A Syzygy of things

This took me so soooo long to assemble, I had a full blown creative meltdown somewhere in between and was on the verge of deleting the entire file, but my bestie and some more sleep saved it.

This took me so soooo long to assemble, I had a full blown creative meltdown somewhere in between and was on the verge of deleting the entire file, but my bestie and some more sleep saved it.

2020

A word in advance, 2020 I came out of a year full of great creative endeavors, paired with great design progress and an overall very satisfying sense of going in the right creative direction. Now aside from the obvious horrors of 2020, my partner an I faced a big personal incident and it still feels like a bad fever dream to me, cause I do not remember much else, other than that and COVID from this year really.

Now back to art, as a result the little time in between it all that I had left was not the most creatively fruitful, as you can imagine...All the highs from the prior year dissipated immediately. Not only was my art time at an all time low, but also whatever I deemed "finished" has never been so little (except for 2012). Still, there are a few pieces and sketches I still really enjoy, so lets get to it:

Starting off with "Fashion Gremlin" Cillah, this was a short but very satisfying tiny doodle, her outfit, if I remember correctly, was directly inspired by a fit Tatsuro (MUCC) wore in a photo shoot. It also birthed the idea of Cillah needing reading glasses.

Next, another doodle of Cillah, this time and maybe even the first time drawing her in a skirt, that far I never thought of her being comfortable in it, or to an extend the idea of her not in pants evoked a "too feminine" idea of her in my brain (brain stupid, I know). Learning to love and enjoy all aspects of fashion on my characters was a big growing aspect these past few years. As for the outfit itself, its is inspired by Dami's (Dreamcatcher) outfit in the Red Sun MV.

This one was very difficult for me, both Voy and Cillah look amazing and I remember having a lot of fun, especially with drawing their cloths, but my girls themselves constantly felt "not right" to me, and to this day I still want to pick it up again and tweak things...though this might be more directly connected to my constant design changes on them. Retrospectively, 2020 was the year of me borrowing outfits from musicians, in this one Voy's outfit is taken from Avu-chan's outfit in 女王蜂 (Queen Bee) MV to Kinsei.

This one took me all year, literally, I struggled a lot with getting it to a finishing point, unlike the initial sketch which went onto canvas smoothly. I still like it, from their outfits, to the poses, tiny details like where their hands linger, who they touch really bring me joy still.

Now for the last one of 2020 I want to share, lose you tonight holds a special place for me. I don't find it particularly well executed now, nor does it move me still like it did 2 years ago, but it was a piece I connect a lot of realization for what moves and inspires me in my emotive illustrations. And that music and music videography always be the closest when it comes to describing a visual connection point to what's going on in my brain while figuring out ideas.

2021

A word of context again, with slowly adapting to this new state of normality due to the pandemic and online lectures and semi-lockdowns, I wanted 2021 to be a more hopeful year. I really was hoping for it, then in April and October my partner and I were hit with tragedy and even just vaguely tip-toeing around it makes my stomach twist.

So, with no surprise art was not my focus for the majority of the year, but I tried to use it as a distraction a lot, which sometimes worked. On a positive note, distraction led to me trying to dive into more spicy content again, which I hadn't done in many years, simple for not really feeling it. Lets get to it:

This one was one of the firsts of 2021, and I had fun just wildly throwing all of Voy's species explorations together like a big spore infested, benthic melting pot. I still really adore the shading in this one and the details on her right arm.

I don't know from when exactly in 2021 this is, but I know it took me til the end of the year to actually finish it. What can I say I just really like mushrooms and Voy all bloodied up and suffering is always a big hnnng for me.

:3c

:3c (No really I have nothing else to say. Head empty, just hnnng)

All I can say to this one is: I.Hate.Backgrounds. The sketch and lines, even the coloring were a breeze to art through and I still love the shading on this one very much. But then I was stuck with "white bg syndrome" (in my case its all mid grey, but its the same concept, so...). It took me a stupidly long time to figure out "where" to put her, in the end was my desire to just be done with it so strong that the easiest solution in my brain was to just throw her in the shower. So let it be known, if everything else fails, throw your characters in the shower.

And lastly, as a matter of distraction from 2021, me delving into meme redraws. I did a couple of them, mainly to scenes out of New Girl, cause Nick Miller is a fantastically chaotic character.

2022

If anything, I try to think of 2022 of a year of trying to recover. Any ambitious thriving for progress or growth were put aside for healing.

This also involved my art. I spend a lot of time this year writing, working on my world building and generally exploring just whatever I wanted to in that moment. No rules, no boundaries, just comfort. And I feel like it helped me get through with shit and I think it shows in my art too:

As I said, comfort was a big factor for me, and exploring and letting my thoughts just do their thing for a creative outlet let me rekindle my love for more domestic stuff too. So, Cillah reading is very very high on that list.

Just as high as Voy dancing,

In that sense, trying to not make sense of how things could work, but just doing them, let to a lot more freedom and peace of mind for me again. I have to keep reminding me to just do things, they will fall into place eventually cause I'm in no rush with my art.

And we as artists say it all the time "not everything has to be a masterpiece", but we're also our own worst enemy when it comes to accepting this fact. But finding comfort in these more "meaningless" small doodles, other than trying to make something "big" out of them, gave me a lot of positive experiences with my character again.

It also let me just do weird sad shit again, and I'm grateful for having that way of venting again. This one of Voy in particular I still love a lot, it makes little sense without context I think, but I don't mind that, cause I did it for myself primarily.

Now, I would have loved to add the partner-piece of this one for Cillah's birthday on the 22nd too, but I could not make it in time so this is officially my last art piece of 2022. As with some pieces in 2020 I took the liberty to draw clothing inspiration from a musician, this time 이채연 (Lee Chae Yeon) from her Hush Rush performance for genie original. I love the layers on the outfit and the details on the embroidery, the dozen light reflections in her hair and the deep shadows.

So this is all I have, 3 years in art and it feels like both only a year has passed while simultaneously also a decade with everything that was thrown at me these past years...

2020

A word in advance, 2020 I came out of a year full of great creative endeavors, paired with great design progress and an overall very satisfying sense of going in the right creative direction. Now aside from the obvious horrors of 2020, my partner an I faced a big personal incident and it still feels like a bad fever dream to me, cause I do not remember much else, other than that and COVID from this year really.

Now back to art, as a result the little time in between it all that I had left was not the most creatively fruitful, as you can imagine...All the highs from the prior year dissipated immediately. Not only was my art time at an all time low, but also whatever I deemed "finished" has never been so little (except for 2012). Still, there are a few pieces and sketches I still really enjoy, so lets get to it:

Starting off with "Fashion Gremlin" Cillah, this was a short but very satisfying tiny doodle, her outfit, if I remember correctly, was directly inspired by a fit Tatsuro (MUCC) wore in a photo shoot. It also birthed the idea of Cillah needing reading glasses.

Next, another doodle of Cillah, this time and maybe even the first time drawing her in a skirt, that far I never thought of her being comfortable in it, or to an extend the idea of her not in pants evoked a "too feminine" idea of her in my brain (brain stupid, I know). Learning to love and enjoy all aspects of fashion on my characters was a big growing aspect these past few years. As for the outfit itself, its is inspired by Dami's (Dreamcatcher) outfit in the Red Sun MV.

This one was very difficult for me, both Voy and Cillah look amazing and I remember having a lot of fun, especially with drawing their cloths, but my girls themselves constantly felt "not right" to me, and to this day I still want to pick it up again and tweak things...though this might be more directly connected to my constant design changes on them. Retrospectively, 2020 was the year of me borrowing outfits from musicians, in this one Voy's outfit is taken from Avu-chan's outfit in 女王蜂 (Queen Bee) MV to Kinsei.

This one took me all year, literally, I struggled a lot with getting it to a finishing point, unlike the initial sketch which went onto canvas smoothly. I still like it, from their outfits, to the poses, tiny details like where their hands linger, who they touch really bring me joy still.

Now for the last one of 2020 I want to share, lose you tonight holds a special place for me. I don't find it particularly well executed now, nor does it move me still like it did 2 years ago, but it was a piece I connect a lot of realization for what moves and inspires me in my emotive illustrations. And that music and music videography always be the closest when it comes to describing a visual connection point to what's going on in my brain while figuring out ideas.

2021

A word of context again, with slowly adapting to this new state of normality due to the pandemic and online lectures and semi-lockdowns, I wanted 2021 to be a more hopeful year. I really was hoping for it, then in April and October my partner and I were hit with tragedy and even just vaguely tip-toeing around it makes my stomach twist.

So, with no surprise art was not my focus for the majority of the year, but I tried to use it as a distraction a lot, which sometimes worked. On a positive note, distraction led to me trying to dive into more spicy content again, which I hadn't done in many years, simple for not really feeling it. Lets get to it:

This one was one of the firsts of 2021, and I had fun just wildly throwing all of Voy's species explorations together like a big spore infested, benthic melting pot. I still really adore the shading in this one and the details on her right arm.

I don't know from when exactly in 2021 this is, but I know it took me til the end of the year to actually finish it. What can I say I just really like mushrooms and Voy all bloodied up and suffering is always a big hnnng for me.

:3c

:3c (No really I have nothing else to say. Head empty, just hnnng)

All I can say to this one is: I.Hate.Backgrounds. The sketch and lines, even the coloring were a breeze to art through and I still love the shading on this one very much. But then I was stuck with "white bg syndrome" (in my case its all mid grey, but its the same concept, so...). It took me a stupidly long time to figure out "where" to put her, in the end was my desire to just be done with it so strong that the easiest solution in my brain was to just throw her in the shower. So let it be know, if everything else fails, throw your characters in the shower.

And lastly, as a matter of distraction from 2021, me delving into meme redraws. I did a couple of them, mainly to scenes out of New Girl, cause Nick Miller is a fantastically chaotic character.

2022

If anything, I try to think of 2022 of a year of trying to recover. Any ambitious thriving for progress or growth where put aside for healing.

This also involved my art. I spend a lot of time this year writing, working on my world building and generally exploring just whatever I wanted to in that moment. No rules, no boundaries, just comfort. And I feel like it helped me get through with shit and I think it shows in my art too:

As I said, comfort was a big factor for me, and exploring and letting my thoughts just do their thing for a creative outlet let me rekindle my love for more domestic stuff too. So, Cillah reading is very very high on that list.

Just as high as Voy dancing,

In that sense, trying to not make sense of how things could work, but just doing them let to a lot more freedom and peace of mind for me again. I have to keep reminding me to just do things, they will fall into place eventually cause I'm in no rush with my art.

And we as artists, day it all the time "not everything has to be a masterpiece", but we're also our own worst enemy when it comes to accepting this fact. But finding comfort in these more "meaningless" small doodles, other than trying to make something "big" out of them, gave me a lot of positive experiences with my character again.

It also let me just do weird sad shit again, which I grateful for having that way of venting again. This one of Voy in particular I still love a lot, it makes little sense without context I think, but I don't mind that, cause I did it for myself primarily.

Now, I would have loved to add the partner-piece of this one for Cillah's birthday on the 22nd too, but I could not make it in time so this is officially my last art piece of 2022. As with some pieces in 2021 I took the liberty to draw clothing inspiration from a musician, this time 이채연 (Lee Chae Yeon) from her Hush Rush performance for genie original. I love the layers on the outfit and the details on the embroidery, the dozen light reflections in her hair and the deep shadows.

So this is all I have, 3 years in art and it feels like both only a year has passed but also a decade with everything that was thrown at me these past years...