#creativity explored

[studioahead]

Artist Spotlight: Elana Cooper - Creativity Explored

In 1983 Florence and Elias Katz founded Creativity Explored, a studio that helps artists with developmental disabilities discover and foster their talents. Four decades later, the organization is still putting out exciting exhibitions and making space for people who have historically been left out of the picture.

When we visited the studio earlier this year, we were arrested by the flower paintings of Elana Cooper. With the help of Creativity Explored’s staff, she answered some of our questions and shared with us her imaginative world.

Studio AHEAD: How did you get started with Creativity Explored? Have you always been an artist?

Elana Cooper: I forget what year I started—Eric knows. When I came here I liked it a lot. I learned how to draw animals, then I learned how to draw flowers, and I kept doing flowers. I went to a different art school before Creativity Explored but only for one day— I didn’t like it.

Studio AHEAD: What does a typical day look like for you when you’re making art?

Elana: I’m really fast in the morning. [laughs] I get tired in the afternoon because of my medication. I have epilepsy and I get tired from it.

Studio AHEAD: Tell us a little bit about your flower paintings.

Elana: I work from a picture, and then I draw it, then I paint it after. Sometimes I do big, big ones, and I do medium size all the time. Like now, with Tom, I’m learning to do a door, with flowers, a patio, a background of trees. Yeah, I’m doing art now with Tom. It’s different with each teacher, I see it a different way now with Tom, he’s helping me learn it.

Studio AHEAD: One thing I find striking about some of these flower paintings is your use of the color black, because flowers aren’t naturally black. Why did you choose this color?

Elana: Paul started it. In the gallery, I got into it, and everybody liked it, then we called it “Flower Power.” I do more black, and I’m trying to get more color into it now too. Now with Tom, I’m doing stuff differently. I’m learning on it.

Studio AHEAD: What’s your favorite flower to paint?

Elana: Any flower.

Studio AHEAD: Do you consider yourself an artist now?

Elana: Yeah, I got a lot of money now. I’m going to London, and LA for Disneyland.

Studio AHEAD: Do you paint at home or just here at Creativity Explored?

Elana: Here. I don’t do it at home. I like doing word searches.

Studio AHEAD: Are you interested in working with other materials besides paint?

Elana: No [laughs]

Kelsey: So you’re a painter through and through.

Elana: Yeah!

Photos: Ekaterina Izmestieva

[ur-daily-inspiration]

Cute cakes appreciation post

[opticandmasturbation]

About her artistic process, Yolanda Ramirez remarks, “You make something that you make. I paint food because it’s good… I like to draw the belts, scarves, potholders, purse, and wallets because I knitted them.” About her experiences as an artist, and what keeps her engaged and prolific, Ramirez states: “When I make art it makes me feel good because it’s just right… I want my art to make people feel stronger and better.”

—Creativity Explored

[artchangeslves--shadowmason]

Dyslexia is not a disability – it’s a gift.

Dyslexia is not a disability – it’s a gift.

From the suite images by Bill Hendricks, “Words That I Cannot Spell.” Dyslexia is not a disability – it’s a gift. It means that I, and many other dyslexic thinkers can portray the world through images because we think in images. I can build worlds, freeze the frame, walk around and touch. I can read people’s faces, drawings, buildings, landscapes and all things in the visual world more quickly…

[processes]

doris yen

[bixels]

Posting a sneak-peak of this now because I'm about to be In The Shit school workload-wise, so this'll take me a while to finish.

Doing some character design exploration/expression sheets for Celestia and Luna. Figuring out Celestia's weird ass anatomy while I'm at it.

[saturnvs]

under the starry skies, where eagles have flown

[thetriangletattoo]

[cantcatchmeee]

Art by @kightek

[elithemiar-blog]

Danny gets invited into a robotics/mechanics club after he mumbled out the basic idea of his parent's latest invention just by looking at it, the name did help.

He doesn't have much of a choice to recognize what an invention can do based off of its look for his safety.

So mechanics and engineering he just starts picking up from his parents through association.

At some point, he has to modify one because it hurts both humans and ghosts.

His parents are so caught up on the fact that it hurts ghosts as intended that they completely miss that it hurts humans too, severely.

Danny, and Tucker when needed, start modifying the weapons for people's safety. Which Danny gets really good at and starts taking his parent's blueprints and building safer, and mostly better, inventions.

So, when this new classmate overhears the trio discussing on how to fix it. They think Danny would be a great addition to the club, and when they bring it up at their next meeting, everyone else either doesn't believe them or is joking.

Due to gossip and high school hierarchy (by Casper standards), Danny is a freak, loser, and stupid.

This classmate brings Danny's intelligence to himself and tries to urge this kid to come to the club one day after school.

Danny downgrades his own intelligence on engineering that the classmate is befuddled, until being at Casper for longer they understand on why this is.

A school event has this classmate trying to strike high praise on Danny, but even his parents kind of bat him aside to talk about ghosts.

People start gossiping that this classmate has a crush on Danny.

Eventually, they do get Danny to a club and the rest of the members kind of call him out on his crush, in front of Danny. However, he does prove himself and the club agrees to invite him to some kind of multi-school engineering showcase, and they do need one other person to make a full team.

He really doesn’t want to go. Somehow his parents are pushing him to go. At some point, somehow, he's being required to go.

Maybe Tucker and Sam urge him to go, who already noticed Danny's talent. He still doesn't want to leave Amity, but with his friends pushing him to have fun he's more willing to think about it.

Maybe the trip becomes a 50/50 extra credit opportunity on his math and science grades, which he needs.

Marvel: Tony, Peter, and/or Banner are at this event to find future employees or award scholarships.

DC: Bruce and/or Tim are at this event (maybe another as well), to also find future employees or award scholarships.

Maybe there's some kind of lead revealed during this event that helps a case.

They find Danny being isolated by the club except for the classmate and they're curious on why.

The classmate is giving high praises, gifting information that Danny doesn't want revealed, to these people who will actually listen.

This team gets challenged to build something different.

The classmate turns to Danny to help out and he gets invited by the rest, but he doesn't get a say...

Danny sees something wrong and tries to say something, but no one let's him get a word in..

When the build gets judged, it doesn't work. Danny with random parts in hand, fixes it on the spot adding a little touch that makes it work and then some.

He gets high compliments from these very smart people, but he brushes them aside. Not realizing what he did, he'd just really wants to get back to Amity.

While the event is still going on, he gets pulled aside to look over a project or design and he can tell what needs fixed or how to reroute power better (purposeful mistakes meant to challenge him).

Here he is, at an event for school, being given complements and not really noticing.

These people very curious on who this kid is goes searching. Maybe the club kids tell the not-paying-attention-club-advisor that he did nothing.

Maybe the one doing the complimenting calls the school and, petty tattles on the club, gives full praise and offers a scholarship.

Someone can be so focused on either working on what they want to do or what they have to do (in Danny's case), that talent found isn't recognized even if highly complimented by an expert.

The mental image of Tim inviting Danny to the manor to help out with a WE project, and Tim is trying to get him to recognize his own talent. Bonus points if its vigilante associated (like Nightwing's eskrima sticks malfunctioning and sleep deprived Tim can't figure it out). Bonus points if the rest of the family are there over seeing.

Maybe he can't be an astronaut anymore cause he doesn’t fit certain requirements. Maybe he can still work for NASA despite his grades, he fixes a missed problem that would've made the rocket launch unsuccessful, and it was a last-minute change.

[miraichergallery]

._.

Program: Paint Tool SAI Tablet: Wacom Intuos Instagram/Telegram: miraicher_gallery

[writingwithfolklore]

Are you Exploring your Concepts to their Fullest?

                There’s nothing worse than getting hooked into a piece of media by a really cool concept—only to be let down through shallow exploration. The entire story I’m distracted from what’s happening by what could have been had they gone more in depth into what they promised.

                The good news is, avoiding this in your own writing is fairly easy as long as you remember to continuously do one thing: ask questions.

                I talk about this a lot, but making room to explore the implications (especially of worldbuilding and events, not just actions) is only going to deepen your narrative and create a more satisfying, well-rounded world. As well, the decisions you make here are going to set the use of your concept apart from the other stories we’ve seen it in.

                If your concept is a character who has lived on a boat their entire life finally hits the shore, think about what it would mean for someone to have never seen land—how would they feel about trees, valleys, mountains, buildings. They would probably be very familiar with stars and constellations, navigation, the dark, swimming, fishing, and danger surrounding the water. They may prefer cramped spaces, sleeping under a low roof, a gentle rocking or white noise.

                If there’s magic in the world but say only some people have it, how does that impact politics, healthcare, parenting? Do people have biases against magic users or non-magic users? Are there laws set to prevent or limit magic use in certain places, or at all?

                You could ask endless amounts of questions about a concept, and you should. If you introduce something big, exciting, and full of consequences—you must also be willing to commit to it, and explore it to its fullest.

                Good luck! If you feel like sharing, tag a concept you’ve come up with and some interesting implications that go with it!

[strangebiology]

Seraphim Angel Anatomy

What are our thoughts on the anatomy of a seraph angel with 6 wings? How does that work? (Outside of it being magic. Let's have fun with science.)

The biblical description of the six-winged Seraphim angels is super minimal (Isa 6:2, 6, with some interpretation here.) But let's just say for reasons they look like people with 6 wings.

To start: What is a seraph related to? In both biblical and Hazbin Hotel lore, it's implied that (maybe some?) angels can breed with humans, which suggests that they're mammals, and very close to humans. But...I wonder if that has to do with shapeshifting or other magic? Bible nerds chime in. It's also just as interesting/valid to consider bug anatomy, and I encourage bug artists to draw a human-ish body with wings attached in dragonfly or spider style or something.

A number of people have explored the concept of angel anatomy by looking at humans and birds, like DCRoleplays on Deviantart. I also recall this image by Uzlo on Deviantart pointing out that you need pectoral muscles to move your arms/wings, so...if you have two arms and two wings, all of which move independently, you might need four pecs.

Alternatively, here's an extremely cool gif by @squidlife-crisis showing a human ribcage with human arms, the keel of a bird, and what looks like layered pectoral muscles for arms and wings. So, rather than multiple visible chests, an angel with the skin on would appear to just have a bigger chest.

But now add MORE wings. Would we have a huge chest with lots of layers of pecs attached to the keel...and would you need to change the shape of the keel to handle so many attachments?

Or, is someone gonna draw Lucifer or the other seraphim with 8 pecs? Will it be me? For science, obviously.

What are your thoughts?

[tenchikotheartist]

HELP MY BRAIN REALLY LIKES COMING UP WITH HEADCANNONS FOR NSYNC’S TROLL-SONAS

[artchangeslves--shadowmason]

One Sketch; Two Paths

One Sketch; Two Paths

No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man. Heraclitus One Sketch; Two Paths

[fruitsofhell]

I used to be one of those guys when I first joined the Kirby fandom, but everytime I hear a discussion of the series writing that starts with "So the Lore is InSaNe-" and not like, "Kirby has a fun writing style that takes advantage of its cute exterior to tell cool stories that reward player's curiosity and leave lots of room for imagination-" I cringe so goddamn hard.

I kinda just hate that people approach things that encourage investment when they don't expect it as inherently absurd. Like it is fun to joke about how absurd Kirby lore can be, but it really often comes with an air of disrespect or exhaustion rather than like, appreciation that these games are made by people who want to tell interesting stories when they could easily make as much money just making polished enough fluffy kiddy platformers. And when it's not met with exhaustion, it's met with - like I said before - that tone that it's stupid for a series like this TO have devs who care about writing stuff for it. Which is a whole other thing about people not respecting things made to appeal to kiddie aesthetic or tone.

Maybe the state of low-stakes YouTube video essays just blows cause people play up ignorance and disbelief for engagement, but like I STG I hear people use this tone for like actual narrative based games sometimes. Some people don't like... appreciate when a game is made by people who care a shitton in ways that aren't direct gameplay feedback. And they especially don't appreciate it when it comes from something with any sense of tonal dissonance intentional or not.

Anyways, I love games made by insane people. I love games made by teams who feel like they wanna make something work or say something so bad. I love that energy, especially when invested into something that could easily rest on its laurels or which obviously won't be taken seriously. I love this in a lot of classic campy 2000s games, I love this in insanely niche yet passionate fanworks, and I love it in the Kirby series and its writing. Can we please stop talking about it like it's an annoyance or complete joke?