#consider this a quick concept art to my own obsession | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

al-hekima-madara-blog · 3 years

Text

"Hashirama, when did I go wrong ?" 2/2 Breath your spirit into the mud

An other Madara's analysis :

Madara is a great shonen villain. The Greatest. But since he asks for a way of redemption and Hashirama is still busy, I gladly proposes my own reflexions.

In the Part 1 : "Hashirama when did I go wrong?" 1/2 Dominate your inner demon We delve into his first mistake, his inability to build trust with others. Inability as well to surrender himself to Fate, since it belongs to the realm of the Unknown. The very concept he can't control. But that's the point of human's experience, do your best with your limited power, and limited time you got and leave the rest to the Fate. I know, it sounds totally crazy considering his position and the shitty fate he got but it was the only sane way. Suspicion attracts more suspicious situations. In contrary hope attract unexpected new opportunities. It's the cheesiest explanation of law of attraction I ever gave, Hashirama will be proud of me. I can feel him sniffing with tears of joy.

This being said, Madara is a genius mind. Ahead of his time, pioneer and avant-garde : first Mangakyou Sharingan, first Eternal Mangakyou Sharingan, first to control a Bijuu, first to awake a Rinnegan on his own, insane fighting creativity, crazy long-term strategist, a longevity beyond the 30's something of his time. He both thinks fast and forward. And as in everything in life, it's within your biggest qualities that reside your own limits. His mind is boundless, free like the wind, driving and bold like fire but real world is very mokuton slow and steady like earth, fluid and clingy like water. Leading me to his second mistake : Madara's inability to have a vision rooted in reality. Let's go !

An idealist

Something rarely discuss about Madara aside is ninjustu's abilities is his smartness. I often headcanon him as a strong thinker and heavy reader of ancient philosophy, literature, and history. And I won't be surprise if he was into calligraphy and haiku since it was an ancient art practice by warrior class. We saw Hiruzen doing it in the beginning of Naruto which mean it was a practice he learned from the founders generation. An other clue is his attraction to elegance. He had way to much vocabulary comparing to his generation and too complex to grab for a simple children like Naruto or Obito. He often talks with poetic metaphor and this from early age. We have « I reach the other side », the famous « Do you want to dance ?», even his « I hate people behind my back» had many implied meanings. And he always have an unsolicited aesthetic opinion on everything and everyone.

Madara is the only ninja (maybe with Orochimaru) who was genuinely curious about ninjutsu's origin. It's not enough for him to master a power, he needs to know the whole concept behind its mechanism. In the second part of his life, When he denied this world, he let himself being obsessed by abstract dilemma . What is peace ? How to escape duality of this world ? How escaping suffering not for himself but for whole humanity ? His ideal was by nature purely metaphysic ( from the greek meta = beyond, physic = matter) and detach from the material world that he intentionally denied. He went so far into denial the matter than he even conceptualised his own self. How generous of him we can all be Madara if we obey him and follow his plan😅.

a quick thinker

His utopian sensibility is hold by a strong intuition. In stressful situation he demonstrate how he analyses every details and act quickly. It's a precious gift during a fight to death. But in daily life, it made him so nervous and impatient. His mind is calculating already 75269 possibilities with 58962 parameters with a timeline of 250 years ahead while the average joe only thinks about his next ramen. People are slow to him. And he can't just chill.

He make up his mind quickly and with his natural pessimist nature end up to gave up as well quickly. He gave up quickly Hashirama's friendship without putting a bit of faith in future. That's why I said learning to surrender to fate is important you never know what future can bring you to open a new door, when an other one stay closed. In my opinion as well I think he signed peace treaty with the Senjus to soon and pressured by context. We don't know what they talk about but for sure Uchiha clan's political position was not a subject and cost him the respect he deserved as founder. Realising his mistake, he gave up as well too quickly Konoha and his clan. Even if you had valid reasons, you cannot ask your clan to join their biggest enemies one day and one year later when they start to find a little bit of security ask them to leave and follow you out in the wild shinobi world. We don't know either how went the conversation with his clan but we know he is not the most talkative person. It went probably something like :

MADARA : We gotta go.

CLAN : but why ?

MADARA : In chapter 399 Konoha will commit genocide on us. I read the script.

CLAN : What script ? We're confused...one day we should be with senju, an other day not... and we already pay our children's fees in ninja academy and what about the mortgage to Konoha and...

* rambling for the next 20 minutes*

MADARA : ...

CLAN : Madara-sama ?

MADARA : ...

CLAN : Can you at least elaborate your thoughts ?

MADARA : ...

CLAN : ...

MADARA : Hn. Forget about it, I'm out.

He put zero effort to popularizing his thoughts. I'm not even sure Izuna ever knews what was his brother's real dream. His quick thinking was perceive unstable to normal citizens.

I can't find anymore this analysis I read on tumblr and if anyone remember please let me know and I will add the source. Someone said that the main difference between Madara and Hashirama's dream was one was looking for an inner Peace and the second was about Outer Peace. Hashirama is about structures, village, clans alliance. And his idea is reinforced by Tobirama who swear only by law enforcement and suppression of emotion altogether.

Madara wanted a way for people to live together despise hate and mistrust rooted in clans for generation. Hashirama rooted this concept in a village. On paper, the combinaison of both of them sounds amazing. But in the storyline, a lot of Madara's point of view stayed unheard : How to reach forvigeness when your very neighbough murder your brother ? Shall we forget and move on ? Shall we ask for justice while every ninja including himself had been too responsible for countless orphans ? Shall we accept to give up one's dream to serve someone else's dream ? How reconciliate owns personal grief with a need for greater good?

It's not enough to live in a village together with rules and hierarchy. In the end we still live with people's pain, ego, hope, dream, ambition. Konoha was built without taking the time to solve this issue between the Senju and Uchiha. As Hashirama admitted himself because they were in hurry to build peace. The will of Fire is in reality the will of the Senju inherited from Asura Otsusuki. But what about Uchiha's Will and Indra's legacy ? Did they take the time to merge both philosophies in order to create a unique Konoha's Will born from both ideologies ? I don't think so. This big problem leads inevitably to those unsolved negative emotions who flow down the village's foundations, and putrified them until later it was impossible to ignore the filths.

When Hashirama begged Madara to stay in the village he knew somehow that with only Tobirama at his side his Outer peace will be more crystallised than ever and more rigid. People are not machine their are both creativity and rationality. Ying and Yang, Light and shadow, you get the point.... With Madara's departure as a powerful Ying energy, and Hashirama's inability to convince him to stay, Konoha was doomed to failed. And it did.

Madara saw in Konoha a hollow shell. And to Hashirama, Madara's vision was like a breath of air. Divinely inspirated but hard to grasp even for the clan he swore to defend. After his departure, Hashirama's vision solidified until it got devoid of compassion. This mentality leads to three Shinobi wars, children still soldiers or worse tik-tok bombs Jinchurikis. Madara's vision left forever the shore of reality, denying human world, denying time passing, abolishing people's freedom of choice. His genius mind kept drifting far, far away into a never-ending genjutsu. He never "wake up to reality", he drown himself deeper and deeper unto Black Zetsu's illusion. His brilliant spirit was never incarnated into earth. Instead it was floating between life and death. Like an unborn ghost inside a barren vessel.

Gaara can be a good example for him to get inspired. Like Madara he is capricorn, quiet and stern personality, like him he suffered trauma, betrayals from his kin and end up with a frightening reputation. When he was Kazekage, people weren't immediately enjoyed by it. Many time some tried to get ride of him. But he did what every capricorn knows to do best : working harder, working for the people and slowly gaining their trust, time is always capricorn's ally. He gained back the support of his brother and sister. Keep strong diplomatic relationship with Konoha. Adopt and raise a son and passed down his wisdom to the next generation And finally people recognise his sacrifice for protecting his village.

And contrary to Gaara, Madara at the time of Konoha had a longer experience in leadership, he could have been easily a second Hokage if he wanted to seriously. By slowly surrounding himself with people out of his clan, even out of Konoha and the Fire land. Using Hashirama's ruling time to build his team, recruiting them specifically for the talents he lacks the most :

sweet diplomatic team to counter Hashirama's natural charm.

Smooth politicians with great skills in hypocrisy and seduction to deal with the feudal Lords courts

an aggressive legal team to defend Uchiha's rights, as a lioness defending her cubs.

an excellent Public Relation team because the word needs to know how sexy Madara actually is, to keep Uchiha's contribution to Konoha alive in memories.

Well I think I answered what was Madara's main mistakes in my point of view. I'm as well curious to hear your opinion.

And if you want to read more about my Madara's analysis follow me in my main page here

#Al Hekima post #madara uchiha #uchiha madara #naruto analysis #naruto shippuden #naruto fandom #uchiha clan #warring states era #founders era #madara #madara analysis #hashirama #gaara #konoha #konohagakure #senju

130 notes · View notes

persephoneyss · 4 years

Text

The Monster.

Pairing: park jimin x f!reader.

Genre: Yandere, dark themes, anguish.

Summary: ❝You can be reborn like spring, but your nightmares will follow your footsteps at night.❞

Warnings: Yandere behavior, obsession, voyeurism, Jimin is a little delusional, implicit murder, death threats, a little violence, stalking, death of secondary characters, reader idolizes his mother, humiliation.

Number of words: 6000+

︙ Author's note: this is my first fic here, sorry if there are errors. My first language is not English and I don't speak it fluently either, so I used the translator. Sorry about that. I hope you enjoy it, I am open to criticism. Thanks!

(Puedes leer este y más fics aquí en español.)

To block.

Your mind felt strangely familiar, like it was processing the same situation all over again. And then the same thing happened again.

Blocking.

You never noticed those little details, invisible to the eyes of others. Or maybe you took too seriously the message and advice that your mother always told you when you were afraid of being left alone in your room because of the obvious and silly repetitive story of the monster under the bed, you were crying looking for your mother's room in the middle of the night. You were looking for refuge in her arms. However, the only loving words she had for you were: "Ignore him and he will go away, darling."

It seemed very clever to you, you began to close your eyes ignoring your worst fears and in a short time you could do what most children could not at your age, sleep alone in the dark.

Your mother was wise, maybe that's why you never understood why your father left her overnight. She never commented on the subject and little by little it was forgotten in her daily lives. Your father never existed, you never saw him again.

In his small town no one was exceptionally well known, unless he had done something good or bad enough to be called a hero or, in the same way, a villain. You were barely seven years old when it happened, a family with a lot of money had chosen your town as a decent land, enough to build their luxurious house where their children who came from golden cradles would grow up. According to the gossip, they were foreigners coming to invade their town and rule it, when in reality the Parks never got more involved in politics than necessary.

They were just rich, spending money.

Young women from all over the world and even from other distant towns came every day to try to conquer the privileged children of the great mansion built finely and strategically in the middle of the main square. The young women were beautiful, many times you stood at the door of your house admiring their distinguished perfect faces and you wondered if the children of the Park family were really worth it so that young and beautiful women who had previously been rejected would come back again. in search of new opportunities.

Your mother sometimes stood next to you with a smile and released another phrase that ended up marking your style of thinking, her voice sounded so ethereal: "Money compensates for external beauty, plus the dignity that you lose to those who possess it, it will never have a price."

Your lost look made her smile beautifully badly, then that same sweet voice that taught you things that other women would see as irrelevant, she too moments later she orders you to come home to eat. You thought about it so much, your mother was beautiful, she could remarry if she wanted to. However, she never did, or at least until that day.

You were poor, you were never afraid to accept it. You noticed it almost immediately, when you saw other children playing with toys that seemed impossible that you will ever possess, your mother was friends with the one who was best friends with your father, a carpenter who seemed to be very kind. He always gave you toys that came out with small defects and he couldn't sell, he was a good man until he seemed to misinterpret the situations and her relationship with your mother, unexpectedly asking her to marry him. Obviously you had to stop seeing him after the rejection. However, you were stubborn like the woman who gave you life, almost every day after finishing school you walk two streets to her local.

"How is your mother? Any suitors who weren't rejected the first time?" You laughed, helping him finish his last job. You shook your head, Peter was always very nice and honestly funny, you still didn't understand how your mother could reject them, but you never got into adult affairs. You were just an eight-year-old girl.

"She still misses dad." You whisper trying to drive a nail into loose wood, before being interrupted by Peter.

You look curiously at his downcast face of hers, as if she was keeping something deep within himself. But he quickly changes his expression as well as the subject. "Very good girl, no more help for today" he says, removing the dangerous tools out of your reach, you let out a exhausted sigh wanting to help him. Deep down you felt guilty. "How are you doing in school? I heard that the Parks will start a new campaign to help more in the education of the children, maybe you can see someone from the family up close."

You move your head in distracting affirmation playing with a piece of wood, Peter watches you for a moment and then sighs. You really were special, and if I could tell what happened to your father, you would let go of that glow for sure.

The following days passed in the same way, there was only a radical change in your routine. Now they forced you to stay longer in school so that you could take art classes with the children of the Park family. You had heard many mothers talking to yours about how handsome they were, and since their daughters would undoubtedly have a chance with Jimin, who was the eldest son and of course the first-born heir, you thought for a long time about a tall man with more years than all those young women who hallucinated with the perfect millionaire husband. However, it was all an illusion. Jimin was not a man, he was a seventeen year old teenager.

Perhaps the young woman who did win him over would be very lucky to marry someone her own age and not a bitter old man who only had money. Jimin was everything, young, handsome and a millionaire, the best bet of any woman.

His first class was alongside his current teacher, introducing each child in the Park family. They were all very handsome, but Jimin seemed to shine brighter than the stars in the dark night. You wondered if his younger siblings would become jealous of him, it would be an interesting concept considering you had no siblings.

Your hands moved the clay very patiently, your classmates seemed to enjoy these classes and they were undoubtedly fun.

"What a beautiful flower ..." You smiled nodding, no one would ever think that someone like Jimin would be delighted with the common drawing of any girl. Her gaze traveled around your pure and innocent face, as if she couldn't get enough of you. She sat next to you, admiring how your hands continued to play with the dough creating new shapes and I certainly enjoyed every second.

She had never met someone who would attract so much attention from her, you were ethereal. Jimin was immediately drawn to you, your gaze clear as daylight and your soft features, maybe you were just a girl but you seemed to tempt his attention incredibly badly from him. He felt the strange sensation of making sure you were okay, safe, probably in his arms.

He followed you closely, always arriving at the same time. Her mother used to say that Jimin was very irresponsible, she never complied with the basic principles of being a Park: Discipline, order and punctuality. Jimin was different, his siblings may have fulfilled those three bases just to give what they wanted to their parents and receive more affection from him, but not him.

Jimin was obsessive. Impulsive, and he had self-control issues.

The biggest dangerous trait that his parents noticed since he was little, is that he suffered attacks of anger against anyone without caring about the consequences of this. More than three of his babysitters claimed that little Jimin had hit them, slapping and shoving them. But all of this was radically ignored by the Parks, who turned a deaf ear claiming that their son was simply too controlling, and in a way, he was. Jimin liked to have everything under control, at his disposal.

Jimin found himself fascinated with your little eyes looking at him without fear and, even though it was painful for him, without love. For you, he was nothing more than a stranger. He tried to change that, sitting next to you every day and talking to you a few times when he could get more than two sentences out of you. He liked art, I could tell by the way you focus too much on a small painting of an insignificant tree.

If you liked trees, Jimin could buy a forest for yourself.

You loved roses, he could plant thousands in every corner of town.

Or maybe, your obsession with the smell of vanilla. Jimin went wildly for the most expensive vanilla scented lotion, hoping for some praise from you and he really didn't fail.

No, when the next day he sat next to you and your gaze turned to him with a kind smile. "It smells great, Mr. Jimin." Your soft tone and your minimal compliment was enough to make his entire body shake, his hands began to sweat and his voice seemed to falter. It was amazing how you managed to make him so nervous, while he was still a child.

"Y-do you like it?" She asked even knowing the answer, your head bobbing in a quick nod and an even bigger smile adorns your features.

You put your painting aside for a moment to continue responding, Jimin feels elated to see that his plan worked. Now you're just looking at him, as it always should be. "It smells like vanilla, I like vanilla." You say honestly.

"I see, I also like vanilla." You seem shocked, Jimin increases the tension of him fearing that he said something wrong. He really wasn't lying, maybe vanilla wasn't something he used constantly but he didn't dislike it either, he was just disguising and embellishing a crude truth.

And before long, Jimin feels his life take an unexpected turn, people had started to notice his closeness to you. They called him an angel when in reality he was a devil, rumors and silly praise that he would be a good father were not lacking and the young women who came to his door every day to look for a date with him increased in an exorbitant way. You were oblivious to all that, clearly. However, you could not ignore all the looks that fell on you when you accompanied your mother to the market, as from one day to the next you became someone important just because you were the focus of attention of him Mr. Jimin, as you used to call him with respect. Peter also suffered the consequences of this, you had not stopped going to his store and the young women looking to conquer Jimin or at least get his attention began to follow you wanting to win your affection so that you will speak well of them with their desired man, no you were interested in what they could offer you but the biggest problem was that they did not like to receive a clear 'No.' as a reply.

They were insistent and often annoying. They followed you closely, even when you went to school or to visit Peter who now only went twice a week, you did not want to go out and have to face the pity that it gave you to see many beautiful young women begging for a vague love and that I was looking for more money arrangements than anything else. Also, not all of them had good intentions with you. Your mother made sure of your safety in the face of any incident, and with that came her last word, her strict order not to approach Park Jimin again until he found a wife.

The rest would be history.

He would surely forget you and start forming his own family, having his own children and likewise, looking for his own problems. Instead, that never happened. Jimin had discovered your plan, he was angry, he couldn't believe that you were ignoring his attempts to approach you in such a way. Your attitude was so pure but you were hurting her so much.

He was delusional, she knew he was. But he didn't want to stop. So, he did the only thing that would make you stay by his side.

You felt strangely calm, you had been to and from school with no one following closely in your footsteps. Until you noticed that the whole town seemed to look at you with superiority, with caution. Peter never stopped taking care of his store, however, that day it was closed. You gave little thought to that coincidence, walking home with slow steps. Deep down you were scared.

Maybe you thought you could feel it, in front of your house a crowd of people lay watching the most unexpected marriage request. Your mother was uncomfortable, you could tell by how her face was distorted, and how her hands seemed to shake for reasons not yet known to you. You watched in horror as Jimin knelt before her with a smile pulling a ring out of a small red box.

For a moment, you thought about your father. You felt strange, you always wanted to have a warm fatherly hug but it made you uncomfortable to imagine Jimin occupying that place, you did not want him, you did not love him as a daughter to his firstborn or as another similar relationship. He was a stranger.

Your body fell into the seat reserved especially for you, your eyes observed any place in the church trying to disperse your mind. Your little shoes brushed against each other, your hands rested on the wooden seat waiting for the wedding to end as soon as possible. You never wanted to oppose your thoughts to the idea of your mother falling in love or getting married again, you really didn't care much as long as that person was good for her.

However, he was Park Jimin. You felt disgusted when her mother looked at you from afar with despicable eyes, just as anger consumed you when Mrs. Park tried to embarrass your mother in front of everyone. You didn't ask for this, nobody asked for it.

Maybe you spent too much time thinking around you to notice that Jimin was unhappy. A little upset. He had done what he had to do, chained you to him in some twisted way, marrying your mother and he felt happy, at first. I could see you walking through the church, you were wearing a little white dress to match your mother's and for a sinister moment I imagine that you were the one walking towards him to be named his wife. But he quickly came back to reality, you weren't his fiancée. You wouldn't be his wife.

Deep inside him, he knew how gross it was to feel like this.

Your mother's eyes reflected how unhappy she was, her gaze was uncertain. Jimin smiled seeing how you kicked the decorations that fell to the ground, you were completely oblivious to everything and more to the look of her that she followed you closely. Many called him a good father. Seeing nothing but his protective attitudes, but under the circumstances there were only hints of what might come next. You weren't allowed to leave Jimin's house, his father had left the mansion where his whole family used to live.

Mrs. Park could find no better excuse to leave than the sudden tantrum of her first-born son for marrying an older woman, a widow, and a daughter. This is a mockery and disgrace to her family's last name. Jimin just let her go, he wasn't even there the day her mother boarded the first train to her grandmother's house.

Your mother flatly refused to leave her house at first, she did not want to leave the little cabin that your father had built with his own effort so that both of them would live there and in the future raise their children, you always lived there and you did not want to leave either. But you never had a solid vote, your mother ended up agreeing from one day to the next, you did not know how Jimin managed to change his word so suddenly. Maybe there was never one reason, but you became all of them.

You were painfully present at all times. You observed how little by little, the wispy and wise glow that your mother possessed was getting lost between her empty eyes and her bent body, her head was never raised as she taught you it should be. She was a stranger, you felt scared in her presence. You remembered very well how her face seemed to light up when she saw you coming home from school and how she taught you something new every day.

"Mommy..." You spoke, your hands were still busy with the picture that you hadn't finished painting. But curiosity began to attack your mind.

Your mother came out of the kitchen with a little gray apron, she smiled when she saw you sitting on the floor. "Yes, honey?"

"Why do people get married?" Your gaze lifted from the sheet of paper, wincing at her glowing eyes.

"It depends, it's not necessarily for love. Maybe for money, comfort or ..." her voice trailed off, she still staring at you she leaned down to take your face in her hands. "Because they found someone, as cute as you!"

"Mommy ... I want to marry you!" Your mother began to laugh, your gaze traveled all over her face, joyful of hers and for a moment, you swore that you would hate anyone who dared to take away the great happiness of a genuine smile.

You finished your drawing, just in time because the front door echoed through the entire cabin. Your father appeared with a small drawer in his hands, your mother seemed to be illuminated with an angel when she saw him enter with a kind smile. Both were such for which. They were, more than lovers and husbands, lifelong best friends. Your life seemed to have something that many do not get even after death.

An outer and inner peace. It was perfect.

Almost so perfect, it wasn't true. White roses were always your favorites. However, you began to detest its soft light petals when it seemed that all the townspeople bought the same bouquet of white roses for the funeral of your, now, deceased mother. You took a seat next to her grave, ignoring everyone's greetings and goodbyes, who apparently forgot how her criticism of her increased even as the days, months and years of her wedding with Jimin passed.

You couldn't blame anyone. Or you just didn't want to.

Because the rope around his neck was not placed by them. And the multiple scars on his wrists weren't his marks. A small part of you felt helpless, angry and respectively, disgusted with yourself. Could you help her? Yes. No. Maybe if you had ... And he had stayed in the past.

The little white rose in your hand fell to the floor, everyone had left the room to go to the large buffet served at the reception. You froze, then with the same rage you began to step on the already dead flower at your feet, the petals of it were no more than a pure color, now they were disgusting and dirty. Jimin appeared minutes later, your gaze fell on his hand that was holding a black and a red rose.

"We should go, honey." He whispered as if afraid to scare you even though you were already looking directly at him. Your immobile figure instinctively ran into his arms, which greeted you with an incredibly loving warmth. The roses were placed on top of the coffin, a smile spread across your face when you saw the color red stand out against so much white, and for a second you came to compare the beauty of an outstanding color with your mother.

She stood out in a world where everyone wanted to paint themselves pure white.

Jimin was even more welcoming to you now. He pretended to sleep waiting for 11:30 to arrive so that he could hear your footsteps on the way to his room, you had developed a great amount of fear of loneliness. Jimin knew you always did that, but before it was with her instead of him. You would walk for several seconds looking in the dark for his room, which was next to hers, then I would always hear her voice singing for you, making you rest in his arms. For a long time, I want to be her. But now he was gone and I knew it was a matter of time before your steps stopped at his door.

She loved the closeness of your body to hers, how your hands clung to her nightshirt when you were cold or a horrible nightmare was projected into your dreams. Jimin horribly wishes he could see beyond your dreams, although that would be disrespectful to your privacy, he wouldn't mind breaking your trust too much if he could be sure that you would never walk away from him, even in your dreams.

He managed to chain your life to his, your scared look was the most beautiful thing I have seen before. I want to touch your little face and kiss your soft lips that tempted him every time the word "dad" came out of it.

Time was his greatest enemy.

Your presentation was no better, your hands were trembling again while your feet moved from here to there restlessly. Jimin just watched silently, but the distance between you and him was gigantic, he just wished that the damn bitch that was presented before him would shut up and leave his house. It was remarkable how you seemed angry, maybe it's jealousy, she has feelings for me. He thought sickly, a smile spreading across his face discreetly at his incoherent thoughts of him. The young woman sitting on the sofa in front of him smiled thinking that her talk had caused some pleasure in the young and widowed man.

Jimin admired her face, she was very cute, also she seemed to have good manipulation technique in people. She noticed it quickly when she walked through the door, her smile that seemed uncontrollable and genuine lit up his childlike face. He took a few seconds, he knew he shouldn't do it but he couldn't help comparing the woman to you. You were shorter, you were obviously younger and your gaze was more pure. Jimin was proud of your firm stance, knowing that in the two years since your mother's death you had developed a closer connection with him, and likewise, you were a beautifully perfect copy of him. Your hard gaze and your legs crossed with each other showed your firmness, and your silent opinion.

You wanted the fucking bitch sitting across from your stepdad outside your house.

You laughed at the very idea of one day finding a really good replacement for your mother. You couldn't replace a rose with bad herbs. For you, as selfish as he was, Jimin was your father, and he was your mother's love from the day he married her. No one would replace his position.

It was all three of them, and a part of your mind conned that Jimin still wasn't over the love he had for her. Or he would have remarried long ago, when the young women stood in front of the door of his house asking for a date with him. In those moments you didn't care, Jimin was a stranger, but now he was your father and you were his only daughter. No one had the right to ruin their harmonious relationship, they were both alone and someday serious like him.

You will be successful, you will make a lot of money and you will be able to marry someone you love.

But for now, your gaze fell on the little worn and dirty shoes of the woman in front of you. A smile crossed your face, your gaze lifted surprising the woman. While Jimin waited with his arms crossed for your following action.

"Woman." Your voice seemed to cut her tranquility, her face lost total color of life and a small grimace of fear passed over her fragile face. "I can't allow shoes like that to step on the carpet in my house ..."

The woman looked at Jimin who seemed indifferent, distracted by the painting on the wall.

"I'm sorry miss" she whispered trying to remove her shoes, his hands seemed more clumsy than usual. Her face burned when your hand moved closer to hers to prevent any further movement.

"Go away." A tiny part of you felt sorry for his embarrassed face and flushed cheeks. But it quickly came to your mind that she thought she was good enough to believe she was your mother. When she couldn't even challenge a stupid girl who acted like a spoiled brat. "Get out of my house, or I'll have to ask you not to just take off your shoes."

"I-sorry, I'll go now-..." A sob interrupted her dialogue, her hands searched for the notebook she was carrying but she gave up making a quick bow to Jimin and running outside.

The garden was your favorite part of the big house, the walls constantly made you believe that you were going to be eaten by them. Every day you came out of your lair admiring the many roses of many different colors growing beautiful and healthy. Your school stage was about to begin and you did not want to neglect your garden, which was also a tribute to your late mother.

So you hired a gardener. You were seventeen years old and soon to be eighteen. To say that you managed to experience the best of all those years was ridiculous, and deep down inside you, you thought that all of that was possible because of all the things Jimin did for you.

You had a debt, which you planned to pay in the future. You thought about leaving and letting him have a quiet life from now on without having to run to solve your problems, even if you never asked him to.

Jimin had eyes watching your every move, he clearly remembers how he put security cameras throughout the house, observing how you slept, what you did in the comfort of your room and privacy. Even when you walked into the shower and your hands ran over your body covered in water. Sometimes he felt guilty, for how he seemed to enjoy those moments that seemed so short.

However, it was repeated that as long as you were safe.

Breaking your trust wasn't that important.

Your eighteenth birthday was moderately quiet, Jimin was not used to throwing parties, and honestly, you never asked for one. So you just stood at the door of your house receiving expensive and cheap gifts from people who when they gave you the gift had a forced smile that told you many things. Most were familiar faces, of women who had previously sought a date with your father, obviously being rejected.

The little birthday cake looked so monotonous, the candles were the only thing you could stand out for. You were never aware that you had started to be privileged and extremely ambitious since Jimin proposed to your mother and forced her to marry him, pointing a gun at her pathetic silly little head. You had it all, and in your previous years maybe you managed to get excited about the new toys and accessories that were brought to you from other countries, you had everything that others did not, and a strange epiphany collapsed over you.

It was you, it was déjà vu. You were them, and those who were before, were now you.

You had all of them, and they didn't. Now, by your side, they were all poor. Jimin showered you with gifts, causing you to gradually lose interest in money. You remember your thoughts when it all started and likewise, you still remember the woman with the dirty shoes. You will be successful, you will make a lot of money. It was what you thought in the future for yourself, but now that was it, in a nutshell. Completely boring. You stayed for a moment thinking about them under the watchful eye of your stepfather who tried not to smile when you saw you, you were an adult now and he could finally take you as his own. They would be husband and wife, as it should have been from the beginning of its history.

And you will be able to marry someone you love. You still had only one option left, you blew out the candles with a single sigh causing Jimin to clap his hands and approach you to hug you fondly. The maids behind you only blushed when his boss started showing all of his affection. They weren't used to seeing him so often, Jimin had a firm and tough stance with everyone but he seemed to become as soft as clay in your presence. You came to mold Jimin in your favor, making him a cold person in front of his own demons and then, you left yours.

"I want marriage proposals, father." A gasp came from the mouths of the maids who just immediately fell silent. Lowering their head as they were taught. "I am ready to get married."

Jimin hummed still keeping his arms around you, your body was trapped in theirs. Your skin burned when his fingers squeezed your skin, leaving permanent marks. There was no reaction from you, you were used to this kind of unexpected treatment and it just didn't hurt.

"Get married?" His arms pulled away from you in disgust, there was no other reaction either. Jimin taught you not to object unless you knew you should. Stay calm and you will win. "And can you tell who would want to marry you? Useless little girl."

"Useless?" Your low voice seemed to make him happy for a moment.

Quickly his hands took the utensils to cut the cake, with a soft and sweet voice he continued: "Honey, men do not look for a girl with a lot of money like you. They look for someone to tame, and you, you could easily crush everyone with a wave of your hands."

A piece of the cake perfectly positioned on the plate was placed in front of you, a sob escaping your lips. You were really pathetic, eh? You clearly wanted to live something that has been claimed many times. You weren't going to get married, not without having it all like Jimin said. Then, you would lose everything and go back up to crush the others with greater pleasure.

"Aren't you going to eat? It's your cum-..."

"I will go to a neighboring town, I will finish my studies there."

Jimin looked down at his plate, ignoring how you got up from the table and put your cake aside. Then, your sweet voice finished destroying his self control that he thought he mastered long ago.

"I never liked that cake taste."

And it was the end.

You went back to the start again. You were planning to leave tonight, your bags were ready. Everything you needed was never in that house, it was never him. They were those that never existed in your present continued.

Your shoes did not seem to contrast with the dirt on the town's floor, you were also aware that those would end up in the trash. You didn't care, they were just shoes Jimin bought for your birthday, insignificant.

People were observant, and often foul-mouthed. It was no different than they spoke far from you or close to you, yet their mouths moved in a fussy way exaggerating reactions and creating new lies.

"_____...?" Your posture was decreasing, you no longer had to pretend. A smile covered your face, framing many emotions in one. "Come in please, it's your house."

Peter stepped aside, leaving room for you to enter. Your hands trembled but this time from cold, you still did not get over the harsh winter that suddenly passed. You took your shoes off quickly, briefly forgetting that this was no longer your home. You had sold the little cabin at a minimal price, and you were even happier when it was Peter who chose that place as his future home to live with his wife and his future child. Now he had two more. The little children ran in the tiny room playing with each other, a feeling of nostalgia invaded you when you saw them. You used to do the same before, together with your parents.

Those moments.

"Glad to see you around here, daughter." Peter hadn't changed, he was still the same kind and understanding person as ever. The opposite of you, of course. "Do you want to have tea? I heard on the streets that you would go to study far from here."

"Coffee, please." You responded still reluctant to talk about your departure.

Peter just laughed at your exaggerated denial, nodding and leading into the kitchen. You took a seat at the small table looking around. "You didn't change the decoration."

"Uh? ...." He seemed surprised by your observation, but he quickly smiled. "No. Actually, I think I liked it from the beginning how your ... er ... your mother decorated it. Besides, my wife loved it too. For her, it's beautiful as spring."

"Spring?" You ask, avoiding looking at it. You look down looking for some reason not to feel sad, in a way, you had compared your mother to spring as well. However, Jimin said that you were his. You never liked being called a light, because you always tried to be in your mother's shadow. And you liked it. "She believed that she is very wise, my mother was like spring."

"Thanks." A voice whispered from behind, your gaze fell on her and her face very much like your mother's. But they were obviously completely different. "I never doubted that you were just as wise. Spring represents the new beginning, a new beginning. Did you manage to find yours?"

Peter tried to intervene, clearly noticing the way his wife was trying to make you talk about your life after your mother died.

"I did. That's why I'm leaving here tonight."

"I'm glad we all need to be born again at some point."

You affirm with a small movement of the head, concentrating your gaze on the coffee cup in your hands. The smoke fell directly on your face hiding your grimace of disgust. Nobody deserves to talk about her like that yet.

"Ok, honey." Peter began by sitting across from you, with a cup of green tea and a serene expression. "Are you planning to go alone or with someone? I heard that travel today is very dangerous."

"Actually, I am accompanied by an acquaintance. His name is Jungkook, he also planned to leave and started working for me as a gardener to get the necessary money. We became good friends." You spoke remembering the adorable smile of the young man, he used to accompany you everywhere you went as if his job was to protect you. At first it was cute, but then it was annoying. Even after all that, you preferred to travel with him rather than alone.

"Oh that's very nice. I'm glad you managed to meet your goals. Good luck."

Your goals?

"Thanks, Peter."

His gaze lingered on your face for a moment, then he seemed to remember something very important. She gave you a smile before getting up to leave the kitchen.

"I have something for you, you are old enough to know this."

It was an envelope. Common and ordinary, but its envelope was beginning to deteriorate, showing that it was an old and very reserved letter.

You questioned your decision but took it, not wanting to read it in front of anyone even more when you read who wrote the letter.

You sat on the small wall, the trees and the cool breeze boosted your adrenaline. Small pieces of paper fell to the ground. So, you weren't thinking correctly at those times.

"I only married a man that I loved in all my life, I was happy. I had a daughter. I lived years of solitude and then, I was chained to an empty love."

"I know what you're reading this now. You're weak, darling. Maybe that's what made us mother and daughter. Because from the beginning I never had the courage to tell you that Jimin put a ring on my finger and a gun to my head. Or maybe, I was weak when I didn't get in the way of his errand, I should have told him that I hated him and that he could put a bullet in my head before giving it to my daughter. And maybe, I should have told everyone who passed by me that He was the same one who murdered my husband, he never left. I made you believe that. You never asked. "

"I saw you so happy today, you were running between the garden and the wedding. I could see his gaze following your hurried steps, I was almost completely sure that he was trying to get closer to you at all times. I told the woman next to me, But she shut me up saying that I can't be jealous of a father and daughter relationship. You weren't her daughter. She also ordered me to let them create a closer relationship, because I already had Park Jimin's heart in my hands. Liars."

"I always loved your curious voice. You used to ask me everything, and why everything was like that. But lately, I don't know what to answer. Why am I crying? Why is there a dark stain under my eyes? Why is there blood in the bathroom? Why did I never ask for help? I see you worry and you don't let me give you affection, because you prefer to give it to me. I also see how I start to bother him, I am a hindrance. Now I understand, I knew it but I never wanted to accept that it happened. He was everywhere, and likewise, I was never part of the plan."

"There were only two things I didn't tell you. I love you and my last piece of advice. Honey, lock it up and fly to the start, whenever you feel lost. A fresh start and never forget spring."

You stifled a sob. Covering up your pain. You had not noticed that the night had covered the sky, a dark blue blanket arrived. It took you a long time to assimilate that all the fragments were torn papers, and it was not a letter. It was an envelope filled with, apparently, incomplete sheets torn from a notebook. There was a fragment that was not part of the leaves, but rather was written later.

"Lost parts of a sad widow's diary.

Peter."

They were from your mother's diary. So where was the rest? What actually happened? A message came to your phone, you read it quickly still drying your tears.

JUNGKOOK:

Our trip is in an hour, I hope you said goodbye to everyone.

Received at 7:05 p.m.

I still do not:(

Received at 7:06 p.m.

Along with both messages was an attached picture, a photo of him and his grandmother. Jungkook talked a lot about her, and hers, her brothers. You smile, still wiping the tears from your face.

Your feet moved, the leaves in your hands seemed too heavy. And yet it was something you needed to do.

"Are you at home." His monotonous voice invaded you, he was busy reading a book that rested in his hand. The maid came over leaving a cup of coffee beside him, greeting your presence politely. "I have some things to discuss with you, darling."

"Me too, Jimin." It was the first time you had said his name without due respect, he seemed surprised for a moment. But his expression changed to one of happiness, as if he had been waiting for it. "I couldn't say goodbye, I'm leaving today. I think you already know that, though."

"Actually, no. But it's nice to hear it from you."

"I ..." Your voice dried in your throat, a giant doubt fell over you. You didn't want to leave without telling him how much you hated everything about him. His attention, his affection, his smile, his gaze, his voice. Everything about him was disgustingly charming. "I think I'll go get my bags."

Jimin nodded, ignoring your presence. Still distracted with reading him.

"Before you go, can you give me that back, darling?" Your gaze followed where he pointed his finger. Your hand. The leaves were still there.

"It's something of mine-..."

"Oh I don't think so. It really is very easy to threaten someone, just suffice to say that you can put a bullet in their head to make them your obedient little puppets."

"I do not understand your..."

"Me? It was obviously me. I'm surprised you thought your mother would be smart enough to leave a confession letter to her ex-lovers, days before her death. You really had a lot of credit for her." His chatter was accompanied by a laugh. You were paralyzed, shaking in your useless state of shock. "But I will not say that I did not plan, I hoped that you would never have the courage to try to leave my side. And even if that were the case, I knew that you would say goodbye to the only person who reminded you of her. Peter, she has a family. lovely."

Nor did he expect you to have the courage to cheat on him with another man. Oh, the gardener. Poor Jungkook, his body now rested leaving behind your favorite flowers. Jimin bit his lip, another mocking smile peeking out with intensity remembering the cutthroat figure of the innocent but guilty young man.

You were his...

"How can you be so cruel?" The doubt in you seemed to want to keep growing, passing second by second through your head. You weren't sure you could understand that everything that happened in front of you was actually planned by the same person who swore never to leave you alone. The same man who disguised himself as a sheep so he could eat you like a wolf. "Did you kill my mother ?!" Jimin seemed surprised by your desperate tone, he did not expect to be able to unbalance your state so easily.

It was lovely. Certainly.

"No sweetie." He murmured closing the book in his hands, setting it on the table next to the steaming cup of American coffee. "But it would have been exquisite to be the reason for his pain. Unfortunately, it was your father who won that title."

"Where did you get this from? I know she wrote it, and I also know that she would never give it to you knowing what a monster you are." Tears were running down your cheeks like water, you knew you were a mess but Jimin seemed to look at you like you were a perfect work of art.

"I found it." He spoke casually, getting up from his seat. Walking slowly towards your trembling figure. "It was a coincidence, I like casual things. It was a coincidence that you studied at that school, that your mother was a widow, that your father died. That he will make me fall in love with you."

What is your goal now?

"I love you darling."

Escape from the monster.

#yandere bts #bts yandere #bts #yandere!bts #yandere bts au #yandere kpop #Yandere #kpop yandere #kpop #kpop smut #bts smut #bts x reader #jimin x reader #yandere jimin x reader #jimin yandere #jimin x you #park jimin #yandere!jimin #jimin smut

207 notes · View notes

idv-ask-azrael · 2 years

Text

[some random af Magnus Archives x IDV crossover ideas for the hunters]

[I will give a quick explanation of the basic concept of TMA. Thus this post will include spoilers from The Magnus Archives (world building) and the backstories of the Hunters of IDV as I have understood them]

[Also this is a Horror Game meeting a Horror Podcast. Even though I will not go into detail, please consider yourself warned.]

[In the world of TMA fears exist as a type of supernatural being/concept. They are not really intelligent; they just want to feed on people's fear from where ever they are outside this reality. They can mark people and those people either become victims (who are very likely to die) or start living with and nurturing the fear, thus becoming an avatar with an unique set of skills that fit the fear they are serving. While there is usually one "main" patron/fear, one can be marked by multiple fears and many statements/episodes mix fears.]

[I will not be going on about what fear does what (that'll take forever and you can read it up on the wiki) but I'll explain my choice]

Hell Ember

The Desolation

The Desolation is primarily associated with fire, loss and destruction

Technically, Freddy would be the avatar and Hell Ember a victim but for the sake of this, we will ignore that fact

The Ripper

The Flesh, the Slaughter or The Hunt

Jack the Ripper murdered and mutilated people and if that doesn't scream The Flesh, then idk what does

Jacks "other personality" might just be The Slaughter hopping into his mind

Hunting, tracking prey is very Hunt-like

Smiley Face

The Desolation, (The Flesh, The Stranger)

He most likely burned down the circus and he himself is a victim of having his life destroyed

He is wearing someone's face.... Flesh and Stranger say hello

Gamekeeper

The Hunt

He is hunting down everyone who steps foot in his territory

Feaster

to be honest, I feel like this man is in his own league and cannot be categorized

If anything, it would probably be The Vast considering Hastur's head is a void with eyes

The ocean is often connected to the Vast as well

Geisha

The Lonely

With Miles gone, Michiko must have felt incredibly alone in this new country and hostile environment

considering we never really get detailed information, she could have cultivated her mark of The Lonely before she was killed

Soul Weaver

The Stranger or The Web

Circus, Freakshow, Prosthetics... Nikola, you forgot to pick up your spider friend

The Flesh would not fit, since she is getting prosthetics (non-biological). main story doesn't really deal with her body but rather what she makes of it

Spider mom. The Web primarily uses spiders.

Wu Chang

The Lonely and The Buried

Considering they seem to be very close (sworn brothers, almost identical design, they only exist together), Wujiu's death must have filled Bian with incredible loneliness

The Buried is also associated with "drowning" and "not being able to breathe", making it perfect for Wujiu

Photographer

The Eye, The Lonely, The End, (The Spiral)

Photography is a visual art, so The Eye is not far fetched

Conquering death and his obsession with it is a very good motive for The End

Joseph knows his brother is dead but still goes on and looks for a cure; it displays an obsession with a certain type of knowledge

Your twin dies. Loneliness here we come.

I only listed The Spiral because he is creating pathways to another place

Mad Eyes

The Hunt, (The Eye)

His fear of another attack would technically count as the fear of being hunted down. again, this would make him a victim, not an avatar but hey

tbh I just put down The Eye because his skills feature cameras

Dream Witch

The Web or the Vast

She is controlling a lot of followers... Web?

"There is something bigger out there" and Yhidra is right there with her followers

Evil Reptilian

The Flesh

His body was changed, thus The Flesh is a possible option

Axe Boy

The End

He certainly outlived his end

There is no special fear associated with nature and tbh I can't really find a theme for him

Bloody Queen

The End or The Slaughter

The End for living after being beheaded

The Slaughter is for going from Marie Antoinette to Bloody Mary

Guard 26

The Stranger, (the Hunt)

a machine becoming conscious and pretending to be human (or more) sounds very Stanger-like

Since Bonbon is used to keep people off the property, one could say he helps Bane hunt down intruders

Disciple

The Corruption

There is a lot of sickness and plague in her backstory; the corruption says hi (especially with the whole cat thing)

As tempting as Devil's Eyes sound, her story as nothing to do with The Eye besides the same symbol

Violinist

The Corruption or The Web

I mean he did get corrupted by the devil

His blood is "infected" by desire

His music seems to captivate others and it sounds almost as if it was addicting; he might be able to corrupt others

The Web usually controls people, so Antonio might fit there

Sculptor

The Spiral, The Stranger or The Flesh

The Spiral is often associated with madness or your mind lying to yourself. I think we can all agree she went mad enough to qualify

Creating very human-like sculptures sounds like a Stranger thing

Considering she most likely turned her caretaker into a sculpture, The Flesh might also be involved

Undead

The End

The End is all about death and this man is undead

There are avatars of The End who appear as "Death" until someone takes their place. They appear to be undead or immortal afterwards, so this is not a very far stretch

Reanimated Corpses/People are also marked by The End

The Breaking Wheel

The Slaughter or The Stranger?

From what I gathered they behaved just fine until one night, they suddenly started attacking people... so Slaughter?

Pretending to be one person or generally acting as a "family", the Stranger seems like a good choice

The Flesh doesn't qualify because while their "abnormal appearance" is mentioned, it is never really the main issue. acting is much more important to them.

The Lonely don't qualify because they still have each other

Naiad

The Buried

The Buried is also associated with "drowning" and "not being able to breathe"

One could also add in some Darkness or Vast for whatever turned her at the bottom of the lake

Wax Artist

The Flesh or The Stranger

His obsession with physical appearance and the fact he fused his sister to his shoulder makes it sound very Flesh-like

His sister still moves on his shoulder, so it might be Stranger related, especially with all those very human-looking sculptures

The End would not qualify since it was a one time event and not a long term obsession or issue

Nightmare

The Spiral or The Slaughter

With all the mind games, drugs and hallucinations, the spiral isn't far off

Another personality with violent tendencies! Slaughter, here we go again!

#just mun things:rambling #ha here we go again #fandoms got me

3 notes · View notes

viviae · 5 years

Text

The Red Plague: An Analysis

Ok, I’m to preface this that I am not at ALL a student of medicine or science I am just a humble blogger who really likes diseases, literary analysis, and the science behind death. This will also be a STUPIDLY long post so I am letting you all live by putting it behind a readmore this time

This goes without saying but there is a content warning to this. I’m talking about death, stages of decay, rotting, corpses, vomit, and other gross medical stuff. There will be NO images however. I subjected myself to viewing those images and I will not condemn you all to view them.

I’m going to start this off making sure everyone is on the same page and post an image from the art book about the Red Plague itself

So let’s start with the canonical facts about the plague first

Average life expectancy was 3-7 days once symptoms show, Averages are also liars which means it could’ve taken a little bit more than 7 days or under 3 days to die.

Spread by the plague beetles, exact method of transfer is unknown but Julian was force fed one and contracted the plague however they are safe to keep in containment.

Plague beetles also infected nonhuman objects like the water supply which is shown as a thick ichor. This ichor no longer possesses infectious properties at the time of the story

Julian believed that it had to do with a corruption in the blood hence the usage of leeches

The Lazarus started as a containment center before becoming a crematorium, meaning people believed that it was spread from contact or things like that

HOWEVER This is not the first appearance of the plague as it would show up at locations Lucio stayed for too long but no note if it spread from these locations.

It’s not a disease, its a curse.

So, this is one nasty plague on our hands. Most diseases that are this lethal would never be able to spread as much as it did unless it could spread from corpse contact or through other means like a carrier. I think that it could be spread through a combination of both which would add an additional need for cremation.

Corpse Disposal & Spreading

Historically during plagues you would simply toss bodies into mass graves or ‘plague pits’. This would be, substantially, easier than what they do in Vesuvia. Cremation is not an easy process and is an art form. The heat needed for a cremation alone is incredibly hot and needs special methods to be contained. Not to mention the tedious cleaning process to make sure ashes don’t damage the heat element. So you are telling me that Vesuvia... went through the process of rowing away their dead to the middle of a lake to do mass cremations because it was the easiest? Yes they would’ve run out of grave space a while ago but no one is saying they can’t go make a plague pit out in the woods for half the work.

Now granted, I understand the imagery of making Asra wade through bodies of rotting corpses to find the apprentice’s bloated corpse is uh,,, graphic. Or making us stumble upon an open plague pit of bones in the woods with you LI is not what most people call romantic. (you’re welcome for that image) So they could’ve just made mass cremations on a separate island for tone reasons but that’s BORING.

Not a lot of diseases are actually capable of surviving in dead body simply because when we die our bodies lose the necessary high heats for them to multiply and survive. But this isn’t a disease in a traditional sense, its a curse to Lucio. And this is Lucio we are talking about, some one who is famously afraid of death and dying, which was grafted by a demon of pestilence who is obsessed with worms (cough maggot symbolism and death by disease cough). So I propose that the plague is spread in addition to plague beetles but by dead bodies themselves. This would put additional pressure on proper corpse disposal and the need for cremation. This fact would also explain why plague doctors were present at the boats leading to the Lazarus instead of simple plague carters (rowers?) as doctors would probably have to keep a closer eye on proper disposal of bodies.

As for how I think the beetles themselves spread the plague, I think it’s probably in a similar way as to how Lyme Disease is spread. I can’t name any disease that is spread by beetles themselves off the top of my head but ticks are pretty similar to beetles (I am not an entomologist). Lyme disease is spread by infected ticks biting into the hosts skin and regurgitating its stomach contents that includes the bacterium for the disease.

This would explain why Julian got the plague pretty awful real quick. He consumed all of the plague beetle’s contents and Lucio didn’t have to try and force a beetle to bite Julian, which would’ve given Julian time to fight back. This is also working with the fact Lucio got bit by a plague beetle when running from Morga in his tale. He most likely contracted the plague, or perhaps he contracted the curse then and later on got re bit, in that bite. This would also explain the ichor that infects the water in the south end. Beetles are significantly larger than ticks, and so they might have a need to empty their stomach contents more and its more waste produced.

Symptoms and Inspirations

The Red Plague is obviously, influenced by the Bubonic Plague in terms of symptoms and Tuberculous in treatment. I will list some of the common symptoms of Black Plague and signs and be comparing these to the Red Plague. I cannot stress enough that I do not have any knowledge in medicine but I don’t think the dev’s are all doctors so we are on even ground.

There are generally speaking three types of plagues; Bubonic (Most common type of The Black Plague and mainly targets your lymphatic system), Pneumonic (When the Plague enters and infects the lungs), and Septicemic (When the plague enters the blood stream, either form can lead to Septicemic)

Bolded Symptoms are what are obvious symptoms the Red Plague has taken from these three variations of plague. Italic is Lucio specific.

High Fevers

Chills

Headache

Muscle Pain

Weakness

Seizures

Swollen black lymph nodes known as Buboes (Bubonic)

Internal Bleeding (Septicemic)

Gangrene (Septicemic)

Shock (Septicemic)

Vomiting Blood (Bubonic & Septicemic)

Coughing Blood & Mucus (Pneumonic)

Shortness of breath (Pneumonic)

The Red Eyes

By far the most obvious symptom of the plague and its trademark. Consider this the equivalent of Buboes to the black plague. This is the first obvious symptom that marks you for dead and probably one of the first symptoms to show after a possible resting phase.

Apparently it takes each eye individually as seen with Julian or it may not take both? The stage we see Julian in isn’t the clearest but I’m assuming he was rather early on with a pretty serious case.

It’s also a debate of what exactly is going on with the red stringy bits under neath the eyes. For the sprite models it appears to be veins under the eyes that have been aggravated. While in the concept art above it has a more liquid and viscous look which is probably blood. And in Julian’s CG of him dying of the plague he has no marks around his eyes. So I’m saying its a fun combo of all of the above.

Essentially I think that the plague is causing the blood vessels in the eyes to pop and do serious damage. There can also be a foreign growth to occur behind the eyes or just magical nonsense, doing additional damage to the veins surrounding the eyes and cause bleeding from putting stress on the veins.

The Arms and Lower Extremities

Ok, remember how I talked about Lucio’s fear of death and how its incredibly likely that the plague is manipulating his fear? In death there are various stages of decay, and different functions occur at each stage. And one of these functions is Livor Mortis.

Livor Mortis is when your blood cells rupture out of your veins and die. These dead blood cells sink down to your body based off of gravity where they settle. This is seen as a purple color on the skin based on gravity, normally the back. This can be disrupted by any disruption to the body, but depending on time you are likely to receive lighter marks based on its previous position.

What I think is going on all over the body is veins are rupturing and the body is going through an extreme form of living Livor Mortis. Just that it’s in red and not purple because this is the “Red Plague” and not the purple plague. And due to the patients still being alive when Livor Mortis is occurring it simply pools into the extremities instead of one specific location, with the fingers and bottom of the foot being the most severe. To add to the veins popping suddenly the subtle bruising through origin points to where the red vein-y look begins remind me of my own experience of having four veins burst in my arm.

Julian had reason to believe he could use leeches to treat the plague and in typical plague doctor fashion of “They were right but not exactly” he was on the right track! Using leeches to drink the settled and dead blood would be beneficial to the patient. As likely leaving these areas to accumulate dead blood would put it at serious risk of rot, since maggots first grow on open wounds and areas affected by Livor Mortis.

Julian might not have been curing the plague but what he was probably doing is preventing a lot of people from developing gangrene and needing amputations. A beneficial skill for a previous combat medic to utilize and what might have drawn additional attention to him. Julian’s uses of leeches could also explain why Lucio does not have any of these red marks since Julian is his personal doctor and Lucio would spare no expense for his treatment.

Lucio’s Unique Symptoms

Portia’s route mentions that due to Lucio’s longer surviving time he developed unique symptoms. We don’t know much details about this besides he was extra miserable and was confined to his bedroom most the time. From my provided list above I think that generally speaking the Red Plague is a combination of Bubonic + Septicemic plagues.

However, Pnuemonic plagues were considered especially deadly, but rarer. Lucio is described as having a cough when he has the plague and generally a wheezy voice. It wouldn’t be odd to think the plague had spread into his lungs due to the increase longevity he had.

There is a dramatic irony in Lucio losing his lungs to sickness as well. Morga tells us about how when Lucio was very young he almost drowned and that instilled a fear of death in him at a young age. He’s also a man with a lot of stamina who can run in the freezing cold carrying a fully grown apprentice on his shoulder or run away from Morga who also possesses a lot of energy. Lucio has trained his lungs to be stronger more so than the average person, and now with his downfall he loses them.

It goes along with his general want of having a new body as well. You can rebuild muscle mass although hard, but recovering from illnesses that target your lungs? You’ll almost never get back to the same degree you previously were.

The imagery of the dead is also present in the animal itself used to spread the plague. Although the beetle comes from Lucio’s tribe, beetles play a role in decomposition. Beetles like to come after the body has been nearly completely rotten, after the maggots and wasps consume most of the dead flesh beetles come in and eat the scraps. Beetles are also used in skeletonizing items, one example I think of off my head is a man who had his amputated foot skeletonized by beetles for keeping. So these beetles are coming in and spreading a plague that forces the body to go through stages of decay while living, for their own food. Just like Lucio’s tribe came in and slaughtered other tribes for their own need to eat.

The plague was handcrafted to torture Lucio for his inability to finish his end of the deal. That’s why it uses imagery of dead bodies, it steals Lucio’s lungs from him, and why even the dead can cause severe damage.

Of course this is all my own theory and analysis of the plague but thank you for reading all of this.

3K notes · View notes

leutik · 3 years

Text

Literature between Political Correctness and Cancel Culture

(Analyzed through Walter Siti, Natalie Wynn and Rick DuFer.)

(buckle up, because if you're gonna read this, it's gonna be long)

«Today is much easier to mistake an author’s personal stances with the content of their works, and then make the author pay for the work’s sins.

Today I look around and I have the sensation that literature is no longer taken seriously: that the way to interpret literature the way I knew it, depth-focused, focused on the power of words to reveal truths otherwise concealed to their own author, is disappearing — substituted by a conception of literature that has to serve a list of good causes.

When some writers of the “neo-effort” (Siti’s neologism) insist on the fact that words are decisive, and that it’d be urgent to change the words in order to change reality, I’m suddenly reminded of those old Marxist authors: they explained that the structure, which is what lays under society, determines what lays upon it, that is words and ideology. Thus, changing the name of something doesn’t change the thing the word stands for at all.

Literature has been considered throughout time the most indicated form to make resurface the part of ourselves — often, the least pleasant — that we’ve exiled in the shadows of our subconscious: a process that often happens without the author’s acknowledgement of it.

The authors of the neo-effort believe they have the duty to spread their ideas to the largest possible number of people and that, in order to do so, they have to simplify as much as they can what they write, sacrificing on the altar of efficiency the style, considered useless. The aim is to do good, namely gain an effect, what does it matter if it’s good or bad literature? Literature used to “take root”, to influence; put at the service of pre-established ideas, and not to venture into the discovery of something we don’t know yet. This way, it gains an ancillary role. And it’s a humiliation of literature — which can truly be useful, instead, only then it hurts.

Sartre’s “Nausea” doesn’t align with his political stances. For Sartre, the effort was the individual reflection of a society in perennial revolution, substantially a school of liberty, whilst for neo-effort the role of literature is to reassure.

Their attitude, their rejection of style, their low consideration of literature, tends to isolate the good writers out there, marginalizing them in a niche that looks like a convention of obsessed aesthetes in the public’s eyes.

I see it in the writing courses I teach: more and more young people whose main interest isn’t to write to learn something about themselves or society, but it’s to write to gain the title of writer and place themselves on the market, detecting the most profitable sector at the moment, which might be fantasy, crime, or effort-centred writing: it doesn’t matter, what matters is for it to be trending and to be reassuring to the reader, in a more and more therapeutic conception of writing.

Literature isn’t immediately therapeutic, this is the difference. When “The Sorrows of Young Werther” was published, copies of this book were burnt, because of the suicides it inspired. Today we read it at school. How much time has passed? I don’t refuse knowledge’s benefit, I refuse that knowledge can benefit instantly, painlessly. When I went to a psychoanalyst to face my neurosis, the psychoanalyst made me suffer for months, and only after I took benefit from it. What would have happened if they had welcomed me with a pat on the back and said “Don’t worry, stop thinking and go help African children”. Probably I would have had an immediate benefit, but all my neurosis would have stayed there, intact.

The Literature I talked to you about is depth-centred, and literature hasn’t always existed: thus it can disappear, sink for many years. Who said that it’ll survive, despite everything?

In Pasolini’s trial he was acquitted because Ungaretti was called to testify. He wrote a letter where he wrote that the formal value of Pasolini’s work turned into literature even those scenes that the prosecution deemed obscene. Law couldn’t do anything but recognize the critical judgement and welcome it. Web’s tribunal, today, would have burned Pasolini at the stake, and Ungaretti with him.» (via Walter Siti’s interview with the Huffingtonpost)

In other words, we can summarize Siti’s view with the sentence «novels aren’t the cure to the world’s evils.» They aren’t, because they don’t have the power to be, and more so they aren’t even supposed to be: writing is a form of art, and art has primarily an end in itself. Literature isn’t a political marketplace, even if it can be used to be — it’s not a crime to turn it into one, but by doing so, one loses Literature’s nature. By doing so, the harm could be mistake literature’s primary aim (that is being a form of art, that is style, that is the pursuit of the truth) with what they turned literature into: a marketplace to defend the author’s ideology.

Siti’s powerful image of the Web’s tribunal, the Web’s court finds an echo in Natalie Wynn video Canceling: in a sense, what Siti calls “neo-effort writers” fall under the same line of thoughts of Cancel Culture perpetrators.

«Like the guillotine, [cancelling] can become a sadistic entertainment spectacle.

Now there's a version of this conversation that's already been had to death, and it goes like this: On the one side are a bunch of male comedians who constantly bitch about how Cancel Culture is out of control, you can't joke about anything anymore without these Millennial jackals trying to get you in trouble.

And the other side is mostly progressive think-piece authors who argue that there's no such thing as cancel culture, it's just that powerful people are finally being held accountable for their actions and they can't fucking handle it, so they go around bitching about cancel culture.

Now unfortunately, neither of those viewpoints is quite as correct as some people might hope.

What Cancel Culture does, [is to] take one story and transform it into a significantly different story.

Presumption of Guilt

There's a traditional understanding of justice according to which, before you condemn or punish a person, you hear the accuser's side of the story and the accused's side of the story. You allow both sides to present evidence and only after everyone involved has had a chance to make their case do you pass judgment and punish the convict.

But cancelling does not abide by the law. Cancelling is a form of vigilante mob justice. And a lot of times, an accusation is proof enough.

Abstraction

Abstraction replaces the specific, concrete details of a claim with a more generic statement.

Essentialism

Essentialism is when we go from criticizing a person's actions to criticizing the person themselves. We're not just saying they did bad things. We’re saying they’re a bad person.

Pseudo-Moralism or Pseudo-Intellectualism

Moralism or intellectualism provide a phony pretext for the call-out. You can pretend you just want an apology; you can pretend you're just a “concerned citizen” who wants the person to improve. You can pretend you're simply offering up criticism, when what you're really doing is attacking a person's career and reputation out of spite, envy, revenge.

No Forgiveness

Cancelers will often dismiss an apology as insincere, no matter how convincingly written or delivered. And of course, an insincere apology is further proof of what a Machiavellian psychopath you really are.

Now sometimes, a good apology will calm things down for a while. But the next time there's a scandal, the original accusation will be raised again as if you never apologized.

The Transitive Property of Cancellation

Cancellation is infectious. If you associate with a cancelled person, the cancellation rubs off. It's like gonorrhoea, except doxycycline won't save you this time sweetie.» (via Natalie Wynn's Canceling video transcript)

Natalie Wynn describes and formalizes the phenomenon of Cancel Culture in those steps:

I only listen to the presumed victim,

I abstract the context to a vague idea,

I equate the action to the actor’s very essence (as if such thing even existed),

I say I’m acting in favour of morals or truth,

I accuse every person the presumed abuser ever came in contact with to be an abuser as well,

and I either reject every form of apology at the moment, or bring up the issue as if no apology was ever made at their first misstep.

Now, in this post I’m not trying to perpetrate any concept of charity, not only because it’s an attitude that takes a lot of work to inherit, but also because the negative aspects that might bring one to be a neo-effort writer or a Cancel Culture perpetrator are part of the very human nature (or, very stupidly, they wouldn’t be humans.)

The self-evidence rises here: those negative parts of human nature can be channelled everywhere, and literature or any other form of art is the healthiest way to do so: you’re not going to get rid of your anger, or your sadness — the best thing you can do is learn to control it and suppress it, but how is it going to work in the long run? It’s going to act past your good judgement, or even cloud your good judgement, clouding it into thinking you’re defending some pseudo-moralism or pseudo-intellectualism, when what you’ll be doing is just venting on someone else.

This is one way to see it: when one forgets what proper thinking is and falls into those quick and gut-feeling “thoughts”. Or one could even take advantage of this Cancel Culture, of this ground of poor thinking to instrumentalize this lack of critical judgement to attack someone else.

On instrumentalization and its dangers, Rick DuFer says:

«Political correctness works when its aim is to protect the weak from abusers, but when it favours every little susceptible sensitivity it turns dangerous.» (via Rick DuFer’s podcast DailyCogito)

Rick DuFer talks about a shared responsibility that happens during offence: shared between the offender and the offended. The problem with offence, as opposed to harm, is that it isn’t quantifiable, so the offender is guilty in regard to their intentions, and the offended is guilty in regard to the instrumentalization they can enact with the situation.

And again we find “instrumentalization”: if one destroys my property, I can quantify the damage, but if one insults me, how can I quantify how offended I truly am? This is when I can twist one person’s words and turn them into an offender, this is when sensitivity becomes a mask and no longer a virtue (or, for the toxic masculinity’s thought, a vice.)

Now, to wrap things up:

These people take the (s)word of this school of thought (which some other dichotomists may, generalizing it, call it “Strong Thought” or “Unique Thought”), perhaps without even knowing there’s an alternative, while there are multiple, actually: as many as the human beings right now populating Earth.

They may do it out of a dualistic and very childish view of society — divided into good and bad people. And if that’s your view of life, you’re not gonna want to be associated with who others deem as bad, following a gut feeling and nothing more. (And I say “gut feeling” to avoid saying “very poor thinking”, because that’s what absolutization, essentialism, and the rest is.)

Your thoughts aren’t really yours, and you become a vessel for something that belongs to someone else, someone who crafted those thoughts in a very different context, or with instrumentalization in mind. You don’t want to risk criticizing those thoughts because you don’t want to be isolated, or because you’re a sane person who deems it important to act rightfully (even if you’re letting others tell you what “right” is.)

And for how problematic moral relativism is, it surely is better than any form of absolutization: better than rejecting your status as “sapiens” and stopping thinking altogether, passively accepting what others taught you to be right and wrong, maybe even out of fear, or a stupid rush for glory and sympathy.

So I wouldn’t call this moral relativism, strictly, but rather moral subjectivism, or context-centred morality. A morality in which people still have a brain to separate a piece of work from an author’s ideology (against essentialism) and to still take into account the context in which an action was performed (against abstraction). A morality in which “good” and “wrong” aren’t seen in black and whites, but rather into lighter and darker greys; a morality which systematic use can slowly dress into the habit of charity towards one another, into kind teaching rather than cruel instrumentalization.

And is it really utopistic, is it really unfeasible, if we’re not falsely annihilating the suffering and the negative parts of the Human Experience?

This whole discourse could be turned into a political marketplace of rights and lefts, of conservatives and progressivists — but my aim here is much smaller (or bigger, if one is a humanist): to make the reader question their critical thinking, and just that.

(We love some self-doubt.)

I believe moral acts aren’t supposed to be a badge to share on one’s vest — to renew your status as “approachable person” (as if saying “don’t worry, you can talk to me, you’re not going to be deemed as bad for it”) or to be praised for. Moral acts are the only acts that raise humans from other species, the acts where the “sapiens” shows its evolution, the acts where our negative aspects aren’t hidden but channelled into arts, without the fear that someone might call us bad for it. (Immoral, even, whilst acting in the most moral way possible, exorcising those negative parts of us in the least harmful way possible.)

So, at the end of this unnecessary rant, my question is: is it better to be a minion in a culture where you have to watch your mouth, as if it wasn’t yours, or to be a person who’s engaged in researching how right and wrong truly manifest?

#the first and last sources are in italian #i did my best translating them #rant #philosophy #literature #cancel culture #cancelled #politically correct #controversial #opinion #thoughts #very open to discuss civilly

14 notes · View notes

lesbiancarat · 3 years

Note

Haha its fine! Im book anon for a reason so take all the time you need! Before I start, I wanna apologize for the possible asks you got about the merch and hybe in general. I didn't intend to cause stress and need to be careful bdjahdsj so slap me with a fish!

Onto the ask! But agreed, I mean before the big kpop boom we saw, this was very common. Build a decent fanbase and then move to Japan or China. (Of course sometimes you see INSTANT movement in other countries but that depends on the company and such but you know what I mean) but since we do have the more global kpop era, we may see more companies do America which isn't a bad thing. It makes sense buisness wise so they will jump on it after debut or something. Thus I don't see it a bad thing for kpop groups to promote in America because hey, if in Korea they do sell western artist music who also tour there, kpop groups can also do the same ya know?

Now onto the hybe comment, I will try not to speak too much on it so I will try to summarize. I think my theory is due with merch from their main artist, they think maybe it could work with svt which maybe could but svt has a different fanbase so throwing on random merch won't make fans really want to buy (not saying some won't which kudos to you! As a fan you are allowed to consume what you please except not be a bad apple about it) so thus like the infamous water bottles which was done for bts, they thought why not do it for svt because bts fans sold it out apparently for a 2nd wave of it being sold again. (Which to this day idk why someone in the hybe team thought this was smart. Like...this is just in bad taste imo) I do wanna agree that it appears that hybe doesn't seem to have a proper art team for svt because while sometimes wild, I do know for their main artist they do have thoughtful merch based around say an album concept I recall. Kf course they will make mistakes i.e. the water bottles. I do wish it can improve because even though it is capitalism, I think fans do want decent merch. We have seen interesting ideas like svt making their own magazine and selling it lol. Of course it is hard to please because some fans want subtle merch ideas while others don't mind the vibrant pastel colors we got or some want wild ideas like svt figurines or something. Overall I hope I didn't drag this too much as I just wanted to respond back to you, I agree with many points you said so yeah cx I say let's also wait as this is barely what, a year or even less of svt being under hybe properly. Especially when hybe had its rebranding and expanding so things are being changed, I know fans are worried about this which is valid but let's not panic just yet. Let's come back in a year to this and see what has improved and what hasn't. (OK but peldis sold the boys rings!? :o since when!? I haven't heard of this actually, when did this happen if I may ask?)

Oof yeah sadly with streaming, many view "oh you don't stream it means you aren't a fan" when isn't the case (which is why I personally don't like when certain companies also do "listening parties" which seems a bit ???) I do remember this popped up big in 2017 but many fans called it out so it quiet down a bit. Like we didn't see it so often where fans were causing problems over it so idk why this returned nor what the cause of it was.

But thank you!! It really was a nice closing chapter, I think when I have personal stuff settled I will try maybe get a new bunny? And oohh congrats on the album! (Note to hybe or pledis. Please make the us store a more common thing, it makes things so much easier! Am happy it was at your place quick so kudos to the us store. Oohh wonderful choices! I think for many fans anyone or heaven's cloud seems to be the popular picks? For me, I may have to say game boi or heaven's cloud as well! Those songs make me just so happy? Like game boy is just so creative with the way it was made. As a video game nerd, it is perfection. I could make an essay about this song lol and heaven's cloud is just...wow. I feel so at ease with the song, comfortable and soothed. Like you are on a cloud lol. Also that is totally fine! Rtl was a grower for me (I blame the mv, it didn't do the song jusitice) but it is a bop and can't stop humming the chorus at random moments. Overall a great summer album. Just imagine any of these songs performed live ndjansns

lol don't feel too bad about it! honestly they weren't that bad + i can always delete asks if i really don't want to answer them, i just always get a bit paranoid that things will get out of hand so i may end up getting more serious in those situations OTL

and yeah i agree! i don't think it's a bad thing for groups to promote in the US, as you said, it's similar to groups expanding their fanbase by promoting in china or Japan or other asian counties, it makes sense from a business standpoint and there's nothing wrong with promoting in different countries. i just wish that some kpop stans understood that western and/or global popularity is a bonus and not a requirement for success. while they do have a global appeal, at the end of the day kpop's main audience is korea, and groups that achieve popularity in Korea have already achieved what they set out to do. but there's unfortunately a decent chunk of international fans that prioritize western popularity over anything and can't fathom that a group can be successful without being popular in the US. or they just talk as if their groups western achievements are more valuable than their Korean ones and to me that starts to look like xenophobia... (sorry if I'm repeating anything i said before in regards to this, i feel like i am but I'm too lazy to go back and check OTL)

since you sent this ask hybe released the caratland merch which was actually really nice, and today they also announced that there will be birthday merch for cheol (and presumably all members from here on out). we don't know what the bday merch is yet but some carats are already a bit miffed that hybe is even thinking to capitalize off the boys' birthdays... i bring both of these up bc i feel like the caratland merch proves your point that hybe is capable of designing good and thoughtful merch, and honestly this does reassure me a bit. but on the other hand them trying to capitalize off the boys' birthdays also proves that they still don't fully understand carats wants and priorities as a fanbase. which, if the future of seventeens merch is gonna be quality merch with some shitty cash grabs in between, i can live with that. I'm not gonna like the shitty cash grabs and i think it would be in our best interest as a fandom to not go crazy buying those shitty cash grabs, because if we don't then hybe will hopefully stop wasting their time and put more effort into /quality/. but if we get quality merch for important events like concerts and fanmeetings, i can live with it. as you said too, it can take time for these things to change, and we should all recognize that. but at the same time merch specifically is market driven, so i don't think it's a bad thing if people like @ hybe on twt about any bad merch that comes out in order to drive that change dhfkfj

but also on a maybe more fun note in regards to the merch... with some carats being upset about the bday merch i was thinking about what hybe could do for merch instead that would fill the niche of being at intervals throughout the year that could still be limited time drops but that carats wouldn't be mad at them capitalizing on and then i was like duh! they could literally just make merch off of going seventeen! honestly I'm surprised they haven't yet. maybe not merch for every episode, but they could have a line of permanent gose merch w a basic logo or something and then release limited time merch themed around some of the more popular episodes at various points during the year. I'm actually kind of obsessed with this idea now and for once I'm like hybe/pledis please capitalize off of this!! dhfkgjg

they never actually sold them, but for seventeens 3rd anniversary, pledis planned to sell replicas of seventeens rings. after it was announced carats were understandably upset since the boys worked so hard for those. luckily pledis heard carats concerns and put out an apology and didn't manufacture them in the end. I'm glad that at least they listened to carats even though it would have been better if they had never considered the idea in the first place :(

oh yeah listening parties are definitely just another marketing technique to boost streams. i think like with a lot of marketing techniques, it just depends on the execution. imo if they're done well it can be a good way for fans to connect while listening to an artists music, which is mutually beneficial for the company, but i can totally see a situation where companies get greedy and push it too hard. i don't know anything about what happened with them back in the day, but if you're curious why SVT had listening parties leading up to your choice, they were set up by UMG, the American distributor that SVT worked with for this cb. in this case the listening parties weren't just for boosting streams, but also likely for UMG to gauge interest. SVT isn't officially signed to a US label yet, but UMG's data from the listening parties could be used to show US labels whether or not there's enough interest for them to be signed. which if that happens we'd almost definitely see a more permanent US shop!

ahh yes, once you're ready I'm sure it would be great to have another bunny companion 🥺

yes! heavens cloud and gam3 bo1 are both such feel good songs! my sister actually added heavens cloud to their Spotify after i made them listen to the album in the car dhfkf it's now one of 6 kpop songs they have saved (4 of which are SVT... my influence 💅 DHFJFH) I'm certain we'll see some of the songs from your choice at caratland this year, hopefully it's all of them but I'd especially like to see heavens cloud and wave 👀 I'm also still crossing my fingers for an i wish live performance bc i can't believe my favorite SVT b-side is one of the TWO tracks they haven't performed live not including the new album (the other one being network love, which i would also like to see live!)

#melia.ask #📖 anon #long post #it always takes me so long to answer these bc i am incapable of shutting up OTL

5 notes · View notes

bookfreaky · 3 years

Text

LOVE DOING - The Analysis

Intro:

I try to never analyse my work while still working on it, because I believe that the painting must be born from an image in your head, or a feeling, and not from a concrete idea. That is the foundation of abstractionism. Then when you’re finished and you are kind of star-gazing your own work, you try to find what made you create all that, what made you use that colour or this shape. I did that and I saw that all the dots were connected in the same theme: Love.

Love as a broad concept and my experience with that. I think love is a very liquid sentiment, like water, it takes the shape of its every container you put it, but pretty much it’s still love. That same impulse is there. It can be like water also in the way it reflects the sun light, how it changes colours and distorts shapes. Love can be illusory; it can be lysergic but it can also be the answer to many simple questions in life. In its gas form it can be contagious and performative as it inhabits imagination, but it can also become solid when under pressure, just like water becomes ice under high pressures. In difficult situations, the love you feel for that person may be the only thing that keeps you going. I experienced that, and I think many people did too with so many people getting ill and dying during the Covid pandemic.

Like water it nurtures, like water it drowns. Love can be represented as a substance, like it just did, but also it persists as an action, an abstract action at so, an actual verb. In abstractionism, it’s to be said that colour is verb while shape is noun (I won’t remember to said that), for that reason I focused in this collection mainly in two colours in their variations, red and blue. Without the political branding aesthetic, red is seen in psychoanalysis as a active colour, the colour of human blood. Blue could be described as a “calmer” colour, but not so lacking in action. As Rebecca Solnit said, I quote:

“Water is colourless, shallow water appears to be the colour of whatever lies underneath it, but deep water is full of this scattered light, the purer the water the deeper the blue. The sky is blue for the same reason, but the blue at the horizon, the blue of land that seems to be dissolving into the sky, is a deeper, dreamier, melancholy blue, the blue at the farthest reaches of the places where you see for miles, the blue of distance.”

So I dedicate this four paintings to the people I love and whomever loves things, but also to all the feelings that come about with love. Some of these paintings are capable of calming me and I could keep looking at them for hours, forgetting about myself. Others make me feel angsty, uncomfortable and looking at them oblige me to think about my own existence and fear my future.

I really hope you look at the paintings before you read the whole thing, and suffer through the same. Thank you.

Love Escaping Into the Blue:

This one was the first painting I made, before I imagined it to be a collection, and it was born from the experience of decompressing love from a place of deep passion; where you are taken by this sudden and enormous sadness but also relief. I felt free, really. I read this biology paper from the Monterey Bay Aquarium, called “Light in the Deep Sea”, and it explains that there’s some uniformity of colour in the ocean animals according to how deep in the water they inhabit. Animals living in the great depths of the sea, between 6,000 and 11,000 meters deep, have commonly a very vivid red colour, but closer to the surface of the water, between 200 and 1,000 meters deep, most animals are silver and grey. That’s because in this depth the brightness of sunlight is fragmented into a blue colour, and grey reflects the blue light creating the illusion that the animal is, in fact, blue. A Blue Whale is actually grey, not blue.

[Seadevil Fish (Cryptosaras couesii), left. Blue Whale (Balaenoptera musculus), right.]

The painting shows a leak of red coming into blue and bluer space, which is this feeling of infatuation and selfish desire, possession, fear and jealousy that is very red in colour and has connotations of violence and anger, moving into a place that is not so deep in the water but clearer and wider as the open sea, illuminated by this navy-blue light. It’s like you can finally breathe and see that your love is still there, but it has changed. In hope by being closer to the atmosphere it is also somehow closer to the divine. I imagine some people might feel lost when love escapes into the blue, and I get this sensation too, but it’s about loving freely, learning how not to feel love so deeply into ourselves, but widely like the ocean.

Love Growing in the Pit of the Stomach:

When I looked at this painting in particular after it was done, I had this sensation of angst that was difficult for me to name. It’s about desire, it’s about this feeling growing inside of you that you know it will be something more than what you want, but what you need. I’ve become obsessed with the image of holes, looking like they are piercing the canvas; I think they show this emptiness I feel, like a window showing how hollow I am inside, but also, they give me this satisfying feeling by looking at them, like opening a wound and poking a bubble. I think this emptiness comes from the idea most trans women cannot take away from the back of their heads, which is if you do or do not have a “female genitalia”. Gender in our culture is very centred around genitals and biological sex, for centuries being a woman has been defined by the person who’s able to carry a man’s child. There is this little fantasy of mine where women have this little hole in them that can swallow the world. The idea of it, for me, has grown into a very real desire very much like the desire for sex. Actually, very close to sex too. But the roots growing out of the hole, in green and blue, represent pain and fear, because I’m not sure if I’m okay with the idea of having to undergo a surgical procedure to fulfil this fantasy, neither I am sure if it is a fantasy or a need.

Most of my work resembles yonic shapes (resembling the form of a vulva), either in this work or in former ones, and it’s never intentional, it sort of just slips from my subconscious. I believe that the vulva, as well as the womb, are under-shadowed symbols of power. Phallic shapes are very common in art and what-not, they are usually associated with offense and aggression. Like when school boys draw a dick on the toilet stalls as if marking their territory. The vulva, however, is never quite portrayed like that.

I read about this Japanese visual artist, Megumi Igarashi, who made several pieces of art shaped after her own vagina, including a yellow vagina-boat (which I absolutely loved) and she got arrested and fined for “obscenity”. I think that for her subversive art-form she should be considered a national hero. Many man-made constructions are phallic images, look at the Washington Obelisk, or the Eiffel Tower, but in nature we most commonly find yonic shapes, like the Grand Canyon.

There is a profound violence in desiring this, feeling as if a part of your own anatomy is lacking, but you can’t grow it naturally, you can’t do it in a god-intended way. The bright red colour represents violence and sex, and in this case both. It’s way more complicated than the concept of having kids and being a mom, it’s a lot more than to be seen as sexual beings, and sexuality, and to feel loved; it’s about symbols of power and somehow getting that denied. It’s about learning how to love this new body, a body that is foreign, infertile, obscene and unconventional. That love is hard to achieve and it is violent because women, and especially trans women, have been taught to hate their bodies.

Love Falls In The Bathroom:

This one took the longest to finish and left me with the most unsure brush-strokes, much perhaps because it isn’t based off on an idea but on a memory, on dream. In three more years I’ll be the same age my mother had and she had me, 29 years old. Somehow it feels like a looming date. Having kids and getting pregnant, specifically, have been sporadic subjects of therapy sessions – the antithesis is always the same: you are not lesser of a woman for not being able to get pregnant, you can still be a mom through other means, you are not even sure if you want kids or marriage, you can always adopt – Those answers feel reasonable, but none of them ever could appease the deep feeling of something missing in me, like something is perpetually wrong with me. Then I understood that in this painting, I was trying to evoke these feelings. Love and grief.

[My mother, pregnant with me, in the 90s.]

My friends tell me I seem to be older than I actually am, and sometimes I wonder if that’s not because I had never been a happy child. I feel like I had my childhood robbed from me. I mean, I had an okay, comfortable childhood, and a problematic teenage-hood, but I never had a girlhood. I am still grieving it. I had been assigned male at birth, I’m still grieving that too.

In July of this year, I experienced a very vivid dream, in which although short all the images and the sensations were, felt very real. I was taking a shower in my bathroom, I close off the water, wrap myself around a towel, my usual pink one, and when I’m stepping out of the shower stall I fell. I hit my right elbow against the toilet lid as I fell with my legs open in opposite directions, a sharp pain struck me under my thighs, close to my groin, and a light string of blood followed right after that. It wasn’t menstruation blood, thin and clear red, but thick and dark. It was all very quick but I knew, right then, right there, exactly everything that was happening. I was pregnant, 13 weeks, alone in the bathroom floor, surrounded by blood. I wonder how many days of my recent life, how many hours a day, I am really just sitting down alone on my bathroom’s floor surrounded by blood. I woke up and it still felt very real. I had spent the next two days very quiet, not wanting to speak to anyone. I wanted to tell someone as soon as I was back from the dream, but I couldn’t do it. I wanted to call someone, a friend, anyone, and say “I lost it. I lost my baby”. I realised then, in that post-dreamy state, that I have been silently grieving for a lot of things, things I haven’t yet allowed myself to grieve for. Things I still did not have a chance.

Love Lost In Imagination:

This one is the only one what doesn’t forecast red and blue colours, but instead in red and blue paint mixed together in a royal purple colour. It was the last one I made, and it’s the one that differs the most in shape. I like to imagine it was love in it’s gas form, vaping inside your brain like Nitrous-oxide, with white-coloured cloud shapes and yellow peacock eye-feathers. It’s about how sometimes love can only exist in imagination, how we often elaborate better scenarios in our heads, and we think “what if things were different?”. I believe to be okay to fantasize, anyway the utopia is what moves us towards a reality, but sometimes we can get lost in imagination, and in questioning the same questions over and over. “What if I hadn’t done this and done that?”; “What if I hadn’t said no?”; “What if I had stayed longer to watch that movie?”; “What if had come out as trans earlier?”; “What if I had become a professional writer?”; “What if I had born a woman?”. Is love real if it perpetrates only in thought?

I would be more than happy to quote some of Saint Augustine here, and his theological virtues, love being one of them, but I wouldn’t like to make this essay even longer and complicated.

I think to myself sometimes, when was it that I started to prefer having peace then pleasure. My head has always been very noisy, very noisy, and I wanted it to stop. Now it feels like I’m constantly too quiet about everything. That somehow, like the Little Mermaid by Hans Christensen Andersen, when transitioning into a woman I exchanged my legs (my body) for my voice, and now I can’t voice or even pinpoint what I want. I’m just so tired. So, so tired. My mental health hasn’t been great for more than one year, and the pandemic didn’t help. I’m constantly anxious around people, even the closest ones to me (especially the closest ones to me), I’ve been eating like a bird and sleeping like a cat. Still, sometimes I imagine what future I would like, and I imagine myself living somewhere with open space, trees, breeding horses just like my grandfather did, space for dogs, musical instruments and the kids. Space for being big.

The painting makes me think that sometimes I can only love myself in this imaginary place. Otherwise, it just looks slightly like a chicken’s head. You decide.

- Original work, G.L. Alódio.

#art #art analysis #art essey #personal #my own #painting

5 notes · View notes

silentfcknhill · 4 years

Text

AtLA + LoK Villains Evilness Rating

(If you wanna dispute my ratings I’ll be happy to tell you why.)

ATLA:

Ty Lee - 0.5 /10

Cinnamon roll. Too pure for this world. Naïve and will put her faith in you 100%. Kind of ditzy but can take you down with no hard feelings. Needs to be liked by everyone. Is very flexible. Can strangle you with her legs and giggle while doing it. Chooses bad friends. Has frustratingly good luck.

Uncle Iroh- 1/10

Actual angel but could still open up a can of whoop-ass if necessary. Too supportive and forgiving. Loves tea, sitting around, speaking in proverbs and leading by example. Probably considers you a friend. Surprisingly powerful but mostly peaceful. Hard to provoke but if you do, just run. Fear the nice ones.

Jet- 3/10

Misguided and extreme but also traumatized. Don't get in his way. Kind of twisted and obsessive af. Ends justify the means, until they don't. Needs a proper role model and has potential. Can be unreasonable and is still kind of a jerk. Will gaslight you.

Prince Zuko- 3.5/10

Conflicted, violent and angsty but mostly needs a lot of reassurance. Has a major boner for his honor. Will freak out over nothing. Has been through a lot and will not be underestimated. Grumpy and willful af and won't listen to you until it's too late, then will blame you for misleading him.

June- 4/10

Might beat you up or kidnap you for money but it's nothing personal. Might insult you as a way of flirting. Looks pretty and delicate but don't be fooled. Can beat you up in a split second and not break a sweat. Will probably take all your stuff and never give it back. Lives for the tough girl aesthetic.

Mai- 5/10

Is just bored and over it all. Throwing knives is something to do. Apathetic and will probably just follow along with whatever including murder but will complain the entire time. Emo af. Would risk it all for a quick nap. Prone to bite your head off. Too smart for you and will let you know.

Wan Shi Tong- 6.5/10

A total dick. Tired of your shit and is judging you. Thinks humans are garbage and won't get involved with them until it suits him. Don't touch his books or he will literally eat you. Nerdiest bastard. Doesn't trust you so don't try any shit with him. Sees through your pathetic lies. Kind of an elitist.

Combustion Man- 7/10

Thinks blowing shit up is a form of art. Doesn't believe in communication. Very serious and focused. Do not fight him. Probably gets crapped on more than he deserves. A mystery wrapped in a bald head. Probably has a tattoo of the names of all the people he's killed and he's ready to add yours.

Hama- 7.5/10

Traumatized old hag. Created bloodbending but too crazy to do much with it now. May kidnap you and keep you in a dank hole forever. Seems sweet at first but is hiding a lot of secrets. Don't eat her cooking. Thinks sitting at home scheming is a job. Hates you for whatever small thing you did to her 57 years ago. Forgets nothing.

Long Feng- 8/10

Conniving af. Will brainwash you, lie to your face and maybe make you disappear. Wants everything and will plot to take it all. Perfectionist and control freak, will stab you in the back and you won't see it coming. Is tired of taking everyone's shit. Thinks he deserves better but he doesn't. Kills children.

Admiral Zhao- 8/10

Explosive temper. Huge egomaniac and narcissist. Hates the moon. Has probably killed a lot of people and fish and you're next. Will do whatever it takes. Won't listen to anything you say. Punch first, ask questions never. Jumps to a lot of conclusions, is usually wrong. Frequently embarrasses self.

Koh the Face-Stealer- 8.5/10

Terrifying and will probably steal your face. Do not approach. Too indifferent to chase you but can be sneaky af so watch your back. Doesn't handle emotions well. A total loner. The guy who knows everything but nobody wants to talk to. Fear him. To know him is to hate him. Makes you question everything.

Firelord Azulon- 9/10

Will order your execution on a whim and maybe a relative or two first for the appetizer. Do not question him. Will play favorites and call you out on things that are his fault. Overreacts and you should probably not be around when it happens. Disapproves of all your choices and is very vocal about this fact. Forces parents to kill their children.

Firelord Sozin- 9/10

Will commit genocide and take over the world while yelling at you for minor shit. Kind of a petty and jealous asshole. Even if you think he is your friend he isn't and is going to attack you. A big old bully with bad breath and a wonky beard. The original starter of all drama and certified instigator shitlord.

Princess Azula- 9/10

Unstable and manipulative. Sadist who thrives off of your fear and suffering. Will hurt you badly in all the ways. Avoid at all costs. Acts cold and calculating but really has no chill. Demands your respect but won't earn it. Trolling you gives her pleasure. The spawn of satan and loving it. Mommy issues to infinity.

Firelord Ozai- 9.5/10

Second worst dad ever. No soul. Will burn every tree and face to a crisp. Child abuse for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Actual sociopath. Will kill someone and banish you for it. Goatee comes first. Will project all his insecurities on you. Will tell everyone your secrets. World's biggest megalomaniac.

LOK:

Varrick- 3/10

Will probably lie, try to con you out of money, order you to do things for him and tell bad jokes but that's as far as it's gonna go. Eccentric and annoying af. Doesn't know when to shut up. Needs to learn some lessons in life. Attracts more trouble than he's worth. Has all the good gossip somehow.

Bataar Jr.- 3/10

The guy that nobody likes because he tries too hard and ends up ruining everything. Enjoys being a bitch. Wants to rebel but is bad at it. Do you love me now father? Tries to act like he doesn't care what you think but cares way too much. Will not kill you but might get engaged to your ex to spite you.

Police Chief Saikhan- 3.5/10

Will do anything you say for a price, except give a fuck. Doesn't really care about anything. Might arrest you just because he doesn't like you. The type to pretend he didn't hear you just to avoid responsibility. Likes to yell into things. Hates helping people. Is actually a giant rock in disguise.

Tahno- 3.5/10

A total prick. Has nicer hair than you and won't let you forget it. Very flamboyant and arrogant. Will gloat over being better than you at everything even though he cheated every time. Talks mad shit but can't walk the walk. Ultimately a big baby. Lowkey protect him. Wants to be the cool kid but isn't cool.

Desna- 4/10

Couldn't care less. Actual inanimate object. Lurks around for no reason. Hates everything and that includes you. Listens to his elders and would probably leave you for dead. Just wants to sleep. Secretly goth. Might actually be two small robots in a trenchcoat pretending to be human.

Councilman Tarrlok- 4.5/10

Attention whore with a savior complex. Smol bean who wants approval. Acts arrogant but is secretly depressed and self-loathing af. Stubborn and clingy emotional wreck with impulse control issues. Needs a hug. Will probably manipulate you through guilt or charisma. Wants to be Lucius Malfoy, but cries at night.

Hiroshi Sato- 5/10

Has lost sight of what's important. Total extremist. Will get revenge on you for something you didn't even do. Well respected and seems innocent but is plotting your downfall. Can build a whole army and take you down. Kind of a traitor. Loyalty is volatile. Thinks he always knows what's best for you but doesn't know shit.

The Lieutenant- 5/10

In way over his head. Wants to make a difference but has let bitterness take over. Will probably electrocute you. Puts his faith in the wrong people. Kind of snobby and will hold a grudge. 99 problems and benders are about 98 of them. Tired of being pushed around but still lets himself be pushed around. FLOPPY MUSTACHE.

Aiwei- 5.5/10

Thinks he's better than you and probably isn't. Wants to be sneaky but really is just too predictable. Boring af and tries to be unique but fails miserably. Lets everyone take advantage of him. Don't lie to him. Will harbor resentment and take it out on you at a random point in time. Discount Long Feng but not as smart or ambitious.

Eska- 5.5/10

Will stalk you aggressively. Thinks slavery is a relationship. Eyeliner sharp enough to kill. Never betray her or she will destroy you. Might use you as a footstool. Seems emotionally dead inside, but don't test her dormant waters. Uses everyone and feels no guilt. Hipster trash. No concept of boundaries or social interaction.

Ghazan- 6/10

Sarcasm game strong enough to fatally wound you. Doesn't say much. Has tree trunks for limbs and will probably use them to throw lava and rocks at you. Lowkey protective af. Don't get on his bad side. You can't get on his good side. Would rather kill everyone including himself than let you win an argument.

Zaheer- 6/10

A wannabe hippie but will still fight the system and you too. Don't try to control him. Gets annoyed when people breathe too loud. Is kind of a contradiction. Will literally blow you away. Anarchy equals freedom. Fuck the police. Can sit in the same spot for a really long time. Probably a flat earther.

Ming-Hua- 7/10

Has a significant disability but can still easily slaughter you. Innovative and sneaky af. As fast and agile as an actual lemur. A natural disaster wherever she goes. Doesn't listen to your advice. Overcompensates a lot. Probably her own worst enemy. Is quiet and likes to eavesdrop on your business.

Kuvira- 7.5/10

Wants to control everything. Who invited her to poop the party? Highkey evil and just plain mean. Will use your corpse as a decoration if you get in her way. Secretly petty and superficial af. Thinks social bonding is trying to seduce you in order to take charge of your life. Individuality punishable by death. Even other villains hate her.

P'Li- 7.5/10

Can explode you with her mind. Her gaze will pierce you to the core. Strong independent and violent woman who don't need a man but chooses to have one anyway. Will shave you off just like the sides of her hair. Has no problem fucking shit up. Boss bitch. Loyal to only a select few, so too bad for you.

Amon- 8/10

Charismatic but scary and mysterious af. Huge hypocrite. Will silently judge you. Powerful, selfish and cruel. Manipulative as hell and uses intimidation to get you to comply. Pretends to have empathy but really just wants control. Will cripple you physically and emotionally without warning. Knows all of your weaknesses but none of his own.

Earth Queen Hou-Ting- 8.5/10

The actual worst. Eats your pets for supper. Her yelling is the #1 cause of deafness worldwide. Will keep you prisoner and then have you killed for looking at her. The bossiest Drama Queen ever. Will be the cause of all your misery and will be proud of it. Bark is the same as her bite. Lots of daddy issues.

Chief Unalaq- 9/10

Religious extremist. Actually batshit insane. Wants to destroy the entire world. Has ascended from this pathetic plane of human existence. Loner whose only friends are invisible. Wants you to think he's just shy and misunderstood but NOPE. Knows what you want to hear and says it. Will sell you to satan for one cornchip.

Yakone- 9.5/10

Worst dad ever. Will either bloodbend you, try to live vicariously through you or both. Absolutely no redeeming traits except for being physically human. Abuse equals tough love. Might beat your ass for no good reason and expect your gratitude for it. Criminal mastermind with no conscience and all of the entitlement.

Vaatu- 10/10

Actually the devil. Literal incarnation of darkness and chaos. Ultimate troll and force of disaster in the world. Doesn't know any better, but still an asshole by choice. Will use you until you're no longer of value. Has a hard-on for destruction. Likes to play the victim. Will consume your soul and burp loudly.

39 notes · View notes

thewhitefluffyhat · 5 years

Text

No, Alina Isn’t Crazy

Let me explain...

When Alina was first introduced, I thought she was the character that made the least sense as an actual person rather than as a trope-y “mad artist” archetype. But after the reveal of her backstory, I find her personality and motivations do make sense, especially when you consider the events of Alina’s Magical Girl Story from her perspective.

Indeed, since that story’s release on JP, she’s quickly risen to become my favorite new character from Magia Record. Hence why I’m posting this today - it’s another semi-Magia Rapport related post, haha. Alina is definitely my favorite of the Forest element characters, and perhaps this essay will show a little of why that is.

Provocative title and Magia Rapport aside, though, what’s actually below the "Keep reading” is a close read analysis essay, specifically focused on Alina’s MGS. (A lot of Holy Alina’s MGS serves to confirm and reinforce little points scattered throughout this too, but this post was long enough without it!)

Introduction

The theme of Alina’s own art might be “Alina’s beauty” and “life, death, and emotion/decay.” But I would argue that the theme of her MGS as a when taken as a short story is “voyeurism and objectification at the cost of self-identity.” Specifically, how Alina’s actions and personality are the logical conclusion to that concept taken to an extreme.

There’s one important truth to Alina’s world, and that is the idea that Alina’s art IS Alina. We see it at the start – when she says her art is what she enjoys and what she grasps with her own hands. We see it at the end – with her realization that her art’s theme is “Alina’s beauty.”

And at the end of the day, what MGS Alina most seems to want is to be left alone to do art, to be herself. But who is Alina?

Alina the Teen Prodigy

Unfortunately for Alina, her fame gets in the way of figuring that out. Such is the life of a teen prodigy. As perhaps can be expected, constantly parading children under a spotlight is a great recipe for turning out extremely high-strung kids with very warped self-esteem.

(See also: Nemu, but especially Touka.)

The exchange regarding the award here is a good illustration of that mindset. It might initially seem contradictory for Alina to work desperately hard to win an award that she later doesn’t want and claims she wasn’t aiming to win. But once being “gifted” becomes central to your identity, winning an award doesn’t feel good anymore. It feels more like running in place, just the bare minimum expected of you to maintain your identity as a genius. And Alina’s perfectionism means she can’t not hold herself to that standard.

Indeed, Alina is already showing signs that she’s struggling under the pressure and overexposure. Normally, Alina seems to love talking about art and her own works (as long as it isn’t about herself, anyway). Arguing with her teacher and running away are far more of a bother and interfere with her ability to get back to painting far more than a quick meeting would have been. Yet she curses at her teacher, bolts, and skips school rather than have to deal with the consequences of her fame again.

She’s irrationally lashing out, asserting her boundaries in whatever way she can. And with the way the characters react, this doesn’t even seem like the first time it’s happened, either...

Which suggests Alina’s problems with her fame also aren’t new. When we first meet her, Alina is already a lot closer to a breakdown than she appears on the surface.

Having natural talent from an early age, Alina probably hasn’t learned how to deal with failure without spiraling into a full blown identity crisis. As a perfectionist, she’s also hypersensitive to even the slightest mistake. And given that she’s been famous for a few years at this point, her acting out is practically expected.

Just given the setting that she’s a well-known child prodigy, it’s not surprising that Alina has all these traits.

Alina’s Adults Are Useless

What is a bit disturbing, though, is that adults around Alina aren’t any help in protecting her from her fame.

Indeed, from what we see, the pattern is the opposite - over and over, the supposedly “responsible” adults in Alina’s life say her visibility matters more than her consent. Her teacher pressures her into competitions she dislikes and then gets on her case when she pushes back. Her parents put up her whole life story, including photos of her as a kid, without Alina’s approval or even permission.

Jumping ahead, I think it’s rather telling that Alina manages to destroy all her art, commit suicide, and get rescued by a third party – and none of these adults even visit her. A popular theory is that Alina’s parents are travelling in a different country. But - did no one tell them? Did they not care? As it is, anything Alina does – even blatant red flags like destroying a classroom and her own art – is treated as just another work of artistic genius, to be advertised and exhibited.

(Because apparently nothing says High Art like creep shots of a teenage girl having a mental breakdown.)

Of course, Alina isn’t being neglected or abused like Sana or Yuma. Not even close. But she’s not in a great situation either. She doesn’t really have anyone she can turn to in a crisis. The adults in her life mostly use her for their own ends, reinforcing that her worth is in her fame as an artist, not her value as a person.

Alina’s Peers Aren’t Much Better

Then, on a more subtle level, there are Alina’s peers. Whenever she’s mentioned by people her own age, she’s either the subject of scary rumors or glowing admiration. Other kids know her as a celebrity name to be idolized or feared, not a person.

Before becoming a magical girl, the only person who actually makes an effort to befriend Alina is Karin. But even she is initially caught up in the aura of Alina’s fame and contributes to the swirl of gossip around her.

The result is a situation where everyone around Alina has their own opinion on who she is. No one seems to care or leave space for who Alina wants herself to be. And Alina, not having a social life to fall back on, is increasingly left with “genius artist” as the only means she has to interact with the world. It’s a self-reinforcing spiral.

The Critic’s Letter

First, what it’s not: this isn’t about Alina getting a bad review and not being able to handle criticism of her work. She’s already won the competition. And Alina is perfectionistic to unhealthy levels - she’s already her own worst critic.

Rather, the letter’s insinuations are both subtler and crueler. As Alina says, the critic isn’t concerned with her artwork - he’s commenting on Alina as a person. Thus, the critic’s words are the same pattern as before, now crystallized into its sharpest and purest form.

Alina’s internal sense of identity is precariously fragile. Meanwhile, Alina’s external identity is being used as a canvas for other people’s desires. Even though all Alina really wants is to create art for her own sake, other people obsess over and dump their own meaning (or lack of meaning) onto her works.

Once again, Alina’s art is conflated with Alina herself. The person is being evaluated as a piece of art.

As if that wasn’t enough, the letter’s final insinuation that Alina is losing her brilliance is a triple threat. If she can’t create great art, Alina loses the activity she enjoys most. She also loses the one thing she knows other people value her for. And worst of all, she loses the only touchpoint she has for her sense of self.

Cue existential crisis. Alina’s life is Alina’s art. Alina’s art is Alina life. Without one, she doesn’t have any concept of the other.

And in the light of all this, her suicide makes perfect sense.

Alina’s Suicide

Welcome to the literal and figurative objectification of Alina. Literal, in that she’s turning into a corpse. Figurative in that by putting her body up for display, she’s allowing people to voyeuristically consume it – an idea further reinforced by the “Kusouzu / Nine Phases” reference in the title implying a tinge of sexual objectification as well.

Now that she’s destroyed all of her previous works, the only thing Alina leaves her audience to look at is Alina herself. Filming her body as it turns from a person into a dead object was simply the logical conclusion to a life of being displayed, objectified, and overwritten by others’ perceptions.

But how does Alina feel about this ending?

The day of her suicide, Alina rushes around in a kind of manic euphoria. This isn’t especially odd. After all, it’s not uncommon for a suicidal person to outwardly appear happier before they make an attempt, as finally having a concrete plan of action can feel like a huge relief.

Dying means a solution to Alina’s worries about her talent fading. Dying also means an end to all the pressure, all the constant struggle of performing to ever-heightening expectations. Alina can simply abandon the cases and tools once she’s done with them - no need to stress about the future when she won’t have one.

Alina’s farewell, though, betrays darker emotions. It’s simultaneously deeply spiteful - “this is what you all wanted from me, are you happy now?” - yet also an admission of utter defeat. Alina is giving up her very humanity and selfhood to be evaluated as whatever her audience wants.

Throughout the story, everyone keeps telling Alina that her art is intoxicating, pulling the viewer into it… but the reality is the exact opposite. Alina’s art was just something Alina made for herself, and any intoxicating meaning was something the viewer injected into it.

And thus, Alina’s revelation. Alina’s theme is “Alina’s beauty” – both a rejection and an embrace of that objectification. Now, Alina has declared that her art loudly and unabashedly about herself, viewer projection be damned. And yet, at the same time, since “Alina” is what viewers are obsessed with seeing, then Alina will give them exactly what they want…

An Artistic Failure?

So then why does Alina consider her final art to be a failure? It fits well within the theme of “Alina’s beauty.” Indeed, her later works like “Humanity’s Implicit Reward” and even her swimsuit are arguably just softer variations of the “Alina’s body as forbidden yet alluring object for the viewer to consume” idea that is present here.

This suicide also seems to fit into the “life and death” motifs she has. It’s a twisted kind of resurrection - effectively, she’s killing herself as a human in order to live on eternally as a memorable piece of art.

Alina plans her final work directly because she thinks she’s dying as a creator. Rather than face her brilliance fading, she chooses to defy it by going out in a blaze of glory. And when put that way, it’s an exciting and fitting conclusion.

There’s just one little problem with that narrative...

While drifting between life and death, Alina realizes the critic was wrong. She had a theme all along. Alina’s brilliance wasn’t fading.

And thus, since she wasn’t a “dying artist,” her “going out in a blaze of glory” no longer holds any profound meaning. She’s just a silly teenager who got too worked up over a harsh letter.

The overall concept behind Alina’s last work wasn’t the issue. The failure was in the timing and execution, killing herself before such a thing had meaning and in a way such that her body would be found.

And so, I don’t think Alina has learned her lesson here. I don’t think Karin’s words have gotten through to her yet. If she concludes at a later point that her talent is truly is fading or that she’s lost her theme, I’d fully expect her to pull another suicidal stunt again.

Conclusion

So the good news: Alina lived! She’ll have plenty more chances to create art and figure herself out!

But the bad news: Alina’s revelation implies she’s now even more reliant on her identity as a genius artist.

And thus, like so many other characters, the end to Alina’s MGS isn’t really an ending. She hasn’t solved the problem at the heart of the crisis that led to her wish. Becoming a magical girl and discovering witches does nothing to stop Alina from falling into another identity spiral, nor has she left her suicidal tendencies behind.

Alina found her theme, but she still hasn’t found herself.

Misc Details

Some other neat miscellaneous details that fit with this interpretation:

I’m glad the English translation keeps at least a little of the quirky way Alina refers to herself. (That being said, in Japanese, it’s even more exaggerated - she doesn’t use normal first person pronouns at all, only using “Alina.” )

Because on the one hand, this is an obvious hint at her extreme narcissism: Alina’s sentences frequently emphasize her name.

On the other hand, it’s a great subtle detail to return to the theme of objectification. To put it another way, Alina refers to herself in third-person. That is, even when Alina is speaking about herself, she reflexively frames it from the point of view of another person. Because Alina is constantly having other people’s perspectives forced onto her!

Also, it turns out the pattern of others projecting onto Alina is present in her witch as well! “Old Dorothy” is a historical figure whose diaries have been analyzed by multiple different researchers. Some of them came to the conclusion that Dorothy was definitely a witch, others came to the conclusion she was definitely a normal, upstanding member of her community. The researchers got completely opposite results from the same exact diaries. So therefore - did they truly care about learning what Dorothy was really like? Or were they just out to prove their own theories?

(Two years in, Old Dorothy is even more fitting of a name. Doroinu basically predicted the entire fan response to Alina. Some people see her as an evil (w)itch, some people see her as a sympathetic figure - all from looking at the same text.

We’re even starting to see the “two sides” of Alina come up in the Main Story, with Karin’s subplot in Arc 2.)

Meanwhile, Old Dorothy’s form - a “paint tube” - carries both this “paint over with your perceptions” meaning while also suggesting the same story as Alina’s final piece in miniature.

Unlike Izabel, Alina’s witch form isn’t that of an artist. Because when Alina hits her lowest point of despair, she no longer considers herself to be an artist. She believes the only value she has left is to become literal materials to create art.

In other words, Old Dorothy is Alina turning herself into art again. It’s just rainbow paint this time instead of red.

Last but not least: yes, I am absolutely aware of the irony of this essay. Here I am rambling about how Alina’s story is all about her struggle to be herself while everyone seems determined to erase her in favor of their own projections – and yet a good chunk of this interpretation is probably my projecting on her. Whoops!

Still, even if you disagree with it, I hope this essay was interesting and maybe made you question some of your assumptions about Alina.

Thanks for reading!

#madoka magica #magia record #alina gray #magia record analysis #my ramblings #long essay #read more #tl;dr #alina is certainly exaggerated #but in her MGS she comes across as #a surprisingly believable gifted kid #going through a nasty identity crisis #exacerbated by her fame

279 notes · View notes

yeslahrt · 3 years

Text

Commission Details & TOS

The prices indicated on my commission sheet are base prices for the examples shown on the graphic. Here is more information to help clear up any additional question you may have. Once I am commissioned, it will be assumed that you have read through the information below!

WHAT I WILL DRAW:

Animals! I can draw a variety of animals and would love to have more practice to expand on my portfolio.

Mythical animals! I will do my best to illustrate your fantasy animal.

Monsters! I will take a stab at drawing your weird creature and make it look awesome.

D&D characters! Anthros! If it has a skeleton, I will do my best to draw what you want.

Yes, I am open to drawing sensual illustrations per my taste.

WHAT I WILL NOT DRAW:

I am still working on gaining more experience with using perspective, therefore I will not draw mech. One day, though.

I do not have the experience to draw gore.

I do not have the experience to draw chibis.

No, I will not draw pron for you.

WHAT TO EXPECT...

INQUIRIES & ORDERS: All clients should tell me everything that I need for your quote. If the client is too vague, I may not be able to accurately portray the character in the same fashion as you would like. (See below for info regarding references). Once we are ready to move forward, you will receive an invoice at the PayPal email you provide me.

I will not start working on your commission until the invoice is paid. If the invoice is not paid within 72 hours, I will send a confirmation of cancellation of your commission and discard your project. You will then have to wait until I have slots available again.

Repeated offenders will be denied service and potentially banned from my services.

Responsibility of following copyright notices and laws will fall solely on the client. Please do your own research and due diligence when commissioning licensed characters that do not belong to you. *

WHAT I NEED FROM YOU:

PayPal Email: (Please note that I only take USDs.)

Commercial or Personal Use? (If commercial, please explain.)

Printed and Framed? (Yes, I can have your illustration printed, framed, and sent to you for additional costs.)

Type of Illustration: (Please tell me what to illustrate for you. IE: Icon, extra small (XSm) portrait, regular portrait, half body, full body, etc.)

Do you want flat color for your illustration? (+$10 for regular portraits, +$15 for half body, +$20 for full body illustrations)

Do you want full color and shading? (+$30 for regular portraits, +$40 for half body, +$50 for full body illustrations)

More characters? Additional characters per illustration START at half cost as a base idea, but prices will vary depending on your commission and how much added work it will be.

Quick Personality: (Used to get a sense of the character I will be illustrating.)

Extra additions? (Do you want them smiling? Crying? Serious? What do you want them doing, if applicable?)

Do you have references? (If yes, I will ask you to email them to my business account. Do not send them to me via Tumblr.)

REFERENCE GUIDELINES

Please send me pictures of your character(s) for reference! Things to consider: potential hairstyles, outfits, color palettes, preferred skin tone, other illustrations of your character that you commissioned from other artists, etc. Anything to better help me portray your character correctly is good.

I also need a few words about their personality for setting a mood for your character. This should be no more than three sentences max.

If you have a pose in mind, please reference the pose. Otherwise I will take artistic freedom with the rough sketch.

WARNING: Do not send me a link to your toyhouse or website where I have to get the references myself. Otherwise you risk your inquiry being rejected.

Yes, I am okay with clients sharing a google folder of references specific to your commission with me.

WiPs & WORK PROCESS

You, the client, will receive periodic WiPs of the initial rough sketch that will lay down the foundation of your commission. This is the time for you to tell me if there are any major concerns or adjustments that should be made to avoid incurring additional work fees.

You will eventually be asked to confirm the rough sketch before I begin working on finalizing the line work and illustration. Once confirmed, minor details can be requested to be altered and changed, but the main part of the illustration will not be altered without incurring additional fees.

Once the line work has been finalized, I will begin working on adding flat colors. I strongly recommend you to send me color palettes if you are very particular, otherwise I will take artistic freedom with the illustration. You will again be sent a WiP to make any color corrections. If any of the flat colors are off, this is the time to tell me before I finish your commission with the final shading.

POST PERIOD OF REVISION: I will make minor alterations within reason after the first 72 hours of completion. Any changes that require me to go back and rework the line art, which will lead to me fixing colors/shading, (ex: a different outfit) you will incur an additional 50% - 75% of the original commission cost.

PLEASE BE ADVISED: If you are having me design your character for the first time and your thought process is exceptionally particular concerning your character, you may incur an additional 30% conceptual design fee for the additional time I will spend with you to make the actualization of your character the best it can be.

DELIVERY OF COMMISSION: I will send you an email with a link to your finished commission (usually via Google drive). Unless you have specifically requested for a printed and framed bundle, there will be no physical product or merchandise exchange.

WHAT ABOUT DEADLINES?

The client is more than welcome to suggest a date that they may need the commission to be completed by. Depending on the type of turnaround you are requesting, you will be charged a rush fee of 35 - 50% of the original cost of the commission.

Otherwise the commission will be done in the order received and you may be given a rough estimate of when the work should be started. The completion of the project will take between 1 week and 2 months, give or take, once you have been notified that the work has started.

ART SCHEDULE & SOCIAL MEDIA

Please be aware that I hold a job outside of social media. I sadly do not have a set schedule for my job. I find my creative drive spontaneous throughout the day, therefore I do not have a predictable drawing schedule. If you wish to watch me draw, then you can find the link in my bio to follow me.

Sadly, because of Tumblr's algorithms of hiding/shadow banning posts, I cannot add a link to it here for your convenience. All I can say is if you have the ITCH to watch me draw, you know where to find me, if ya' catch my drift? 'Eh? 'Eh?

ADDITIONAL FEES

If you, the client, are requesting thorough concept art of your character, which include reference sheets alongside of an illustration, I will ask for an additional fee for the service I will provide when spending extra time making sure that your new character is just right and providing a character reference sheet.

As a rule, I always add my watermark to a small portion of every commission that will not hinder your view of the work. If you wish to have a file without my watermark, please expect an additional fee added to your commission price. Personal use only.

If you wish for a high-quality illustration for printing, please expect an additional 50% minimum fee added to your commission. Personal use only.

The print-and-frame bundle will incur additional costs and time. Please contact me for more details.

CANCELLATIONS AND REFUNDS

Every client has the right to cancel their commission any time before I START work on their commission. Other refunds may be issued based on client relation, otherwise all payments are non-refundable once I have started work on your commission.

I also reserve the right to cancel your commission for any reason, for which you will see a refund if you have paid.

HOWEVER: If I terminate your commission due to the harassment of myself or my followers on social media, racially charged behavior or hate speech, threats of violence, obsessive or otherwise disturbing behavior... YOU WILL NOT GET A REFUND REGARDLESS OF THE STATUS OF YOUR COMMISSION.

I reserve the right to refuse your inquiry and/or commission for any reason I feel necessary. If I refuse your commission inquiry, please do not inquire about said commission again in the future.

— TERMS OF SERVICE —

MY RIGHTS — My right as an artist grants ownership of the copyright of my artwork. I do not however claim ownership of a client’s character or ownership of characters from television shows, movies, games, books, etc. In addition, I control the display and exhibition of my work, and the distribution of the work. Clients and/or followers cannot:

Re-post my work without my written consent.

Use my work for their Wattpad novel colors.

Upload my work on other social media platforms without my written consent.

Claim my work as their own, even if it's a commissioned piece.

Use my work with the intention to redistribute, promote themselves, generate revenue off of my work, or take away from my bottom line. I am a business owner and my artwork is my brand.

PERSONAL USE TERMS — As default, all commissions will be assumed that they are for the client’s personal use and enjoyment. Any intention to use my work in any way that may promote you, generate revenue, or that will redistribute my work will require a commercial user license.

COMMERCIAL USE TERMS — If you would like to commission artwork from me in a way that will promote you, generate revenue, or that will redistribute my work, (such as, and not limited to: promotional material, merchandise, raffles, giveaways, indie games) will require you to sign an official agreement. Commercial based commissions have different fees. Once signed, my illustrations will not include any watermarks and will come to you with a high-quality resolution. This will not allow you to change, edit, or repurpose my illustrations and I will ask you to credit me for my work in some form. You are required to clearly state if your commission will be used commercially.

Extended License — This license is an agreement that will grant the client full ownership of your commissioned artwork. You will receive my work with no watermarks, at a high-quality resolution, and you will be able to edit, change, repurpose, redistribute the product at your leisure with no credit to me as the artist is so desired.

Licenses are not eligible for discounts. Non-negotiable.

Again, responsibility of following copyright notices and laws will fall solely on the client. Please do your own research and due diligence when commissioning licensed characters that do not belong to you.

— DISTRIBUTION OF INFORMATION —

I acknowledge that I sometimes collect sensitive information from my clients. You have a right to privacy. I do not collect, sell, or otherwise give out your personal information. Your inquiries and orders are confidential unless I feel a reasonable threat is being made and/or must report such information to the authorities.

If the client requests that I do not display their commission in my online portfolio, I will respect that request to the best of my abilities. However please understand that I reserve the right to print and display my artwork for my physical portfolio and that your request will not extend to my physical gallery unless other arrangements have been made.

#commissions #commission info #commission sheet #commission tos #tos #terms of service

5 notes · View notes

curious-minx · 4 years

Text

The Divine Hustle

Do the hustle(!)

Working yourself to the death has never been so glamours!

To live in America is to play by the business savvy handbook. America has never been a country of a wholesome omniloving God, instead the USA has always been the land of fleeced pockets. Much of America has fetishized the concept of “Hard Work” from the Puritantical Protestants to the Bootstrap pulling fantasia sprung from the Industrial Age. Some business CEOs even go as far to reinvent history by putting the word “Hustle” into Abraham Lincoln’s mouth:

“Things may come to those who wait … but only the things left by those who hustle.”

An actual quote from our Hardest Working President Business

Yes, Lincoln the original Tall King, the first Presidential White Saviour, a Myth more than Man, the living embodiment of a Pull Yourself By the Bootstraps Aesop fable. He needed that stove pipe hat to hide his vast quantity of hustle. I can see why a Business CEO type would be tickled by this fake quote. Lincoln’s legal work had him making more money at times than that of a prominent State Governor. There are reasons why he’s a Money Man. So tell me, Encyclopedia Britannica why would Lincoln feel the drive to accumulate this money and capital? Does it stem from Abraham Lincoln’s insecurities and low self-esteem from coming from a low income background? EB offers us none such info but it does lean heavily into Mary Todd Lincoln being a questionable influence on Lincoln. The EB is quick to file MTL as being the Insane, Difficult Woman who has developed an “obsessive need to spend money.” Of course, Lincoln had to make all of this money in order to pay for his expensive crazy wife. Makes perfect sense if I am someone completely stoned and drunk from hagiography and cute, quaint reductive views of history.

Lincoln’s business savviness is made abundantly clear in his failed presidential campaign against Douglas. He published personally curated debate transcripts and his own Biography to hawk on the campaign trail. The acute self-awareness of his own remarkableness is perhaps one of Lincoln’s main shortcomings and strengths. The man worked himself into a frenzy, constantly looked emaciated and worn down, and for what? The one few times he tries to take in one of his only pleasures in life, The Arts, he gets murdered. The Capitalist Mythmakers want us to forget about all of that. Abraham Lincoln worked because he loved to work and he was a good American, therefore if you want to be a good American like Lincoln, you’ll work the Hustle.

Yes, this essay has been nothing but the ramblings of someone pretending like they know what they are talking about, but everytime I see the word “Hustle,” exclusively when it’s being used in terms of celebrating hyper capitalist America another part of me dies.

////

Wow, the people look meaningless from up here.

The New York Hustle. The Detroit Hustle. To do these hustles once meant finding a dancing partner for the night and telling the 4/4 rhythm, “4 steps are fine, but six steps are even better.” Now the New York Hustle is working three unpaid internships with the promise that a slightly underpaid gig could be on the way. All language inevitAbly changes and evolves, but that doesn’t mean I have to be okay about it. The modern hustle is the joy killer. The modern hustle is pushing and shoving fellow hustlers over the faint whiff of dining room scraps. To hustle is to continue to believe in your own self mythology so hard that you too can become your personal Lincoln. An emaciated, husk working for the Good of the Company, er, I mean Nation. Maybe a scuzzy Matthew McConaughey will give you a spin. That’s sure to make any hard worker smile before she collapses.

/////

Have you ever seen a side hustle news filler story that didn’t make you want to walk into a murky ocean’s depths? One Google “News” search of the term hustle brings up this article about a New Zealand Woman supposedly planning slumber parties during Covid times. One can only assume that this is the case because the article (sourced from the highly reputable looking Stuff.co) despite being published in February 2021 makes no reference to the pandemic. This is because New Zealand has already moved well beyond those covid days. Covid slumber party nightmares aside, the idea of hiring a professional slumber party planner in or out of Covid times is a brazenly gross idea. The extent of “planning” that should go into a slumber party is how much should you tip the pizza delivery driver, how many boxes of brownie mix, and maybe the one job I could jokingly fathom hiring a person for is choosing what regrettable movie a kid should watch at a slumber party.

Slumber parties are for children, and can easily be planned and arranged by a child. There should never be a need to outsource “Harrypotter glam” themed teepees and treats. Maybe that’s the kind of life people in New Zealand want to lead and if certain individuals want to have that ambitious drive to make a ridiculous small company they should be free to do so. The sinister creeping reality is that the standards of the Exceptional Money Making Individual are becoming the standards everyone is expected to live up to. Passion for the sake of passion, and art for the sake of art is getting the squeeze in favor of monetizing slumber parties.

Monetizing off of Twitter followers. Monetizing off of newsletters. Monetizing off of podcasts. Content creation for the sake of profit is basically the main reason the Internet exists anymore. If you have something you love to do in your life like the act of reading a book you better be willing to invest in a USB microphone and recording booth to start your audio book reading career because otherwise you’re just reading a book. You’re just playing a video game when you could be streaming yourself for all of your adoring fans and followers. I could be thinking, but instead I’m tweeting.

I do not respect the Hustle. I respect differences and a variety of lifestyles. I respect Passion and drive. I do not respect the Hustle, because the side hustle is just a full-time job the capitalist system is trying to make you consider a “side” project. One look at this exhaustive CNBC “The ultimate side hustle guide for 2021”, and what they are describing is not a side hustle but starting your own small business. They are not the same thing. A side hustle should not require an immense amount of time, personal wealth, and the possible necessity of hiring a freelancer and tax analysts to start when you are already working a full-time job and/or participating in the American Breeding Dream.

I know that I am lazy compared to many over working Americans. I am already in my late twenties and still staunchly refuse to engage in American Adult Tie Sensitive Checklist. I would like to work, truly I do. I would love nothing more than to be in possession of a job in a safe and humane company that legitimately favored Human Kindness and Decency over the Grind. Working for a company that didn’t feel like the sole purpose of its existence is to make more and more money.. I am trying to minimize. I am trying not to let other people’s perceptions clutter and crowd out my mind. I am trying to survive through this pandemic that has completely melted what little brains and physical strength I had. I will not stop trying to do the Divine Hustle.

Let’s just appreciate this blurry picture of Divine being eaten by a lobster and call it a day.

#hustle #side hustle #economy #personal essay #capitalism #employment #employee #work #america #divine #John waters #Abraham lincoln #lincoln #president lincoln

3 notes · View notes

marksinn · 3 years

Text

Contemporary Typographic Design

The past year of design study has shown me that everything from the past has its place in influencing the present and the future. Multiple names have shone through in previous research pieces, all of them important and influential in their own fields. With specific regard to typography I’ll re-reference Jonathan Hoefler (Abstract, 2019) who spoke about the creation of a typeface being seen as “designing oxygen”: it’s something that is just everywhere, and to the untrained eye is a fact of life.

Like air, text at its base structure, is functional and common. But in the hands of typographers and designers it is a medium to expressive diversity and, over time, show the progression of how we can get information across through not only the words, but through their appearance as well.

Wim Crouwel – structure

“A message that should be explained on paper to other people should be as straightforward as possible without coming in between my personal ideas and thinking. I am the one who is structuring the message and not mixing it with my personal feelings.” - Crouwel, 2015

A Dutch-born designer who worked through the middle of the 20th Century to bring identity to multiple public venues – from museums, to post offices to airports. Known for his creation of New Alphabet, a self-proclaimed experimental yet unusable font (online), it allowed him to start the consideration of design changing to meet the developing technology of the 1960s. Crouwel has works in various collections and museums for his artistic spin on what had been such a functional part of art until this time period. A follower of Josef Müller Brockmann, Max Bill, Karlt Gerstner he worked with a grid system to perfect his typefaces. Through the 1950s he met and worked with many of these influencers, translating their styles into his own interpretation. When struggling to find the typefaces his Swiss colleagues were using, he would cut it out of magazines imported from Germany and Switzerland, and when Univers came on the scene in 1958 it represented a new way of thinking to Crouwel (2015). It was during this period, from 1958-1963 that he found himself experimenting with typography: using sans-serif fonts, more straightforward designs, considering the aesthetics and combating this against the function of the text. The function was always the driving force, but he worked to find out how much of his own opinion or style should come across in his work.

GAIL ANDERSON – diversity

“It’s time to embrace what are no longer just grey roots.” - Anderson, 2018

Known for her work at Rolling Stone, with the US Postal Service and for the multiple books she has co-authored, Gail Anderson is a pre-eminent black designer who, despite winning multiple awards in the genre, sees herself as a “master type obsessive more than a master typographer” (2018). In looking through many of her works, a theme I’m noticing is her tendency to mix typefaces. Her partner in design, Stephen Heller, goes into great detail describing her eclectic styles utilising “old and new forms” to create something “which is neither modernist nor post-modernist” (2008), to me allowing her work to seem utterly timeless. Posters for modern Broadways shows that wouldn’t look out place in a wild West saloon, Rolling Stone covers that look as enticing today as they did when they were created 25 years ago. Another thing that strikes me in almost every interview I read from her, is her desire to pay it forward. This is a phrase that’s overused as a term for people pushing others to be better than themselves, but Anderson seems to mention is as a justification for what she does naturally. As a female African-American designer she has won awards and immediately used the platform to push the mentality that “It’s all about talent and your ability to communicate effectively” (Rawsthorn, 2011), something she credits the creative industries as understanding already.

HAMISH MUIR – progression

“It is a fact that typography is rarely noticed and of little interest to most people, including some graphic designers: perhaps the raw material, the type forms, are too familiar.” - Muir et al, 1986b

In reading the typography journals Octavo curated by Muir between 1986 and 1992, the progression element of his work was clear. Solid, clear columns delivered information in the early editions, by 1990 the text was being rotated and played with, and by the final edition in 1992 huge letters were being utilised to make huge statements. A quick wander down the ‘Selected Work’ on 8vo’s website shows how his style developed with the time, showing work from the late 90s and early 2000s that now feels stereotypically late 1990s and early 2000s. Rounded, computerised letters represent the blossoming digital age that the world was coming into, bringing life to the concept that “typography is the point where content and form meet” (Muir et al, 1986a). His work seems to push forward at all points, he talks of having a set structure and intentionally seeing how far it can be pushed before you see some potential in what it is at its limit (2017). His posters and type-uses seem to have a very futuristic edge, many of the fonts created by MuirMcNeil in the past eleven years are clearly based in grid-systems influenced by Wim Crouwel and Karl Gerstner (2017), but have a very futuristic edge. Using geometric shapes or glyphs to represent the “too familiar” letter shapes Muir and McNeil show their willingness to push type into the 21st Century, not seeing themselves as “type designers so much as designers making type” (2014). This partnership is another massive part of Muir’s success, he feels that working along as a hindrance to the creative process – with collaboration comes challenge, freedom and a force that helps you to adapt.

966 words. I’m as surprised as you are.

REFERENCE

Hoefler, J. Netflix.com. (2017). Abstract: The Art of Design. [online] Available at: https://www.netflix.com/title/80057883

www.designculture.it. (n.d.). Designculture • Wim Crouwel. [online] Available at: http://www.designculture.it/interview/wim-crouwel.html.

‌ www.youtube.com. (n.d.). Wim Crouwel interview: Wim Crouwel – A Graphic Design Odyssey exhibition | Design | Dezeen. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYGRAAgYhpM [Accessed 9 Apr. 2021].

‌Talking About Swiss Style: Wim Crouwel. (2015). YouTube. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQCZuN1khPk.

PrintMag (2018). Gail Anderson Receives National Design Award for Lifetime Achievement. [online] PRINT. Available at: https://www.printmag.com/post/gail-anderson-national-design-award-lifetime-achievement [Accessed 11 Apr. 2021].

gailycurl.com. (n.d.). About / Contact - Gail Anderson. [online] Available at: https://gailycurl.com/About-Contact [Accessed 11 Apr. 2021].

‌Heller, Stephen (2008) AIGA | the professional association for design. (n.d.). 2008 AIGA Medalist: Gail Anderson. [online] Available at: https://www.aiga.org/medalist-gailanderson/.

‌Rawsthorn, A. (2011). Design Gets More Diverse. The New York Times. [online] 20 Mar. Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/21/arts/21iht-DESIGN21.html?pagewanted=all [Accessed 11 Apr. 2021].

Muir, H., Johnstone, S., Holt, M. and Burke, M. (1986a). Hamish Muir | Octavo 86.1. [online] Available at: http://hamishmuir.com/8vo/work/octavo-86-1 [Accessed 12 Apr. 2021].

Muir, H., Johnstone, S., Holt, M. and Burke, M. (1986b). Hamish Muir | Octavo 86.2. [online] Available at: http://hamishmuir.com/8vo/work/octavo-86-2 [Accessed 12 Apr. 2021].

‌ Muir, H (2014) interviewed by Andy Butler at Architecture & Design magazine. (2014). interview with hamish muir and paul mcneil (muirmcneil). [online] Available at: https://www.designboom.com/design/interview-with-designers-hamish-muir-and-paul-mcneil-muirmcneil-12-17-2014/.

Muir, H (2017). Interview: Hamish Muir, Graphic Designer | Big Conference. [online] Available at: http://bigconference.co.uk/2017/04/hamish-muir-graphic-designer/ [Accessed 12 Apr. 2021].

‌muirmcneil.com. (n.d.). Two Type System «MuirMcNeil. [online] Available at: https://muirmcneil.com/project/two-type-system/ [Accessed 12 Apr. 2021].

#gms_hncgd1 #wim crouwel #gailanderson #hamishmuir #typography

3 notes · View notes