Handel's blog

“You’re no longer bound by the future. Of course, that includes me too.”

YOU CANT BE FUCKING SERIOUS

what could possibly be as shocking as-

WHAT

Person on screen: needs a couple pats of butter, a splash of olive oil, simmered on low with a bay leaf and a cinnamon stick. What?! You never seen a boy who knows his way around the kitchen? 

Yeah my mom always wanted a little girl but she got stuck with me instead. That wasn’t gonna stop her though so all my friends were opening up nerf guns and bmx bikes on their birthday, I was getting crockpots. 

(scene changes to the person dressed in a nice black suit jacket, bright pink dress shirt, and black tie) Yeah laugh it up! Take a picture while you’re at it 'cause this is the last time you’ll ever see me in a suit! How do boys wear these things??

The context is a woman sitting for a portrait and she and the artist fall in love with each other.

I love Inoue's characters best when he's writing about art and artists (which he does a lot, so yay!), as he seems to be a guy who is just infatuated with creating and connecting through that process. And "process" is an important word here, because I think that's the thing about art he loves best, not some product.

I think a lot about how Otoya and Maya fall in love making the Bloody Rose violin in Kamen Rider Kiva. Sure, it's Otoya's playing that gets Maya's attention, but it's the crafting of that instrument that really seals their relationship (and takes on the weight of an affair that pushes Yuri out of Otoya's life).

The artist in this Donbrother's episode dies, and his final wish is for the woman to burn the painting he made of her, as he felt it could never convey his full feelings of love for the woman. It was the process, not the product, where that love was found.

But that's the thing. She doesn't exaggerate or grotesqueify or alter people's bodies to fit some standard. (Except insofar as she draws different species differently, and those are exquisitely practiced to ensure they have the same diversity of appearances that humans do.) She just presents people exactly as they are, complexities and oddities and all.