she was laughing too hard to continue.

two weeks ago my friend and i met in the basement of her apartment complex so she could work out a piece of choreography. we have a language barrier - i'm not as good at ASL as i'd like to be (i'm still learning!) so we communicate mostly through the notes app and this strange secret language of dancers - we have the same movement vocabulary. the two of us cracking jokes at each other, giggling. there were kids in the basement too, who had been playing soccer until we took up the far corner of the room. one by one they made their slow way over like feral cats - they laid down, belly-flat against the floor, just watching. my friend and i were not in tutus - we were in slouchy shirts and leggings and socks. nothing fancy. but when i asked the kids would you like to dance too? they were immediately on their feet and spinning. i love when people dance with abandon, the wild and leggy fervor of childhood. i think it is gorgeous.

their adults showed up eventually, and a few of them said hey, let's not bother the nice ladies. but they weren't bothering us, they were just having fun - so. a few of the adults started dancing awkwardly along, and then most of the adults. someone brought down a better sound system. someone opened a watermelon and started handing out slices. it was 8 PM on a tuesday and nothing about that day was particularly special; we might as well party.

one time i hosted a free "paint along party" and about 20 adults worked quietly while i taught them how to paint nessie. one time i taught community dance classes and so many people showed up we had to move the whole thing outside. we used chairs and coatracks to balance. one time i showed up to a random band playing in a random location, and the whole thing got packed so quickly we had to open every door and window in the place.

i don't think i can tell you how much people want to be making art and engaging with art. they want to, desperately. so many people would be stunning artists, but they are lied to and told from a very young age that art only matters if it is planned, purposeful, beautiful. that if you have an idea, you need to be able to express it perfectly. this is not true. you don't get only 1 chance to communicate. you can spend a lifetime trying to display exactly 1 thing you can never quite language. you can just express the "!!??!!!"-ing-ness of being alive; that is something none of us really have a full grasp on creating. and even when we can't make what we want - god, it feels fucking good to try. and even just enjoying other artists - art inherently rewards the act of participating.

i wasn't raised wealthy. whenever i make a post about art, someone inevitably says something along the lines of well some of us aren't that lucky. i am not lucky; i am dedicated. i have a chronic condition, my hands are constantly in pain. i am not neurotypical, nor was i raised safe. i worked 5-7 jobs while some of these memories happened. i chose art because it mattered to me more than anything on this fucking planet - i would work 80 hours a week just so i could afford to write in 3 of them.

and i am still telling you - if you are called to make art, you are called to the part of you that is human. you do not have to be good at it. you do not have to have enormous amounts of privilege. you can just... give yourself permission. you can just say i'm going to make something now and then - go out and make it. raquel it won't be good though that is okay, i don't make good things every time either. besides. who decides what good even is?

you weren't called to make something because you wanted it to be good, you were called to make something because it is a basic instinct. you were taught to judge its worth and over-value perfection. you are doing something impossible. a god's ability: from nothing springs creation.

a few months ago i found a piece of sidewalk chalk and started drawing. within an hour i had somehow collected a small classroom of young children. their adults often brought their own chalk. i looked up and about fifteen families had joined me from around the block. we drew scrangly unicorns and messed up flowers and one girl asked me to draw charizard. i am not good at drawing. i basically drew an orb with wings. you would have thought i drew her the mona lisa. she dragged her mother over and pointed and said look! look what she drew for me and, in the moment, i admit i flinched (sorry, i don't -). but the mother just grinned at me. he's beautiful. and then she sat down and started drawing.

someone took a picture of it. it was in the local newspaper. the summary underneath said joyful and spontaneous artwork from local artists springs up in public gallery. in the picture, a little girl covered in chalk dust has her head thrown back, delighted. laughing.

[kai2arts]

i wonder if aventurine, robin, and firefly will somehow find each other in the deep dreamscape now that they've all been killed in the dream.

i think it would be funny if they just got really bored together while waiting for the non-dead people to figure out the watchmaker's secrets or whatever

[almondcroissantsandink]

watching gravity falls for the first time at the request of my little sister and i just watched a tale of two stans and CRIED

[popsicle-stick]

will you meet me halfway?

anyway i finished wolf 359 earlier this month and ive been insane ever since so i had to get this out my system. i Care for them so so Deeply

[pencilscratchins]

to everyone asking when i’m gonna post art again… hey guys i recently acquired six incredibly large clown paintings so i’m sort of booked at the moment

[tibialtybalt]

Actually let's make a separate post for this one. Look at this piece of official rain world art.

It's sick af it might be my favorite rw piece. So I'm gonna ramble about technical art stuff that it does that I think is neat.

First let's look at the layout. It's got a very distinct foreground middle ground background layering that you can break down like this

With these layers you can put a lot of Stuff in the background without any of the important parts getting lost. If you look at any small section of the piece you'll see Ten Billion wires, plants, metal sticking out, shadows, anything and everything. But since it's all grouped together on the same layer, it sorta fades into the background as Background and you don't lose the main shapes.

The scant use of purple/pink is also very neat. The purple is eye catching. The artist wants you to look at the purple stuff. But some of it isn't important at all, like the curling plants - they aren't supposed to be looked at directly, exactly, but they still lead the eyes around where they're wanted.

Your eye goes from the pink lizard at the top to the dragonslayer symbol to the slugcat, where it lingers for a moment, framed by the purple plants, then you eventually follow the plants and the pole up, the chain left, back to the lizard. The path your eye is supposed to follow is highlighted for you.

Okay last thing I want to talk about. The thing the tags at the beginning of the post actually mention. The secondary light source.

It's pink yeah like I was saying about eye movement. But also. It defines the slugcat. Look at this edited version without the pink light.

The tail gets lost. The foot gets lost. The slugcat becomes part of the scenery instead of the focus. The intended focus is so much more boring to look at then the little lizard.

So yeah I'm obsessed with rain world art I'm obsessed with this piece in particular. Study it and break it down ok <3

[demaparbat-hp]

Izumi of Jang Hui died young. She was sixteen and unwed. A kind child, protective and lonely—thus unfit for this world.

Izumi of Jang Hui was murdered. The Painted Lady was born out of hatred and grief. Her skin is painted red with the patterns of her scars. Her home is the river where the Dark Water Spirit dwells—he who found her, drowned and beautiful.

Build shrines by the river and pray for her good will. Harm her land or people and pray for mercy.

[chickenchirps27]

Last night after reading a bit of the Book of Bill i went to sleep.

i had a dream that i had to team up with Bill Cipher to assassinate an angel.

I had to carve out its heart so that Bill would let me go.

I woke up very tired.

[hinamie]

theyre soft your honour

[megaawkwardhuman]

[humming-fly]

I only just now realized what a shame it is we never got to see Al and Greedling really interacting

[llitchilitchi]

more Slovak Miku! this time in folk dress from Čajkov with its iconic horned cap