retheshal

i have started watching/reading witch hat atelier after being repeatedly told that it's real damn good, as well as a few people in my life swearing up and down that 'zmeess you will love it so so much', and you know what, they were not wrong. good stuff! always love a complex allegory, and the artistic skill of Shirahama is to die for. anyway, i finally have my tablet back after a long trip so i sketched the witch dads in my style

finally finished a painting i've been cooking in my mind for a few years! shadowgast as The Devil, one of my favorite tarot cards and one of the three cards i associate with their relationship

i'm not much for divination but i love the story-telling aspect of tarot, and one of my favorite visual metaphors of The Devil is how loose the chains around the two figures' necks are. they're not kept bound. it's that possibility to choose that i find so significant, and so fitting for the story of these two wizards. to say you're not defined by your past is to say you're born with all the choices you make; but to say you are forever defined by it is to deny yourself the right to change. the chains around your neck might be very heavy, but the choice to shrug them off is always yours to take.