amy ross

I have a long way to go, but I’m nearly done with the major arcana.

Here are some of my favorites:

I set myself a design challenge (as I often do). I wanted to limit the color palette and the brush styles to create a very consistent look.

And since each card focuses on black cats, it forces me to think deeply about symbolism and design to make sure the meaning of each card is clear and each design is unique.

But there’s still a lot of variety coming through. It’s not all class, or all silliness - just like cats

I have a forearm tattoo of the cats in this one ☝️

I’m so happy with how both of these two managed to feel dark, but adorable at the same time.

And then there’s this one absolute diva:

Most of these used my own feline friends for reference.

Mališa, otherwise known as Little One, is a pet pigeon owned by a conservative butler of the Austro-Hungarian aristocracy. She is loved, and she is pampered— until her owner is murdered in cold blood, and she is left to fend for herself in Sarajevo.

In the wilds of the city, she feeds from the poor, working nationalist radicals, and the vieux riches alike.

To Mališa, there are no ethical concerns. No politics. No burgeoning nationalism.

Are you going to come out of it with a Klein-level work? No. Dude was bonkers skilled. But I am here to tell you that if you've ever gone to Home Depot and shuffled through paint chips and been like "God, this is such a gorgeous color, I fucking love this color" and then immediately been like "...but I can't imagine painting a wall with it." and bought a can of soul-killing eggshell off-white or what the fuck ever, you absolutely can go pick up a $10 canvas from a craftstore and a $5 sample of that color and just hang 6 square feet of it on a wall and enjoy the fuck out of it.

Bill Watterson – Calvin and Hobbes (1986)

Hergé – Tintin (1947, Tintin Magazine)

Jeff Smith – Bone (1993, Bone Holiday Special)

Walt Kelly – Pogo (1950, Maclean's Magazine)

And a bonus:

Dark and gloomy pharmaceutical advertisement artwork for the French sedative ‘Sympathyl’, c. 1930s

Hermann Warm (1889–1976)

set design art for “Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari”, 1920

Propaganda

Dr. Daisuke Serizawa (Godzilla)—The original Godzilla (ゴジラ, 1954) is a horror film right? Because if it somehow isn’t enough that we have the postwar horror of nuclear apocalypse symbolized by the monster himself, consider the tragedy of Dr. Serizawa. He’s the brilliant, tortured, visually impaired young scientist haunted by the possibility of his astonishing new technology falling into the wrong hands and destroying the world - you know, the trope that should be a hoary cliche by now but instead just gets more depressingly relevant by the day. Also, and perhaps more importantly for this particular poll, he’s HOT and he BROODS.

Ben (Night of the Living Dead)—You know every guy in a zombie apocalypse movie who's just trying to keep it together while having the worst time of his life? Well Duane Jones was the first guy ever to do it and it nailed it right out of the gate. Just thrown headlong into having to be the voice of reason and authority for a half dozen random strangers who are NOT helping the situation (zombie apocalypse) at hand. And he looks good doing it too.

This is the FINAL poll of the vintage horror hotties tourney. All previous polls can be found under #horror hotties. Please reblog with further support for your favorite hot vintage horror hottie. This poll will last one week.

Questions about the bracket? Send me an ask here.

[additional propaganda submitted under the cut.]

congrats to the joint winners of the horror hotties mini tournament!

David Hockney ‘California’, 1965. Private Collection. “I never thought the Swimming Pool Pictures were at all about mere hedonist pleasure. They were about the surface of the water, the very thin film, the shimmering, two-dimensionality.