Cinnamon Cheese

There's a lot of inspiration that went into this art piece so prepare yourself.

I was watching a Youtube short when I came across a painting called "Common Ground", painted by Tom Lovell in 1940. This art piece is a reference to the painting.

The painting reminded me of a post @antidotefortheawkward-art made regarding a possibility for how Princess Iron Fan and Jade-Faced Fox's dynamic turned for the better after the Bull Demon King was captured.

If you know what the "Common Ground" painting looks like, then a notable difference I'm sure you've noticed is the hair. In the painting, the women's hair is up in a prim and proper hairdo; not a single strand out of place. However, in this drawing both PIF and JFF's hair is let loose and looks very unruly. There are two reasons for this.

I cannot for the life of me draw those hair loops. They are so fucking elaborate and I can do anything but that.

Depicting their hair a disheveled mess communicates the emotional rawness more clearly this way. From what I can gather, Chinese culture holds hair in a very high manner and to see these two women completely disregard it really nails home the, how do I call it? the effect of loss. after the Bull Demon King is taken away. They both love him, and care about him, even though their circumstances are wildly different and should act as friction between the two.

Okay, onto point number three. I know that Princess Iron Fan is shown with more youth-like beauty, but after seeing how she's depicted in the 1986 show, I wanted to give her a more "aged beauty" look. I think it works well with the exhaustion she must've felt, competing for her husband's love, enduring the lack of it and dealing with her son's own capture (I know it didn't go down exactly like that but she was going through it and did not care for the details.)

As for the colors- I chose them because I am partial to warm tone colors and also because they communicate the complicated feelings both Princess Iron Fan and Jade-Faced Fox must've been going through, seeking comfort in each other during this time. The red is meant to show that there is still some hostility between the two, which is to be expected after the whole debacle. However, the softer colors such as the light orange and yellow are meant to show, well. both of those colors are my favorite colors, and are meant to represent what I think is the best feeling in the world: care.

But how I implemented them here.. I'm not going to lie to you- I low-key just hoped they would.. merge. I guess. I could've done better, but I think it looks cool.

Before I go into depth about my re-imaging for these two I gotta do some honorable mentions.

I used OSP's Princess Iron Fan and Jade-Face Fox designs as a reference for their attire. Shout out to my favorite channels ever :D

And as for the chair PIF is sitting on- it's actually an opium bench! I learned about this when I searched for "tang dynasty furniture" on Tumblr and came across @tsunamishark's post about it. I used their concept art as a reference as well.

Now alllll of that is out of the way, possible PIF and JFF solidarity!

Let me be clear. I think Jade-Faced Fox is a bitch. If you like her, I respect your opinion and I have only seen OSP video in the chapter where she appears so you know.

But the way she acted, I literally cannot, like girl, you mad that she wants to see her husband? Who, by the way, isn't your husband? She is so bitchy. The fact that she had audacity to say that shit is honestly so baffling because if I talked about the Princess Iron Fan like that I would be looking over my shoulder to see if she was on her way to kill me.

However, antidote's take on her has made her more sympathetic to me. I think while it wouldn't be OOC if it turned out she didn't care much for the Bull Demon King in the first place, it's a lot more interesting if she did really love him as well, making her feel more like a person with good intentions just as much as bad ones.

In my AU, I do plan for Princess Iron Fan and Jade-Faced Fox to reconcile and settle on good terms with each other. I have been debating whether or not they should become a couple as well (another Yuri to add to this AU) but that feels like wrapping things up in a neat little bow which is NOT what I want to do. I think I'll keep the status of their relationship ambiguous to both the readers and to me; if y'all are a PIF x JFF truther then I won't be telling you otherwise. (the ship is kinda growing on me tbh). but still. I do want to point out that Jade-Faced Fox caused a huge tear in PIF's relationship with her husband, so obviously it's going to be complicated. (like I understand that was the culture at the time but it was pretty obvious that PIF was NOT happy with the arrangement. at all.)