#the other is an artistic masterpiece on the level of the mona lisa

[swan2swan]

Most sobering revelation of today is watching the final half-hour of A Few Good Men and realizing that the movie is....certainly a movie...and then having Office Space come on and understanding just how vast the disparity of quality is between them.

[madebycloud]

A Masterpiece

wednesday addams x reader — 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭

summary: you led wednesday through the cavernous halls of the art museum. but for wednesday, there was only one work of art that truly mattered: you. warnings/themes: fluff, art museum date words: 0.8k (it's too short, im sorry) note: this fic is based on a song i listen to while I'm in class, so i hope you enjoy it! (ignore the grammar errors.)

Wednesday should've said no.

Her writing time was too precious to be spent in an art museum. She had plans to brainstorm more ideas for the stories and poems she wanted to publish in the near future. Wednesday had always been a writer at heart, and she felt like her creativity flowed best when she was alone and surrounded by her own thoughts.

But with your bright smiles and enthusiastic jumps, it was hard to say no. She knew that your love for art was endless.

For you, art is more than just a hobby or a passion, it's a way of life. You adore the colors, the details, and the meaning behind every brushstroke.

The prospect of seeing your face light up with excitement was all the motivation she needed to accept the invitation.

You walked through the museum, admiring the art, discussing history and technique, and letting your enthusiasm shine through.

Wednesday followed you, with soft music playing in the background. She could hear the footsteps of other visitors, the rustle of clothes, and the quiet whisper of conversations.

You stop to admire a famous painting, the Mona Lisa, and your eyes light up as you take in the beauty of Leonardo da Vinci's work.

"It's beautiful, isn't it?" You pointed out the intricate details, the colors, and the perfection of every stroke. "I'm not sure which word is best, but it's certainly a masterpiece."

She couldn't help but turn to look at you as you stood before a painting, smiling as you admired it.

A masterpiece? Wednesday couldn't understand how you could refer to a painting with nothing but paint on it, just splashes all over, as a masterpiece.

Your hair, your eyes, your nose, your lips— Wednesday was mesmerized by your beauty, feeling as though she were looking at a work of art come to life.

That was the moment she realized that you were the true masterpiece, and no painting, sculpture, or drawing could ever compare to the beauty of you.

You looked at the painting and felt like a true artist. You knew you couldn't recreate the beauty before you, but your hands yearned to try. Your mind was abuzz with ideas, and you wanted to share your thoughts with Wednesday.

She was the masterpiece, your muse, the inspiration for everything you desired to create in this moment.

The way her brown eyes shone like the stars in the sky, her freckles dotting her skin like a constellation— she was the definition of perfection. You wanted to capture her on canvas, to preserve her perfection forever. But for now, you would enjoy her presence and let your imagination run wild.

You looked back at the painting. Feeling the blood rush in your ears.

"But you know, some people don't really appreciate art," you continued, referring to the people in front of you who were taking pictures. "They take pictures just to add to their social media, done. They don't try to understand the essence of the artwork, all the emotions and hard work put into it."

Wednesday nodded in agreement, understanding that some people just don't try to understand the emotions and hard work that artists put into their art. It takes years of practice to perfect their craft, and some people just look at the surface level of it.

You checked your watch and noticed it was time to go back. You asked, "So, which styles of art did you enjoy the most? Did you prefer classical, medieval, romanticism, basque, or could you relate to Leonardo da Vinci's art, maybe even Vincent van Gogh or Claude Monet's works? Tell me, my love." You asked, tilting your head as you walked, trying to make conversation and get a feel for her perspective on the artwork.

Wednesday paused for a moment, considering your question, before her eyes met yours. She finally spoke, her voice low and serious. "Your question is so banal and pointless," she said, rolling her eyes.

She continued, her eyes still locked with yours "Art is a subjective experience, influenced by myriad factors such as one's personal taste, cultural background, and emotional state. But if I had to choose, I would say that, to me, the most beautiful art is the art of life itself. And looking at you, my dear, I can't help but see the most exquisite and breathtaking work of art that I have ever had the privilege of laying my eyes upon."

You can't help but smile as you look down at her. Her slender frame, her pale complexion, her dark hair… everything about her seems to radiate a sense of beauty and mystery.

And as she leans in to loop her arm around yours, you realize that this is not just a moment, but a memory that you will cherish forever.

How did you manage to find someone as wonderful as her? You ask yourself as you look up at the sky.

Knowing that you want to share all of life's beauty and wonder with her makes you want to spend the rest of your days with her.

[starwars-art-events]

Art Event 4: Different Genres

Hello there!

This is an informal, for-fun art event, meant for any person who enjoys making art. This time, it's a two-parter: both a trade, and just a casual event for those who just wish to create art for themselves. It's a pressure-free event! No need to create a big masterpiece--just something you or others would happily enjoy.

The theme this time around is "Different Genres." You can choose any character(s) from any media(s) and put them into a different universe entirely. Make a clone a mermaid! Toss Thrawn into a K-drama! Hondo Ohnaka could sail the seas in the Golden Era of Piracy! Anakin Skywalker could be a Warrior cat! Whatever genre you can dream up, they could be in.

Types of art welcome:

Drawings (digital or scanned traditional)

Short comics

Short animation

Photo edits

Video edits (music or otherwise)

Music creation

Moodboards/photo collages

Quotes-and-photo collages

Other (contact moderator ASAP)

Dates to adhere to:

Deadline to join the trade: February 10th (There is no sign-up or deadline for free-posting individuals)

Dates to post: March 30th-31st

Rules:

For the trade: Joining requires creating art. To recieve art, you must create art! Simple as that. Many types of art are allowed (see above), and all can be adapted to how you wish to conceive yours.

You don't have to be "great" at any art to join! This is an informal event with no level restrictions. The important thing is that your art absolutely must have effort. For example, a moodboard should be cohesive, and it should contain enough photos that it could be worthy of giving as a gift. Make sure you are satisfied with what you are giving out (to your abilities levels, of course--don't expect the Star Wars Mona Lisa if you aren't to par with DaVinci's skills!).

This is an anonymous event. You will know who they are creating art for, but you will not know who you are recieving from! Until posting dates, please keep your art to yourself (or a trusted non-participating friend). In the words of Gandalf the Grey: Keep it secret; keep it safe.

Art should be created for your giftee based on things/characters/ideas they enjoy. Do a bit of "pseudo-stalking" (not real stalking) of their tags. See what the person enjoys, both in terms of mediums and concepts. If they have clone trooper OC's, base something off those guys! If they are a big Ezra Bridger fan, see what types of AUs they enjoy! If the concept of the Force makes them go wild, include that in your art! If you are at a loss for ideas, send an anon message to the person to see what they are interested in OR contact the moderator.

Please sign up only ONCE. You will recieve art from only ONE artist. The artist may wish to give you more than one piece of art, but it will only be from THAT artist alone. If you wish to make more art for someone else, arrange that on your own time, please!

If you need to drop out, that is okay! Things happen. You are able to drop out at any time. Please contact the moderator ASAP if you need to drop. Please understand that the other artists are putting their own time and effort into their pieces. The artist gifting their time and effort to you is no longer obligated to do so anymore. If you drop out, they are completely allowed to drop, too.

Important note: All skin tones and disabilities must be accurately portrayed. No skin tone should be lighter than the actor/character's actual skin colour. Disabilities must be depicted correctly. If not, you will be dropped. The same goes for respecting canon cultures. Please refrain from depicting Children of the Watch or Tuskens without their garments, unless the scenario is explicitly of situations where the removal of clothing/armour/helms is acceptable. Please cover the heads of Twi'lek women, and that of Mirialans. These requests are not only personal wishes of the moderators, but also just basic decency. Do your research portraying someone different than you. Do not fall prey to harmful tropes. This hurts others..

IF YOU HAVE ANY FURTHER QUESTIONS, PLEASE DM THE MODERATOR. You may do so here, or at @engagemythrusters or @darlin-djarin.

Sign Up Form for Trade Here

Thanks, all!

[uniformbravo]

since i've spent the past few days essentially staring at nothing but natsuyuu volume covers i thought it'd be so fun and silly to try and redraw them all from memory tee hee. all 30 (thirty) (三十) of them!!! wheee!!!!

i haven't actually looked at them next to the originals yet so guess what time it is!!!! LET'S COMPARE

starting with volume 1. iconic. show stopping. masterpiece. the mona lisa of natsuyuu SURELY i reproduced every single detail perfectly such that it kickstarts my career as a forgery artist RIGHT

well feast ur eyes

(im using the english volumes for comparison btw they have a good clear view of the art)

CAN U TELL WHICH IS WHICH OOO THEYRE SO ALIKE BET U CANT!!! SPOT THE DIFFERENCE LEVEL 1000 WHICH ONE DO U SHOOT

all i remembered for this one was GREEN and it's not even the right shade of green ajgosugdjfkdgj i even made the fuckin. what do u call it. i'll just say yukata??? I MADE IT GREEN AND ITS SUPPOSED TO BE RED i stg if u held a gun to my head & asked if there was any red on vol 1 i'd be DEAD

but i remembered the book of friends is like. weirdly purple? ok well in this pic it looks p gray BUT ON OTHER COPIES...... IF U UP THE SATURATION GKSJKDNFKDG

why is nyanko sensei smack dab in the middle HUH i couldve sworn he was bottom left this is so fucked up and scary. haunted manga volume??????? i bought it from a grarage sale idk you guys-

at least natsume's pose is like kind of right but also that's most definitely a complete accident i can ASSURE u (im rereading this the next day and the pose isnt even CLOSE what are u TALKING ABOUT)

anyway can i just fucking point out the kanji on the book of friends bc that is from MEMORY YEEHAW here's what it's Supposed to look like: 友人帳

LIKE even tho i got the last one wrong ITS LIKE STILL PRETTY CLOSE??? i think i deserve 100 points for this objectively

MOVING ON THO....

OK NOT AS BAD AS I THOUGHT SURPRISINGLY im actually like. i thought i bombed this one completely but liKE THE COMPOSITION??? KIND OF ON POINT. KIND OF GENIUS TBH

i remembered Blue and Madara and like what else do u need rly. butterflies are optional in all scenarios imo

also i NEVER have any idea what natsume's wearing in any of these so i always just like default throw him into his school uniform LMAO u will see a pattern

why is the book of friends burgundy in this one btw. it was GRAY i mean purple definitely purple aha

ok volume 3 im actually scared for i know i fucked up SOMETHING

HGLKFKGLKFKGFN OK!!!!! OK NOT SUPER AWFUL!!!! just noticed i forgor to color the book of friends fukg

main thing i remembered abt this one was the color of natsume's... attire.... and which characters were present. whats sensei doing all the way up in the top corner tho 0/10

return of the school uniform lmaooooo hm. irrelevant who cares plus didnt ask. all things considered this wasn't as bad as i thought. THE NEXT ONE HOWEVER,

hsngjfgnfjn okayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

sensei's way cuter in this one than i realized wait wtf this cover's cute af how did i never notice. underrated cover -10 @ me. look at his lil BLEP >:O!!!!!!!

i knew there was some fuckshit going on w the yukata in this one ourhg i was just like hehe greeennnn also sensei's there. my work here is done

what is natsume's pose even hgnkg i was straight up making shit up at this point LIKE the first 6 or so covers are SO hard for me to distinguish in my head i should get a free pass for the poses in all of them like i can do whatever i want IM the artist now

oh god whats next vol 5

OK!!!! like a straight 5/10 TBH i literally forgot i was planning on rating these LMAO

i remembered the like white v-neck shirt thing and his pose kind of??? i had NO idea what to do for the yukata tho i just made it orange and u know what?? close enough. my rule of thumb is just like pick a color and then throw flowers all over it u cant go wrong

taki looks so much more mysterious on the original and also wearing a skirt. i gave her a big stick bc i thought i remembered her having one in general but i think i made that up tbh wouldn't put it past me. got her hat right tho hee haw

cant believe i didn't get natsume's beautiful artwork tho look at that little shit sensei up there god hes so ROUMD literally moma material

PROBABLY my best one yet uhhhh but i maybe cheated JUST a little for this one ITS LIKE BARELY CHEATING STOP BOOING ME

as i was toying w the idea of doing this redraw thing i was still working on collecting my Images and Pictures so i kinda started taking note of a few small things here & there and one of them was just. the general gist of this cover SO LIKE that's why it's so good LOL

forgor the flowers tho. i literally forget everything that isn't a character like immediately BUT OK CUT ME SOME SLACK like after a point the covers start being whole ass scenes which are SO much easier to remember shit abt than the fuckin Green Void (p sure this is the last green void cover tho)

8/10 composition is gr8 but details like the shirt & the yellow flowers are wrong, also the stick is backwards. i literally looked up what that thing is called and forgot already tee hee

OK WE'RE NOT DONE W THE GREEN VOID I REPEAT-

fuck dude. fuck. i rly thought vol 6 was the last one LOL not to spoil but as i was grabbing these images i saw a Preview of what's to come and the green void lasts until fuckign volume TEN LOL collapses onto the ground and dies

so erhermrm this is vol 7 lolllll i remembered the bg flowers this time can u believe hahaha distracts u from the fact that LITERALLY everything else is wrong auhghg

u know what the green void turned into bushes and i think that's beautiful.... like points for creativity on my part tbh. like to be completely honest. 3/10 i got the characters right

YO????? GATE CONFIRMED LET'S GO?????? it's definitely the school gate but i choose to believe natsume & tanuma r in jail for crimes and u should too

actually this is shockingly accurate for how much i goddamn struggled w this one gkjsldkg the CHARACTERS are right the OUTFITS are right SENSEI'S THERE urgh i knew one of these covers had tanuma holding sensei like that but i couldn't remember Which

i can't believe i actually got tanuma's pose that close i rly thought i was bullshitting w that one wtf. +5 points instantly

do u like how i just scribbled sensei wherever lmaoooo i drew natsume & tanuma & went like. i think sensei's in this one. PLOP

6/10 honestly closer than i thought

OK........ I SEE........ literally dies

this one i was getting MASSIVELY confused w vol 4 bc i could remember nothing distinct abt either of them except Green and natsume w Big Doggie

i remembered the BARE essentials of the composition but not much else... since i thought the green void was gone i put the green i remembered into natsume's yukata (and then put him in the school uniform again LOL) and went WELP. GUESS I'LL DIE NOW

2/10 honestly one of the worst fucking ones lskdjflsdkg

OK THIS ONE.... i almost died irl trying to remember this shit, even before i started and i was still viewing the covers i was like there is no way in HELL im remembering this shit for vol 10. and i was right

like. Purple. White Mask. Antlers. WILD layered clothing. at first i drew the mask as an actual deer skull but later had a straight up epiphany and redrew it like that which... still not correct but I MEAN.... IT'S PRETTY GOOD

i cant believe most of the purple is the bg oughgh his clothes are WHITE..... this is fucked up. i DID remember the stick tho, bells and everything!! actually bells and nothing else!!!

7/10 ok it might seem high but CONSIDERING this design..... i think i did shockingly well TBH

NOT...... the worst...... one....... i could've sworn he was sitting on a pile of books this is so sad that woulda been so cute 😭

for a second when i saw the real cover again i thought he was sitting ON the bookshelf and i was about to RIOT but its okay it's a step stool. still physically possible

my version of natsume here is so much more like Proper gksld he looks like a school boy... studying in the academy's library... hardworking student.... but no the real one is just sitting there like a wet puppy orz he's not even READING i rly thought he was reading. this is such a huge L

cannot fucking believe i was right abt the window tho. like wrong shape but the fact that it's even there.... giving myself a whole ass point for that one

5/10 i rly thought i nailed this one gksgndfkj

also RIP TO THE GREEN VOID U WILL NOT BE MISSED o7

ah shit ok. well one of them was in the school uniform at least fjgugjdkf

why is my natsume lying there like hes abt to start a therapy session, boy would NEVER-

also the plushie hmnmhnmhngnf i dont KNOW i knew there was some kind of prop there but like gun to my head i woulda died again. main colors that stood out to me for this were green and that bluish purple so i got those into mine but i mean. well u can see

once again a random window in the bg i got correct let's gooooo 5/10

LMAO SPITS OUT MY DRINK WHOOPSIE!!!!!!

this is so fucking bad im choking im gurgling LOLLLL i was SO sure natsume's paper had an eye on it i was POSITIVE this is so fucked up. i mean obvs i picked that up from sensei but like i didn't even KNOW sensei was there. or that there were bg characters at all uuuuuououohghh (matoba ignored +5)

i was like. black yukata red flowers CHECK piece of paper w eye CHECK horns CHECK i even went back and edited the horns to be more accurate i was so proud of myself sobs

ok but i knew it was shit trasjh when those were the ONLY details i could remember bc obviously there was gonna be more going on I JUST DIDN'T REALIZE HOW MUCH MORE.....

straight up dookie/10 no jk fr like 3/10 @ me u need to use ur EYES

OK..... I WAS VERY CONFIDENT ABT THIS ONE..... except for his outfit i knew i was bullshitting that BUT I THOUGHT I NAILED THIS ONE....... the one fucking time i didn't just default to his uniform LMFAO

even remembered the pink flower ball smh and for WHAT. i knew he was sitting in a pile of plushies & blankets or smth but no way in HELL was i even gonna attempt to draw them with a speck of detail. but HEY the plushie i drew for vol 12!!! i knew he existed Somewhere. he doesn't even have a horn tho thats so fucked up i thought he did

obviously the most striking thing abt this cover is the bg w that deep burgundy & the circular window so that was the main thing i nailed down right away (my palette was more muted tho). also natsume sitting there w paper in his mouth but i thought he was mid return when rly hes playing like keep-the-balloon-off-the-floor or whatever the fuck he's doing. i love u natsume

(if i thought he was in the middle of returning a name WHY didn't i include the actual book of friends flksglkd automatic fake fan/10)

8/10 this was like my ace in the hole i was like if i got nothing else i got U volume 14!!! and then

NOT THE FAMILY PHOTO......... FUCKING DIES

man idk shit just end me. whats even going on in this cover im gonna deck u natori. dont ask why this makes me want to commit violence hes just so. URHGHGHnH

i dont know whats happening to me rn looking at this im losing my fucking grip dude who let this happen im gonna hurl this volume into the sun??? i think???

why did i add the other two youkai i just thought they should be included but i played myself i had to draw them from memory and for WHAT. pls tell me i got them at least a little bit right i stg

it's the crossed legts dude if he was just sitting there like a board the way i drew him id be like ah shit it was just natori sitting not natsume too but he just HAS to cross his legs and the fucing elbow propped up holding the glasses im S MAD IM SO MADdestroy him

it's 1am i gotta go. i have to go. right now my mom is calling me i have to fukcng. 4/10 i got the couch colorr right. bye

---

tumglr...... only allows 30 pictures per post..... bc im not on desktop? or is that a site-wide thing now. in any case this is getting long so i think im gonna split it right down the middle into 2 posts so there u go, first 15 volumes. so far my score is ermmm

well i didn't rate the first few volumes.

vol 1: 6/10 decent

vol 2: 6/10 also decent

vol 3: 5/10 composition is Scramboled

vol 4: 2/10 it's SO BAD

so now my overall score is 74/150 fjggudjofjdkgjk doing gr8!!!!!!!!!

ok bye for real ✌️

[eternalfarnham]

vague complaining about p5 that takes the shape of rewriting some in-setting metaphysics:

an individual's mind isn't powerful enough to rewrite cognition on its own no matter how strange their perceptions or desires. however, certain people have enough temporal power (social, economic etc.) that they can shape the mindshare of larger groups, influencing the way people think en masse; the collective will of many minds indoctrinated, abused or persuaded into sharing a single view, that of a single powerful figure, creates a Palace. each Palace is built around a particular worldview on the part of its ruler, something they're trying to "teach" others or that lies implicit in their actions. treasures are proof of their right-to-rule or instruments by which they demonstrate their power over the consensus; taking one means stealing the hearts of the people!

becoming a phantom thief is about reclaiming the right to decide what you believe, how you see the world, often from a palace ruler. a phantom thief's costume is a kind of miniaturized personal Palace of one: Palace rulers can't use their authority to rewrite your body and mind, because you rule yourself, and don't let your decisions get overruled by the consensus.

further blow-by-blow beneath the cut:

Kamoshida thinks that becoming an adult is about figuring out what you can get away with. In this there's a certain amount of arrested development. let's say he was a teen athletic star who peaked early on, desperately trying to relive his glory days by sticking around in high school and relitigating high school power games from a position of power and prestige as a teacher. he abuses students because he figures, if no one's stopping him, then it can't really be wrong, because on some level he still conceives of himself as a student whose teachers like him and bend rules for him; this must be what he deserves. ryuji could've lived respectably, too, but he childishly acted beyond his means, and ruined his future. (ryuji and ann rejecting this — rejecting the idea that they have to quietly live with what they're permitted to have, and be grateful for that much — is how they awaken their personas.) treasure probably still an olympic medal, proof that he has enough value to not be punished.

madarame's thing is adjusted to point at the art-over-all mindset Yusuke wound up with: ms. kitagawa was a no-name artist who managed to produce a masterpiece, but the Sayuri would languish in obscurity if it were hitched to her star. madarame had to take it for himself, and use his fame to give it the recognition it deserves! bring in something about "which would you save if the Louvre burned: an ordinary person, or the Mona Lisa?" with the clear implication (and twist in logic) that madarame has to curtail the futures of children who might dedicate themselves to other paths or stray or live on their own, because otherwise they might stop making art. better death than that! treasure is the sayuri, still, whose worth is what really made his name and in whose name he continues to torment children into becoming art factories.

fuck kaneshiro, absolutely the most boring palace owner, let's replace him with Jounodaira Tsukasa, "peace-castle instructor," a police sergeant or captain known for his love of teaching rookie officers, thoroughly in bed with the yakuza, to whom the precinct is a bank from which he can confiscate all the money he could ever need. plays directly into makoto's issues — he's already got his hooks in her because his ideology is that it's fine, they're criminals — human rights are for humans. it's how he teaches all his newbies; he would've tried to bring makoto in line with that thinking. it's fine to enrich yourself at the hands of criminals — and the yaks, why, they police themselves, and all they want is a little freedom to operate! isn't peace the point? didn't you stoop to blackmail to locate the Phantom Thieves, because you needed opportunities to live a decent life — such a respectable thing, and it's only lowly thieves who'll suffer! if you're conducting justice, why not enrich yourself — is that such a terrible thing? probably a badge for his treasure, or a gold-plated gun: symbol of his authority to project force.

also futaba gets to be a bastard like everyone else: having seen her family fold like a house of cards and the investigation conclude at "suicide" despite her mother's obviously aberrant behavior, complete with cops who berated her into claiming responsibility for her mom killing herself, futaba has concluded in her despair and frustration that justice is meaningless. it's all a game, a distraction, having fun with exercising power over others because real change is impossible — and if nothing can ever really change, well, she who dies with the most toys wins. hence the tomb: pharaohs were buried with their treasures, after all. futaba turned her hacker collective loose to fuck with people because she doesn't care any more, because every real change she tried to make as a hacktivist was undone by Anonymous going "lol" and amusing themselves. that's Medjed's ideology, the one she spreads. she's just idly looking for distractions from her neurosis, frustration and despair, and she'll die still distracting herself. (until she decides, no, even if it kills me i won't stop thinking — no, i can only die if i stop thinking — and pulls her own ideology, the foundational brick, out of her palace. she gives up power over Medjed and everything collapses.) her treasure is a top-of-the-line computer, one of those aforementioned toys, and a perfect distraction; she gives it up as unnecessary to the Thieves after her Palace is cleared. note the voluntary surrender of power to decide how others think! This Will Be On The Test!

Okumura's Palace is kind of thematically incoherent despite being cool, and also needs to be handwaved really hard with "futaba did research and figured out his keywords," so instead let's say that he's got a Lupin classic: the Okumura Foods corporate headquarters are a cult survivalist bunker in Kunikazu's head, sci-fi-inflected because that's still cool but still fundamentally about surviving what he thinks of as a coming economic apocalypse. you should be grateful for your spot (your job), even if maintaining the bunker means risking your life and you're constantly fighting and squabbling not to be booted out — out there, in the blasted, recessed jobless wasteland beyond the compound's walls, death is certain! only our supreme overseer Okumura can save us! for the sake of survival and safety, any price is justified! (this is how Okumura squares the circle on loving Haru and selling her off to her fiance: she should be grateful to be hitched to a safe bet, stored in a special well-appointed safety chamber even if it's agonizing to appease Sugimura, instead of risking it all for freedom in the world outside. and she reverses it on him: for the sake of her survival, her happiness, she can justify sacrificing him, too. if his betrayal of her is worthwhile, then so is hers of him. does he want to live in a world like that? or does he want to consider the possibility of another way?) His treasure... is probably some physical key to the okumura foods building, or a way of locking it down, or even a scale model of the building with plans to turn it into a sci-fi wonderland of safety come the end of times.

and of course Shido's thesis statement is obvious, and even vaguely pointed to in his Palace in canon: sacrifices don't matter. He can build a better society — he can save Japan from decay, economic degeneration, crime, whatever moral crisis he perceives, but only if he spends people, steps on their backs, rides his ship through a sea of frothing, half-liquidated bodies in pursuit of the Promised Land. include some elements of Arthuriana in his self-image here: Arthur chasing Avalon and, yes, the Grail. and the conceptual similarity here between his Palace's thesis and Okumura's, and to a lesser extent Madarame's and Jounodaira's, is because Shido's conspiracy is so powerful that he has a Palace of Palace-rulers: Shido moves the hearts of the powerful (who owe their power to him) and shapes how they think, such that everyone they rule over in their own Palaces ends up thinking like Shido, and winds up contributing another drop to his ocean and a little more power to his engine. Akechi himself has been taken in for some time as part of that Palace's walls, and even if he fights his father he replicates his methods and ideology unthinkingly: the sacrifices don't matter, as long as I can humiliate and kill Shido.

Also, if you're going to have an "await the change of heart" gun on the mantelpiece you had better damn well fire it eventually! So: Shido's change of heart doesn't take, exactly like everyone thought might happen every time. his Palace doesn't dissolve. he reaches Avalon, grounds his ark on the shores of the promised land — or, really, he sinks it and leaves its twisted, wrecked hull on the rocks, complete with a pile of Shadow corpses he literally steps on to get to the shore — and moves to claim the Grail. split up his boss fight: the Beast of Human Sacrifice happens on the Ark, but Senator Armstrong Shido fights you on the Isle of the Blest, instead, the grail a scant few feet away, granting him power. here Shido wears a robe and crown and carries an Excalibur which is thrown to him from a bloody Vivian residing in the sea of human sacrifices, and fancies himself True King, because all that matters is that this dissolute world have a ruler — someone to unite the countless, scattered, sinful hearts within it, instead of becoming satisfied with the lesser power and prestige of a Palace. the thing is that Shido's ark is the Titanic and he knows it — he's not just a grubby power-monger, he's a true idealist, passing himself off as corruptible, garnering information and getting the rich aboard his filthy party boat, so he can sink it with everybody onboard, wipe the slate clean of corruption, and rule over a reformed and united Japan with no crime and no disobedience. He's not going to rest on his laurels — he's planning a mass purge! Hence his retaining Akechi, not just his assassin and agent but his eventual kingslayer and executioner, the so-called Prince to Shido's own King.

the Trophy Room, incidentally, is diegetic rather than abstract and DLC-flavored here. the phantom thieves don't sell their treasures, they keep them — and the reality-distorting power of a Treasure, as wielded and directed by a proper Metaverse-user, expands Meta-Leblanc over time, forming a proper lair with individualized rooms for each Thief. (almost as if it were... a palace...) because as the Thieves decide how Palace rulers should think, changing their hearts, so too do they claim greater authority over how the Japanese public should think — until the Phantom Thieves' Trophy Room becomes Japan's single, unopposed ruling Palace, and its master, Joker, a single qualified candidate for the True King of all Humanity. hence the Grail's interest in him: out of all the possible kings it raised and discarded, of course it would eventually hit on one of humble origins. relying on pedigree, like it did with that Akechi kid, was always going to go wrong, in retrospect. the True King need only claim the Grail and be anointed, and the Thieves will be able to emerge from hiding to rule the world... and of course that's not a tolerable outcome, there are no virtuous kings who can rule unopposed, the Grail is only that desire to be ruled and freed from the agonies of making moral judgments for oneself, no single vision can unite everyone and if you meet the True King on the road, kill him.

and it all plays into the themes of control over public perception as an instrument of control more generally, of how the powerful curtail what possibilities seem available to the marginalized so that reclaiming power must happen on their terms, how power in the absence of accountability becomes monstrous even when wielded by virtuous people (not sure how I'd spin Maruki considering he's just objectively correct — the accountability thing is important but maybe we could stand to resurrect the dead sometimes instead of sticking to the status quo), how the phantom thieves' power is necessarily ambiguous and temporal and cannot become a governing principle, how believing in the phantom thieves isn't enough when what you need to do is believe in your own capacity to decide...

[honestlyboringperson]

Name: Isabella White

Age: 16

Wish: “Let me paint just like those famous artists in the past!”

Magic: Copying other’s abilities

Weapon: Giant Paintbrush

Likes: Charcoal Drawings, Eel

Dislikes: Digital Art

Element: Water

Magia: Midas’ Brushwork

Teammates: Sienna

Skill Level: Newbie

Witch/Doppel: Izabel

A vain and haughty girl who desires to be famous and adored. She loves artwork and spends most of her time in an art room painting her next “masterpiece”. She doesn’t consider digital art as “real” art, causing her to have a nasty reputation online and offline, not that she cares anyway.

BACKSTORY

A vain and stuck up young woman with a sharp tongue. She looked down upon all her other peers and desired greatness. She had a genuine love for art and enjoyed staring at the art pieces in a museum. From sculptures, paintings and even the abstract, she loved it all.

She detested her own work as it was no where near the quality of the works she saw online or on canvas. The paint too streaky or just wasn’t proportional.

She wished to paint just like the artists from old! And she got exactly that. She could draw and paint just like those artists, Starry Night, The Mona Lisa, The Final Supper, she could make exact copies.

But that was that. She could only make copies, and when she tried to draw her own, they were of the exact quality of her work before her wish. She despaired upon realizing she sold her soul for a shortcut that never even gave her what she wanted.

Doppel Description

“Let the beauty of my art be known!”

The doppel of vanity. It takes the form of an artist. The master of this emotion has happily sculpted her doppel from it’s true clay formless shape into an exact replica of a piece of artwork you have probably seen before. Likewise, the doppel can create elaborate pieces of artwork using it’s mind and the strange paint that pools at it’s base, but none of them are new as they all seem like replicas or other paintings it has seen. If one were to comment on this, the doppel will drag you into the paint and make you into it’s next gruesome piece of artwork. Due to it’s clay body, a simple strong bop to the doppel can cause it to collapse back into it’s weak formless shape.

[sharanalemane]

Uncovering the Secrets of the Mona Lisa’s Lasting Fame

The Mona Lisa, painted by Leonardo da Vinci in the early 16th century, is arguably the most famous and widely recognized piece of art in the world. From her enigmatic smile to the countless reproductions and parodies, the Mona Lisa has captured the imagination of people across the globe for centuries. But what exactly is it about this painting that has made it so enduringly popular? Let's explore the elements that contribute to the Mona Lisa's lasting appeal.

1. The Enigmatic Smile

One of the most discussed aspects of the Mona Lisa is her mysterious smile. Art historians, psychologists, and even laypeople have debated for years whether she is smiling, smirking, or simply maintaining a neutral expression. This ambiguity is a significant part of what makes the painting so intriguing. The smile seems to change depending on the viewer's perspective and mood, making the Mona Lisa a constantly evolving work of art that never fully reveals its secrets.

2. Leonardo da Vinci’s Mastery

Leonardo da Vinci was a master of the Renaissance, and the Mona Lisa is a testament to his genius. His use of sfumato—a technique that blends colors and tones seamlessly—gives the Mona Lisa her lifelike quality. The painting’s subtle gradations of light and shadow create depth and dimension, making it appear almost three-dimensional. Da Vinci's meticulous attention to detail, from the texture of her skin to the folds of her clothing, showcases his unparalleled skill as an artist.

3. The Mystery of Mona Lisa’s Identity

Another element that adds to the painting's mystique is the uncertainty surrounding the identity of the woman portrayed. While many believe she is Lisa Gherardini, the wife of a wealthy Florentine merchant, this theory has never been definitively proven. The mystery of her identity adds another layer of intrigue to the painting, encouraging viewers to speculate and imagine who she might have been.

4. The Painting’s History and Provenance

The Mona Lisa's history is as fascinating as the painting itself. It was part of the French royal collection before being displayed at the Louvre. Its theft in 1911 by an Italian patriot who believed it belonged in Italy, and its subsequent recovery, only added to its fame. The painting has also survived multiple incidents of vandalism, each time emerging unscathed, which has contributed to its legendary status.

5. Global Recognition and Cultural Impact

The Mona Lisa’s presence in popular culture has also played a significant role in its enduring popularity. The painting has been referenced, parodied, and reproduced in countless forms, from advertisements to movies. This widespread recognition has cemented the Mona Lisa as not just a masterpiece of art but a cultural icon. Her image is instantly recognizable, even to those who know little about art history.

6. The Influence of Modern Media

In today’s digital age, the Mona Lisa has become even more accessible, with millions of people viewing it online or on social media. The painting's fame has transcended the walls of the Louvre, reaching audiences worldwide who may never see it in person. The viral nature of modern media has kept the Mona Lisa in the public eye, ensuring that its allure remains as strong as ever.

Sharan Alemane’s Perspective on the Mona Lisa’s Popularity

Sharan Alemane, a philosopher based in San Antonio, offers a unique perspective on the Mona Lisa’s enduring appeal. "The Mona Lisa fascinates us not just because of her beauty or the skill of the artist, but because she represents the unknown," Sharan explains. "Her smile, her identity, the story behind the painting—all of these elements tap into our natural curiosity and desire for mystery."

Sharan also believes that the painting's timeless appeal lies in its ability to resonate with viewers on a deeply personal level. "Art speaks to the soul, and the Mona Lisa does this in a way that few other works can. Each person who looks at her sees something different, reflecting their own thoughts, emotions, and experiences. This personal connection is what keeps people coming back to her, generation after generation."

The Mona Lisa’s enduring popularity is the result of a combination of factors, from Leonardo da Vinci’s artistic mastery to the painting’s intriguing history and cultural impact. Her enigmatic smile, mysterious identity, and the timeless questions she raises continue to captivate audiences around the world. As Sharan Alemane suggests, the Mona Lisa’s ability to connect with viewers on a personal level ensures that she remains not just a masterpiece of art, but a living, breathing enigma that will continue to fascinate for centuries to come.

[paintlystore]

Explore the World of Masterpiece Paint by Numbers with Paintly Store

Remember the joy of coloring as a child? Paint by numbers offers a delightful way to recapture that creative spark and create stunning artwork – even if you have no prior artistic experience! Here at Paintly Store, we specialize in masterpiece paint by numbers kits, allowing you to bring iconic works of art to life in the comfort of your own home.

What is Masterpiece Paint by Numbers?

Traditional paint by numbers kits often feature simple illustrations. However, masterpiece paint by numbers takes things to a whole new level. Our kits feature intricate reproductions of famous paintings by renowned artists like Van Gogh, Monet, and Da Vinci. Imagine creating your own mini masterpiece of "Starry Night" or "The Mona Lisa"!

Why Choose Masterpiece Paint by Numbers with Paintly Store?

High-Quality Materials: We use premium pre-printed canvases with detailed outlines and vibrant acrylic paints to ensure a professional and rewarding artistic experience.

Wide Variety of Masterpieces: Our extensive collection boasts iconic works of art across various art styles, allowing you to find the perfect masterpiece to suit your taste.

Multiple Difficulty Levels: Whether you're a seasoned artist or a complete beginner, we offer kits with varying levels of detail to cater to your skill level.

The Perfect Gift: Surprise your loved ones with a unique and personalized gift that allows them to express their creativity and create a stunning piece of art.

Benefits of Paint by Numbers for Adults:

Stress Relief & Relaxation: Immerse yourself in the therapeutic world of color. Focus on the present moment and let the worries of the day fade away.

Improved Focus & Concentration: The methodical process of painting by numbers can help enhance your focus and concentration skills.

Sense of Accomplishment: Witnessing your masterpiece come to life with each completed section creates a rewarding sense of accomplishment.

Spark Your Creativity: Paint by numbers is a fun and accessible way to explore your creative side and rediscover the joy of art.

Beyond Masterpieces: Explore Other Paint by Numbers Options at Paintly Store

While we specialize in masterpiece paint by numbers kits, Paintly Store also offers a diverse selection of other paint by numbers options, including:

Landscapes & Animals: Find scenes of breathtaking landscapes, adorable animals, or calming floral patterns.

Seasonal Themes: Immerse yourself in the spirit of the season with festive holiday-themed or peaceful winter scenes.

Custom Paint by Numbers: Turn your favorite photo into a one-of-a-kind paint by numbers kit – a perfect personalized gift!

Ready to Dive into the World of Paint by Numbers?

Whether you're a seasoned artist or a curious beginner, Paintly Store has the perfect paint by numbers kit to spark your creativity and unleash your inner artist. Visit our website today to browse our collection of masterpiece paint by numbers kits and other exciting options.

Happy Painting!

[atelier-kristel]

The Art of Storytelling: Narratives in Visual Art

In the mesmerizing realm of visual art, where expressive colors and bold patterns grace monochromatic canvases, a profound form of storytelling emerges. I’m Kristel Bechara, a visual artist who weaves tales through artistry, and I invite you to embark on a journey through the captivating narratives within visual creativity. This exploration delves into the profound impact of narratives in artistic expression, touching upon the use of expressive colors and bold patterns on a monochromatic background that depicts life polarities. 

Visual art, in its myriad forms, serves as a universal language. Art interpretation transcends the barriers of culture and language, offering a unique medium through which artists convey their stories. Visual art possesses the remarkable ability to communicate complex ideas, evoke emotions, and leave an indelible mark on the viewer’s soul. 

Artists across time and cultures have utilized visual art as a means of storytelling. From the intricate cave paintings of Lascaux, dating back over 17,000 years, to contemporary digital art installations, the narrative aspect of visual art has remained a constant thread, binding generations and civilizations. 

In the diverse tapestry of humanity, visual art acts as a bridge, connecting people through shared emotions, experiences, and stories. Whether it’s the vibrant canvases of Frida Kahlo, depicting her personal struggles and triumphs, or the thought-provoking installations of Ai Weiwei, challenging societal norms, visual art communicates across boundaries. 

At the heart of every exceptional work of visual art lies a story, waiting to be told. It’s a profound expression of the artist’s soul, a reflection of their experiences, beliefs, and emotions. Whether it’s a painting, sculpture, photograph, or any other form, artists utilize their creations as vessels for narratives that touch the human spirit. These narratives can be overt, with a clear storyline, or subtle, leaving room for interpretation and introspection. 

Consider, for example, Vincent van Gogh’s iconic “Starry Night.” This masterpiece is not merely a depiction of a serene night sky but an emotional outpouring of the artist’s struggles with mental health and his yearning for tranquility. The swirling stars and the quiet village below become metaphors for the turmoil within his mind. 

Narrative art transcends mere aesthetics; it delves deep into the realm of emotional resonance. It seeks to connect with the viewer on a profound level, stirring feelings and thoughts that linger long after one has left the gallery. It’s not limited to the traditional forms of storytelling with a beginning, middle, and end. Instead, it embraces the abstract, the symbolic, and the ambiguous. 

Consider Jackson Pollock’s action paintings. At first glance, they may seem like chaotic splatters of paint, devoid of narrative. However, these works invite viewers to engage with the process of creation. They encourage us to question what constitutes art and to find our narratives in the interplay of colors and shapes. 

One of the most captivating aspects of storytelling art is its openness to interpretation. Each viewer brings their unique experiences, beliefs, and emotions to the artwork. Thus, the narrative in visual art becomes a deeply personal journey, with each observer finding their story within the art. 

Imagine standing before Leonardo da Vinci’s enigmatic “Mona Lisa.” Her enigmatic smile has perplexed art enthusiasts for centuries. Is she smiling or is it a hint of melancholy? The narrative of this painting becomes a dialogue between the viewer and the subject, a conversation that transcends time and space. 

Visual narratives are a silent dialogue between the artist and the viewer. They communicate without words, yet they possess the power to convey profound messages. Artists utilize symbols, colors, composition, and even the absence of elements to craft narratives that resonate with diverse audiences. 

Consider Grant Wood’s iconic “American Gothic.” The stern expressions of the farmer and his daughter, set against a backdrop of a simple farmhouse, evoke a narrative of resilience, tradition, and the American spirit. This visual narrative speaks to the challenges and hopes of an era and a nation. 

Narrative art is a vessel for emotional resonance, leaving an indelible cultural print. It captures the essence of a time, place, or society, evoking nostalgia, provoking critical thought, or reflecting the realities of our world. 

Frida Kahlo’s self-portraits, for instance, resonate deeply with themes of pain, identity, and femininity. Her bold and unapologetic portrayal of her physical and emotional struggles has left an enduring emotional impact, inspiring countless artists and feminists worldwide. 

For artists like me, storytelling art is a potent form of creative expression. It allows us to explore the intricate interplay of life’s dualities through the canvas. In this dance between the vivid and the restrained, we find the means to express the full spectrum of emotions and perspectives. 

My signature style involves using expressive colors and bold patterns on a monochromatic background that depicts life’s polarities. This approach allows me to tell stories through the visual language of art. Whether it’s the contrast between light and dark, chaos and serenity, or joy and sorrow, I seek to capture he essence of the human experience through the interplay of visual elements. 

In conclusion, the art of storytelling in visual art is a captivating journey into the human experience. It’s a testament to the power of images and their ability to communicate, connect, and captivate. As we explore the narratives within visual art, we discover not only the stories that artists tell but also the stories that we carry within us, forever intertwined with the art we cherish. 

Shop my ARTWORK COLLECTION.

Check my DIGITAL ARTWORK COLLECTION.

[sartle-blog]

Reimaging a Renaissance Man: Leonardo da Vinci in Fate Grand/Order

(Source: Aniplex)

  In Delightworks's mobile game Fate Grand/Order, you’re challenged to save the world with the help of historical figures and legends. In most cases, those historical figures turn out to be far different than you’d expect. Sometimes a person like the famous shogunate swordsman Okita Souji is changed to a female without explanation, but more often than you’d expect, the game is surprisingly clever in how it incorporates historical facts about the characters into their design. If you go into a history class and start to argue that King Louis XIV was secretly female, you might get kicked out. Looking past the anime images on the surface though, there is some art history to be learned from Fate.

  (Source: Aniplex)

  Leonardo da Vinci in particular is a great example of this. Leonardo is genderbent to be female, with the explanation that his search of perfection and beauty led him to redesign his body into the Mona Lisa. Also, she’s a little obsessed with the painting.

  Left: Mona Lisa by Shimokoshi (image: Aniplex) Right: Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci in the Louvre

  Fate also features a lot of art, called “craft essences” that come with effects to assist you while equipped in battle. Most of which have no historical basis except for, obviously, the Mona Lisa.

  (Source: Aniplex)

  As a mobile game, Fate rotates time-limited events and one called “Da Vinci and the Seven Counterfeit Servants” featured three craft essences inspired by famous masterpieces. They were earned by collecting Leonardo’s famous manuscripts and counterfeits of all his masterpieces and writings. 

  Left: Maiden Leading Chaldea by pako (image: Aniplex) Right: Liberty Leading the People by Eugène Delacroix in the Louvre

  Collecting Leonardo’s manuscripts rewarded you with Maiden Leading Chaldea inspired by Delacroix's Liberty Leading the People. In it, Liberty has been swapped out with Joan of Arc, referred to as Jeanne D’Arc in Fate, whose flag is as inspiring to your in-game army as Liberty’s was to France. In the bottom left, you can spot Gilles De Rais, who was a close ally of Jeanne, but this is the Bluebeard version of Gilles, not the noble warrior he was prior to Jeanne’s death. In history, Gilles de Rais was a companion-in-arms who fought alongside Joan of Arc. But after retiring from the military he became known for an interest in the occult and was convicted as a child serial killer. The story of his horrible murder spree was the inspiration for the Bluebeard fairytale.

  On Jeanne’s right is Hans Christian Anderson who’s holding up papers in place of guns because words are his weapons and the pen is mightier - well you get the picture. In the back are other in-game characters, but neither have a historical counterpart, so moving on. 

  Left: The Merciless One by Aoi Tsukimoto (image: Aniplex) Right: Pietà by Michelangelo, in the Apostolic Palace

  The counterfeit manuscripts give you The Merciless One, based on the Pietà by Michelangelo who was a close friend of Leonardo (in Fate lore not so much in real life). This features Jeanne D’Arc Alter who is a dark version of Joan of Arc. In the image she’s cradling the pre-Bluebeard version of Gilles de Rais, the noble warrior who fought bravely by her side. The art mirrors Jesus being held by Mary after his crucifixion with Gilles de Rais’s fall into evil. 

  Left: The Scholars of Chaldea by Cherokee (image: Aniplex) Right: The School of Athens by Raphael in the Apostolic Palace

  The last famous art inspired craft essence of the event was The Scholars of Chaldea. You received this one by collecting fake copies of Mona Lisa, Self Portrait, and Vitruvian Man. This piece was inspired by the painting The School of Athens, but specifically just Plato and Aristotle in the back center. In it, Dr. Roman (your in-game boss essentially) and Leonardo are featured as the two great minds whose partnership will help save the world.

  Leonardo Da Vinci also has two side quests focused on her, both of which, while fictional narratives, feature a few winks and nods to lesser-known facts and paintings from the artist’s life. 

  Tobias and the Angel by Andrea del Verrocchio in the National Gallery London

  In the first, she’s traveling with you to London and casually mentions she was the model for the archangel Raphael in Verrocchio’s painting in the National Gallery. Based on that brief description it's most likely Tobias and the Angel to which she is referring. There’s no historical evidence to back her claim as a model but it's possible (the real-life) Leonardo did assist in the painting of the piece and if so it's his earliest work as a painter.

  (Source: Aniplex)

  You don’t get to visit the National Gallery to see the piece, instead you make your way to the British Museum to see Leonardo’s old friend “Mikey”. It’s the only appearance that Michelangelo makes in Fate so far, and Leonardo makes a point of saying that he’ll be unable to return in the future. She speaks of him fondly as a dear friend, calling him the other “uomo universale” but since he’s a lingering ghost and the game is mainly combat-based you do have to kill him. Rest in peace Mikey.

  In real life, Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo were known rivals. Their best known interaction was a pair of commissions that put them in direct competition with each other. They were hired to paint battle scenes on the same wall of a Council Hall in Florence. Long story short, neither finished their work and they parted on unfriendly terms. But, it is thought that despite their rivalry they both had a private respect and appreciation for the other’s work. 

  Drawing of Michelangelo’s David by Leonardo Da Vinci in the Windsor Castle, The Royal Collection

  At least on Leonardo’s side, we know Leonardo did a sketch of Michelangelo’s David for example. In Fate, Leonardo mentions more than once how much she admires David, but in real life Leonardo likened Michelangelo’s depiction of human musculature to a “sack of walnuts.” Maybe he meant that, maybe he was just bitter. 

  If Michelangelo ever drew any of Leonardo’s works we’ll never know since he torched most of his sketches right before he died. At the core of their interaction in Fate, Leonardo is basically saying that Michelangelo was the closest she ever had to a true equal to her level of genius, at least in the field of arts. That aspect might have held true for real-life Leonardo. 

  Virgin of the Rocks by Leonardo da Vinci in the Louvre

  Leonardo’s second side quest focuses a lot on her mother and the painting Virgin of the Rocks. It’s not known if she’s talking about the one housed in the Louvre or the one in the National Gallery. She’s referring to both but mentions she can’t remember if one was painted by her apprentice. Based on the museums’ descriptions of the two versions, they were both done by Leonardo himself. She says that while painting the Madonna she found herself longing for her mother and that’s what prompted her to bring her mother to come stay with her in Milan.

  Leonardo says this with a twinge of regret, remarking that by moving her mother to Milan she may have unknowingly shortened her life and caused her to fall ill. In actual history, there isn’t much known about Leonardo’s mother. He writes in his journal of a Caterina, who is strongly believed to be his mother, that visited him in Milan but died within a year. Her cause of death is also up for debate so the tragic narrative suggested by Fate’s Leonardo does seem to be a fictional invention. It’s been theorized by some that Mona Lisa is based off of Leonardo’s mother. When asked about this in Fate, she says no but adds she’s sure her mother had a wonderful smile.

  In the side quest, Leonardo also mentions going way past the deadline for the commission of Virgin of the Rocks and getting really annoyed when she found out how much the patron wanted to pay for the piece. This has some historical basis, the description of the version in the National Gallery says it was possibly made to replace the original since Leonardo wasn’t paid adequately for the first and sold it elsewhere. 

  (Source: Aniplex)

  Next in the side quest, you encounter Leonardo’s assistant Gian Giacomo Caprotti who she refers to as Salaì. How she describes him in the above image seems to be historically accurate. Salaì is a nickname that means “little devil” and he stole from Leonardo often. Leonardo da Vinci wrote of him frequently in his journal, mostly documenting what he broke and how much Salaì’s father would have to repay him. 

  Despite all of his antics, Salaì lived with Leonardo for thirty years and was even left half a vineyard in his mentor’s will. So when you run into his ghost in Fate, it's pretty clear Leonardo was hoping for a real reunion but since he’s an evil ghost who can’t talk you have to put him out of his misery just like with Mikey. Rest in peace little devil. 

  (Source: Aniplex)

  Lastly, Fate introduced a second Leonardo Da Vinci, called Da Vinci Lily, and she is a reference to a unfinished masterpiece of Leonardo’s. This version is also known as Gran Cavallo, the name of a horse sculpture the real-life Leonardo was unable to ever complete. 

  (video source: Aniplex)

  She’s also supposedly modeled off her childhood appearance... if Leonardo looked like the Mona Lisa as a child. 

  Design for a fighting vehicle by Leonardo da Vinci in the British Museum

  Da Vinci Lily is in command of an armored vehicle called the Shadow Border. The Shadow Border, which was built/designed in part by Da Vinci, bears some similarity to an armored tank Leonardo designed in his journals. 

Studies of Horses by Leonardo da Vinci in the Collection of the Royal Library, Windsor Castle

  In real history, Gran Cavallo was to be the largest equine statue ever created, but at the time Leonardo’s attention was divided between The Last Supper and countless other projects. He created a clay model of the piece meant to be later cast in bronze, but French bowmen used it for target practice when they invaded Milan. He was never able to recreate it and the story goes he never stopped mourning the project. 

  Left: Bella Lisa by Simosi Right: Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci in the Louvre

  Da Vinci Lily also got her own version of the Mona Lisa, called Bella Lisa.

On the other end of the spectrum of historical accuracy in Fate, Thomas Edison is a lion, for reasons having nothing to do with his life or career. So while the same can’t be said for every Fate character, the design and writing around Leonardo da Vinci feels like a loving homage to the life and work of the universal genius.

By: Danielle DeVeaux

[harbingerhorizon]

Individual Responsibility to Society

Introduction

As humans, we have the capability of creating beautiful works of art. Leonardo da Vinci was most well known for the Mona Lisa. Vincent Van Gogh created the Starry Night. Johannes Vermeer made Girl with a Pearl Earing and Milchelangelo with the Sistine Chapel. These are just a few works admired by millions if not billions as works that could have only been completed by intellectuals. People flock from around the world for an opportunity to see such talent on display not recognizing that they themselves are artist in nature. A mosaic of people of many colors defined by many different types of pieces trying to figure out how to best fit into a pattern we call community. What makes any work of art a masterpiece is not just putting imagination on to canvass but the ability to carefully choose the colors, manage those colors, stay within the lines, and holding themselves accountable to every paint stroke made. 

Carefully Choosing the Colors

The world is a complexed series of problems on a canvass designed by many colors. Those many colors are the people within a community that cross intersect to make one complete picture. Within those colors are a mixture of ingredients that make up the shades that if not monitored, causes imperfections in the final work: unemployment, political violence, poverty, and ecological disasters all of which exist but dependent on the skill of the painter get overlooked despite being the things we should care about the most. What makes these problems so complexed is how they intersect one another on the canvass as colors mix. The more paint that is applied to the canvass and the more colors that are chosen, the more they become entangled and more difficult to manage. While some may go unphased by the harsh chemicals, it does not go unnoticed that the mixtures cause reprehensible results which if corrected early enough has a new unique perspective to the picture but if left unaddressed, could in worst case destroy the work and waste the time spent developing it.

Managing of the Colors

For those viewing our painting - our community, what perspective are we providing to them? The actions of individuals within our community gives sanction to the viewer of the art to determine which color is most relevant.  It also allows any viewer to pose the questions of “Are any of these colors important to me, If I were the artist, what colors would I have chosen instead, and what does the entire picture mean to me? We based these questions on cultural values and beliefs which helps us answering fundamental questions to what colors one chooses to focus on or find most appealing. In a 2007 journal on the study of Youth Sense of Community: Voice and Power In Community Context, Scot Evans (Author) concludes the importance of adolescents involvement in community affairs. In this study, youth express their views of their society and what matters to them citing while they have a high interest in contributing, “…teenagers are often unequipped and under supported to participate fully and feel like they are making meaningful contributions to society.” Teens themselves are of a separate color on the pallet that is often ignored or given equal consideration especially those young people “who are disadvantaged or members of minority groups” (S. Evans, 2007).

Staying Within the Lines

Both teens and adults have a similar set of values and that has evolved throughout history a system of governance that selects values and beliefs based on those most shared. This governing is imposed on the people as the “Rule of Law” (J. Hart, 2014). The theory behind the rule of law is designed to govern the decorum of the people within a society that are fair and equitable. This system throughout history has not been perfect but in the description of democracy, has stood through the test of time by its foundational principles of governing by the people with majority rule and with ultimate authority from its people. This is important to our societal canvass as we are essentially giving the colors that make up the painting the power to choose what is considered out of bounds or outside the lines of the painting we intend on creating.

Within a democratic society is the creation of government systems and within that, courts. The purpose of these courts is to take a common set of beliefs and values and implement them into law to protect people from other people. Originally designed to be judicial in nature, western society courts have progressed into an inclusive affair where the public through concepts of faith become involved in the decision making of what is socially acceptable. The involvement of people that are governed included the “participation in local law enforcement and administration (as sheriffs, JPs and constables) or juries (grand and petty) and, indeed, in parliament itself (as lawmakers) …” (J. Hart JR, 2014). This invited society to buy into an idea of shared responsibility and “…the commitment to the traditional means and methods of English government.  The United States continues to maintain the concept of shared responsibility through government practice in the appointments of peace officers of similar title at a local level, judges and magistrates at all levels, and the election of congressional and senatorial positions for both state and federal level. Collectively, the bodies of these entities collaborate with the communities in which they serve to solve complexed quality of life issues. To be effective, they all must make a commitment to enforcing laws in an equal and equitable manner.

The principles of a societal occupied justice system are not just for the purposes of societal cohesion but too personal gain. In a free society, people are afforded the right to explore financial independence through entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurial ventures invite innovation which as a byproduct also invites competitors to steal the ideas of one to make it their own. Individuals of society are sought to play roles in the civil judicial system to protect the rights of intellect that contribute to economic growth. Civil judicial courts as defined by Glenn Hubbard and Patrick O’Brien in “Macroeconomics” are independent courts who make decisions free of influence from any other portion of the government, governed people who have connections to political influence or any person who intimidates by criminal gang. These courts are expected to be used to make decisions based solely on law.

The legal protections of our society are lines on our canvass we have chosen to remain in to maintain order. These same lines are what society collectively create through majority vote and like the practice of artist leading to a perfect masterpiece, we are continuing to improve upon. When we work outside the lines it lends opportunity to anarchy, unrest, and disorder. This is the paint finding its way away from the canvass, splattered throughout the room in places it should never belong. As a society, working collectively, we can paint a beautiful work of art. The best direction is to embrace each color to help complement one another and, in some cases, create new colors.

Accountability to Every Paint Stroke

Some of the colors used in paintings share similar tones. What is a simple brown can be changed to a lighter or darker form of brown. We recognize these slight variations as a family of tones. A color that is mixed into another loses its identity as one color and becomes a totally different color. As it pertains to civic responsibility, we see this happen when it comes to influence on youth. According to the study of Youth Sense of Community: Voice and Power in Community Context (S. Evans, 2007), people demonstrate a higher interest in personal responsibility and accountability when they are introduced to civics and politics at an adolescent age. Youth not only have a higher interest in civics but to are “…more likely to consider public interest an important life goal when their families emphasized an ethic of social responsibility (S. Evans, 2007). When there is an absence of influence from family, there are plenty of replacements today through technology that fill the void that shapes the views of teens. Social media and online content are huge replacements that manipulate the values and beliefs in teens as they become adults.

Youth are encouraged to engage in civic programs like student body councils and Mayor Youth Council (MYC) which help them with problem solving and understand the necessity of community partnership for the greater good of all within the community. Engaging in civic government programs, teens have positions of power bestowed upon them. In Evans study, he concluded that when this power is gained, they are more conscience of their personal responsibility to the community. The students in the study also expressed their want to better their communities after becoming aware of inequalities within and outside of their own communities “revealing how their opportunities to play meaningful roles promote their developing sense of social responsibility to the agency.”

Conclusion

As a society working collectively, we can paint a beautiful work of art. The best direction is to embrace each color to help complement one another and, in some cases, create new colors. As contributing colors to the painting, we have a voice to influence the significance of our own color within the painting governed by the rule of law where the colors on the canvass dictate what is fair and just. When we say, “The system isn’t fair,” The question that we should ask ourselves is: “How are we contributing to it?” To create a picture we want others to see, we must become involved. We must find a way to carefully put our color on to the canvass, staying within the lines and holding ourselves accountable for the strokes we make. Are we becoming a part of the painting as designed, or are we fighting against it?

 References

 Evans, S. D. (2007). Youth sense of community: Voice and power in community contexts. Journal of Community Psychology, 35(6), 693–709. https://doi.org/10.1002/jcop.20173

Hart, J. S. (2003). The Rule of Law, 1603-1660: Crowns, Courts and Judges (1st ed.). Routledge.

 Hubbard, R. G., & O’Brien, A. P. (2020). Macroeconomics. Pearson.

[starwars-art-events]

Art Trade 2: Put Them In Situations/Make Them Cozy

Hello there!

This is an informal, for-fun art trade event, meant for people who enjoy drawing for others. It's a pressure-free and casual trade! No need to create a big masterpiece--just something others would happily enjoy.

The theme this time around is "Put Them In Situations OR Make Them Cozy." You can select to either participate in making art of a character/multiple characters in peril/a sticky situation/comedically painful situation, OR you can choose to give them the comfort you feel they deserve. Both of these require SCENES this time! You will create art of the whole picture. What's happening? Who is it happening to? A snapshot (or a few!) of the scenario!

(More below the cut!)

Types of art welcome:

Drawings (digital or scanned traditional)

Short comics

Short animation

Photo edits

Video edits (music or otherwise)

Music creation

Moodboards/photo collages

Quotes-and-photo collages

Other (contact moderator ASAP)

Dates to adhere to:

Deadline to join: October 1st.

Dates to post: November 4th-5th.

Rules:

Joining requires creating art. To recieve art, you must create art! Simple as that. Many types of art are allowed (see above), and all can be adapted to how you wish to conceive yours.

You don't have to be "great" at any art to join! This is an informal event with no level restrictions. The important thing is that your art absolutely must have effort. For example, a moodboard should be cohesive, and it should contain enough photos that it could be worthy of giving as a gift. Make sure you are satisfied with what you are giving out (to your abilities levels, of course--don't expect the Star Wars Mona Lisa if you aren't to par with DaVinci's skills!).

This is an anonymous event. You will know who they are creating art for, but you will not know who you are recieving from! Until posting dates, please keep your art to yourself (or a trusted non-participating friend). In the words of Gandalf the Grey: Keep it secret; keep it safe.

Art should be created for your giftee based on things/characters/ideas they enjoy. Do a bit of "pseudo-stalking" (not real stalking) of their tags. See what the person enjoys, both in terms of mediums and concepts. If they have clone trooper OC's, base something off those guys! If they are a big Ezra Bridger fan, see what types of AUs they enjoy! If the concept of the Force makes them go wild, include that in your art! If you are at a loss for ideas, send an anon message to the person to see what they are interested in OR contact the moderator.

Please sign up only ONCE. You will recieve art from only ONE artist. The artist may wish to give you more than one piece of art, but it will only be from THAT artist alone. If you wish to make more art for someone else, arrange that on your own time, please!

If you need to drop out, that is okay! Things happen. You are able to drop out at any time. Please contact the moderator ASAP if you need to drop. Please understand that the other artists are putting their own time and effort into their pieces. The artist gifting their time and effort to you is no longer obligated to do so anymore. If you drop out, they are completely allowed to drop, too.

Important note: all skin tones and disabilities MUST be accurately portrayed. No skin tone should be lighter than the actor/character's actual skin colour. Disabilities must be depicted correctly. If not, you will be dropped. This is the personal wish of the moderator, but also just basic decency. Seriously, do your research portraying someone different than you. Do not fall prey to harmful tropes. This hurts others.

Depicting clothing for characters of specific religious/cultural backgrounds MUST be done with accuracy. For example, you must properly helmet Children of the Watch as they are shown in canon. Do not depict them out of armour in public settings. Same goes for Mirialans--make sure they are dressed appropriately, as shown by Luminara Unduli and Barriss Offee. There will be NO "situations" regarding them being forced out of clothing/armour. NO THEMES OF SUCH XENOPHOBIA ARE ALLOWED.

NO NON-CONSENSUAL THEMES ARE PERMITTED.

IF YOU HAVE ANY FURTHER QUESTIONS, PLEASE DM THE MODERATORs. You may do so here, or at @engagemythrusters OR @darlin-djarin.

Thanks, all!

[letterboxd]

Satisfied?

We examine what Letterboxd reviews of Hamilton reveal about the musical’s cultural currency in 2020.

In this absolutely insane year, when our love of movies feels helpless in the face of pandemic-induced economic collapse, some extremely good decisions are being made on behalf of audiences. Studio Ghibli on streaming platforms. Virtual screenings to support art house cinemas. Free streaming of many important films about Black experience. And: Disney+ releasing the filmed version of Hamilton: An American Musical—recorded at the Richard Rodgers Theater in 2016 with most of its original Broadway cast—a year ahead of schedule, on Independence Day weekend.

“Superlative pop art,” writes Wesley of the filmed musical. “Hamilton wears its influences and themes on its sleeve, and it’s all the better for it. Lin-Manuel Miranda and his team employ an unlikely cocktail of not only hip-hop and showtunes, but also jazz (‘What’d I Miss?’), British-Invasion pop-rock (‘You’ll Be Back’), folk music (‘Dear Theodosia’) and Shakespeare (‘Take a Break’) in service of developing an impressively vast array of themes. This is a testament to the power of writing, an immigrant narrative, a cautionary tale about ambition, a tragic family drama, and a reevaluation of who decides the narrative of history.”

2016 may only be a half-decade ago, but it feels like an eon in American political years. With theaters dark and America’s long record of racism under urgent scrutiny, the complex smash-hit lands back in the spotlight at an interesting time. Is Hamilton “the most offensive cultural artefact of the last decade”, as Lee writes? Or “timeless and wholly of the moment”, as Tom suggests? The answer, according to a deep read of your Letterboxd reviews, is “all of the above”.

First things first: why now?

Sophie has a theory:

“Disney executive: Hey we’re losing a lot of money because our parks are closed. How do we start making money again?

Other Disney executive: It might be nice, it might be nice… to get Hamilton on our side.”

Sure, business. Still, it’s historically unprecedented that a Broadway show of this caliber (a record-setting sixteen Tony nominations, eleven wins, plus a Grammy and a Pulitzer) would be filmed and released to the public while it’s still, in a Covid-free universe, capable of filling theaters every night. Will people stay away when Broadway reopens because they’re all Disney+’d out?

No chance, reckons Erika. “I’d still kill to see Hamilton live with any cast… I get why producers are afraid that these videos might hurt ticket sales, but I’m fucking ready to buy a ticket and fly to NY one day just to see as many shows as I can after watching this.”

Not every musical fan has the resources to travel, often waiting years for a touring version to come near their hometown. And even if you do live in a town with Hamilton, the ticket price is beyond many; a daily lottery the only way some of us get to go. So Holly-Beth speaks for many when she writes: “I entered the Hamilton lottery every day for almost two years but I never got to be in the room where it happens… however, this 4K recording of the original cast will do very nicely for now! Finally getting to see the context and performances after obsessing over the music for years was so, so satisfying.”

“Finally” is a common theme. Sydnie writes, “I love this musical with every fiber of my body and it was an extraordinary experience finally getting to watch it in Australia”. Flogic: “To finally be able to put the intended visuals to a soundtrack that I’ve had on repeat for such a long time: goosebumps for 160 minutes.” Newt Potter: “Now I fully understand people’s love for this masterpiece of a musical!”

I’ve got a small query for you.

Where’s the motherfucking swearing? Unsurprisingly, Disney+ comes with some limitations. For Hamilton, it’s the loss of a perfectly placed F-word.

“I know Disney is ‘too pure’ to let a couple of ‘fucks’ slip by,” writes Fernando, “but come on, it’s kind of distracting having the sound go out completely when they sing the very satisfying ‘Southern Motherfucking Democratic Republicans!’ line.”

Will agrees: “Disney cutting ‘motherfucking’ from ‘Washington on Your Side’ felt like sacrilege akin to Mickey Mouse taking an eyebrow pencil to the Mona Lisa.”

Nevertheless, sings Allison:

“Even tho Disney stripped the story of its f***s, Don’t think for a moment that it sucks.”

(Yes, she has a vegan alert for Hamilton.)

Does it throw away its shot?

The crew filmed two regular shows in front of live audiences, with additional audience-less sessions for a dolly, crane and Steadicam to capture specific numbers. The vast majority of you are satisfied. “It’s the most engaging and expertly crafted life filming I’ve seen since Stop Making Sense,” writes ArtPig. “The film does an incredible job of placing you right in the action. It feels like the best seat you could get in the theater. You can see the sweat and spit.”

“Translates perfectly onto the small screen,” agrees Ollie. “There’s a level of intimacy that feels hard to replicate in any other filmed production. We see those close ups, the passion and gusto behind every actor’s performance.”

“Shockingly cinematic for something filmed on such a small stage,” is Technerd’s succinct summary, while Paul praises director Thomas Kail: “He knows when to back away along with moving nearer when appropriate, and the choices always serve to govern the power and stamina of the performances.”

Though cast members’ voices were recorded on individual audio tracks, Noah had a few quibbles with the sound quality. “Some of the audio capture is off in the recording, sometimes voices being too soft or too loud. It’s not immersion breaking, but it is noticeable enough to irk me a little in pivotal moments. Some of the shot composition doesn’t fully work either. Of course nothing is going to be as good as seeing it in person.”

Robert, recalling another recent cinematic escapade of musical theater, lets his poetry do the talking:

“This will do for now until the true movie’s made, Though if Hooper directs, there’ll be an angry tirade.”

I think your pants look hot.

Hamilton fans have their cast favorites, but something about being able to see Jonathan Groff’s spittle and Leslie Odom Jr’s scowls in 4K has you losing it all over again. Several specific shout-outs we enjoyed:

“Daveed Diggs the Legend! Go watch Blindspotting (2018), it’s one of the best movies ever!” —Kyle

“It’s hard to believe anyone will ever top Leslie Odom Jr. as Aaron Burr. I already loved him from the original cast recording, but seeing his full performance in all its glory was just godly.” —Erika

“Thankful that it was made possible for me to view with such clarity the phenomenon that is Renée Elise Goldsberry and spectacular Phillipa Soo.” —Thea

“Daveed Diggs was electrifying and Jonathan Groff was absolutely hilarious. If they interacted together the stage would’ve combusted from the sheer will of their talent.” —Nick

This is not a game.

On one hand, the release of Hamilton is sweet relief for music theater nerds riding out the pandemic. A generation of kids knows every word by heart, rapping (this version of) American history like it’s no thing. On the other, the Obama-era musical already feels behind-the-times, even for many Hamilton lovers, and the filmed version has brought that into sharp focus.

“I listened to the OG cast album about 50 times when it came out, the production is about as good as I’d always hoped,” writes Josh. “Since then however there’s been a very important and broader reckoning with the failures of neoliberalism and the Obama years ([from] which this has to be the most emblematic piece of art) and for me personally a drifting further to the left that has resulted in a very different relationship with the material. So my feelings today are a bit more complicated.”

“Hamilton is extremely non-committal about its politics,” writes Sting. “It doesn’t examine much of what Hamilton dictated besides ‘he wants complete financial control of the country’ (which would sound like a fucking supervillain in any other context, including reality).”

That lack of political commitment, reckons Morgan, is what helped Hamilton as a musical become so popular: “It’s fun. It’s catchy. It interweaves trendy and socially relevant artistic tools to infer a subversive subtext, while simultaneously sanitizing and, at times, flat out fabricating the historical narrative and downplaying the brutality of the true origin story, for the sake of appeasing those in power. Classic Bill Shakespeare stuff.”

History has its eyes on you.

Much criticism lies with the fundamental storytelling decision to make a modern ruckus about America’s Founding Fathers, the men (including Alexander Hamilton) who in the late eighteenth century united the thirteen colonies and co-wrote the Constitution. Undisputed titans of history, they also have blood on their hands, and HoneyRose writes that the musical “glorifies these men, and paints them as self-sacrificing heroes, and honestly normalizes and validates slavery, as well as the behavior of slave owners.”

Stevie, who saw the Broadway production as well as the filmed version, confesses: “I’ve tried (I’ve really tried) to understand what makes people lose their minds over this but I’m still completely baffled by the hype… These were horrible men and a romanticism of them through song and dance just seems entirely misguided.”

Sean is not convinced that Hamilton is a hagiography. “I can’t imagine anyone watching all of this and thinking it paints a portrait of the Founding Fathers as anything other than childish, greedy, venal and self-aggrandizing.” Wesley agrees: “I don’t think Hamilton is trying to be a history lesson, so much as a lesson about how we think about history. It’s a compelling human story told in a revolutionary way.”

That “revolutionary way” is the musical’s central conceit: that of a cast-of-color playing the white founding fathers as they bumble towards independence. Journalist Jamelle Bouie, who regards the musical as “fun, exciting, innovative and, at points, genuinely moving,” wrestles with the “celebratory narrative in which the Framers are men to admire without reservation. Through its casting, it invites audiences of color to take ownership of that narrative, as if they should want to take ownership of a narrative that white-washes the history of the revolution under the guise of inclusion.”

It’s complicated for Matt, too: “It’s widely agreed upon that the show encapsulates the Obama era better than anything, how it coddles white liberals with a post-racial vision of history in a superficial sense, overlooking the insidious and oppressive systems that they benefit from (hearing the audience clap to ‘Immigrants, we get the job done’ unsettled me). Of course hopefully its legacy will be that it opened up more Broadway roles for POC. But I really think that the show doesn’t make Broadway more appealing and accessible to POC, it just makes hip hop more accessible to white people, a launching pad of course to listening to Watsky or something.

“No hate though to anyone that’s completely in love with this, it’s definitely worth seeing despite any hang ups.”

I wanna build something that’s gonna outlive me.

The story doesn’t end, just because the music does. Kai_Kenn has a suggestion: “I have been a part of discussions that dissect the culture that created Hamilton, as well as the culture that Hamilton created, and whether or not Hamilton appropriately addresses the modern issues [that] the cult following proposes it does.

“This is an ongoing discussion that I am trying to be an active listener in and, if you consider yourself to be a conscientious consumer of art, you should too.”

Noah is on board with that: “Reflecting on the past and focusing on the future are not two mutually exclusive actions. Both are a must, regardless of who you are or what you do. A five-star experience in a four-and-a-half-star film. I think that’s just fine.”

Related content

Want to see more of the key cast? Watch Daveed Diggs in ‘Blindspotting’; Renée Elise Goldsberry in ‘Waves’, Jonathan Groff repeat his role as Kristoff in ‘Frozen 2’, Lin-Manuel Miranda in ‘Mary Poppins Returns’, Leslie Odom Jr. in ‘Harriet’, Phillipa Soo in the forthcoming ‘Broken Hearts Gallery’, Christopher Jackson in the forthcoming ‘In The Heights’, Jasmine Cephas Jones in ‘The Photograph’, Okiereriete Onaodowan in ‘A Quiet Place II’ and Anthony Ramos in ‘Monsters and Men’ and ‘A Star is Born’.

Ways to support the Black Lives Matter movement

Official Black Lives Matter’s Resources

Teenagers that have ‘Hamilton’ stuff on their bedroom walls

Films where they mention ‘Hamilton’

[kittyreading]

21 Questions tag

Rules: Answer 21 questions and then tag 21 people who you want to get to know better.

I was tagged by @anassarhenisch Thank you for tagging me!

Nickname: I have a few, Katydid, Kitty, Katilia, Kate, Katiet, Katie Kate, Katie Lady, Ladybug, and my aunt calls me Mabel??? Don’t know why but ya know still cute. (My name is Kathryn)

Zodiac: Taurus 

Height: 5′ 5″

Last movie I saw: In theaters? I have no idea I haven’t gone to a theater in a while, Moana maybe?

Favorite musicians: Amanda Palmer, Alec Benjamin, Billie Eilish, Gorillaz, The Dumblinders, Ruth B, The High Kings, Enya  

Last thing I googled: side effects to tylonal overdoses and caffeine withdrawal

Song stuck in my head: I’ve had “Merry Doll” the song sung by Tom Bombadil in The Fellowship of the Rings (that isn’t even in the movie) stuck in my head since the first Hobbit film came out. It’s like elevator music stuck in the back of my head.

Other blogs: @allaboardwebcomic

Following: 402

Do I get asks: Yes sometimes but they’re usually only if I reblog an ask meme or someone decides to send something really random.

What I’m Wearing: It’s a tan collared midi dress from the brand Ashley? I don’t really know how to describe it, with an Over the Garden Wall bow and some tan boots. I’m a beige queen today. but a cute beige queen.

Lucky number: 8 but only because it’s perfectly symmetrical and it makes me happy

Amount of sleep: 3-5 hrs is my average

Favorite food: Paneer Tikka Masala

Dream trip: Japan for a year or so with my friends and an unlimited budget :)

Dream job: Museum Curator while writing and/or being an artist on the side

Describe yourself as aesthetic things: Studio Ghibli, large trees and deer, house cats next to green plants in the window sill, hot coffee on the table by my computer, blankets and stuffed toys littered over the room, stacks of books piled as tall as I am, sandal wood, and crisp cool rainy days bundled up in sweaters. 

Random fact: The only reason the Mona Lisa is famous is actually because it was stolen in the 1800s. Before then it was neither popular nor considered a masterpiece and I honestly find the fact that people try to explain that it’s popularity is due to her not smile rather ridiculous. 

Languages: English, Conversational Japanese, just under conversational French while speaking but I can read it at a conversational level.

I’m tagging: @cozy-sage @bookcub and @greycatstations 

[aion-rsa]

The Simpsons Season 32 Episode 3 Review: Now Museum, Now You Don’t

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

This The Simpsons review contains spoilers.

The Simpsons Season 32 Episode 3

While it may not be a masterpiece, The Simpsons season 32, episode 3, “Now Museum, Now You Don’t” can hang in most galleries. Beyond the humor, the visuals are quite impressive, and varied.

This is another story-time episode for The Simpsons, repopulating pages from history with Springfield residents.  Lisa is home sick, so delirious she thinks she’s in school. Marge, ever the enabler, encourages her in her fantasia. When Lisa asks if she will be graded on whatever she reads, Marge promises pop quizzes galore.

This really encapsulates the mother-daughter relationship in the Simpson family. Marge is incredibly encouraging, often overly so, when she sees opportunity. This is a chance for Lisa to indulge her most intellectual pursuits, without the resistance of reality, with just a little sweat. Who cares if it’s a fever in the making?

Lisa lives up to expectations because the book she picks to get her through the fever dream is a coffee-table book waiting for a coffee table, an illustrated history of art. She opens to the year 1462, and the first segment is set in Vinci, Italy. Lisanardo is a young artist with a promising future in criminal sketching. She studies with contemporaries such as Barticelli, Gregor the Inconvenient, and Ralfael Mediocrito.  Not everyone can be a genius, and Lisa’s arc is more uplifting, until she pisses off a Cardinal in flight.

The takeoff of Janis Ian’s “At 17” is sweeter than it is comedic. It does show Lisa’s dilemma, and self-conscious awareness. Although her “brilliance genius” is shown, she spends her last supper all alone in 1470. The show mixes some very interesting tidbits about the Renaissance artist.

The notebook Barticelli steals is written while Lisanardo is dreaming, pulling in information from the astral realms, and of course a Magic 8 Ball. This shows sick Lisa can read between the lines of an illustrated art book. The bits about the “secret diary that no one will see for 400 years” works on an esoteric level but also sets up the “Da Vinci Code”/Ron Howard joke, which we were waiting for whether we knew it or not.

The best social commentary of the segment comes from Mr. Burns’ historical counterpart’s idea of killing his way to pope. Because there’s nothing more evil than Christians who are slightly different than his kinds of Christian.  The playing of Nat King Cole’s “Mona Lisa” was a bit too obvious. The Italian stereotypes are thicker than pasta fasul, so thick the cat prefers the sweet death of hemlock to hearing Abe go on and on in the dialect. It seems extremely self-satirical to do an entire episode of exaggerated accents so soon after having to shut down the Apu character.

They’ve done this kind of subversive self-humor before. The “Itchy and Scratchy” show was a stand-in for the flak The Simpsons was getting for celebrating bad role models. But then there’s the “Don’t Smoke” message after Patty and Selma visit Marge, portraying Mexican artist Frida Kahlo, as angels. The show has never done anything like that before. This pulls the show further into political correctness, as if there is some kind of scale and they’re exchanging karmic debt.

The Paris segment is as much a single entendre as it says it is. Barney makes an appearance as a Dionysian supermodel, who keeps in shape by eating and drinking all day. Moe Lautrec gets to enjoy the can-can and keeps liquor in his cane. He may not know enough to hollow it out first, but he can spot talent and sees it in Bart.

Everyone else paints traditional pieces which wouldn’t look out of place in a dentist’s office. Homer plays Mulan Huge, a monarch with Ned Flanders’s mustache who loves challenges to the establishment almost as much as he loves cubed cheese. He issues a royal decree against cheese wheels. Expressionism fits cleanly on the walls of the ruling class, while the necks of Principal Skinner and Superintendent Chalmers have to be measured for the guillotine.

Maggie’s segment as the representative of Renaissance artists’ baby angels goes for the cute, even though Lisa makes us worry why heaven would be so full of them at the time. This brings dark hues to the cherubic proceedings. It is a standard, but exciting, “Maggie Segment,” set to the tune of “Flight of the Valkyries,” as she plunges from the heavens chasing a falling nipple and kills a bunch of unibrow cherubs, along with Homer, who is one half of a young couple. Maggie mistakes one of the Cupid love arrows for a killing one. It’s very Maggie.

The best bit of the Frida Kahlo sequence is the Bernie Babies. Defiant artist Marge tells the biggest capitalist in New York, played by Mr. Burns, that a young socialist has just been born who will take down his empire. Bernie Sanders is of course only a toddler in this tale. Even though he has sandbox goons shaking down nannies for health benefits, Baby Bernie would approve of the message.

Another subtle comedy passing tone was Homer saying he’s never heard of Jackson Pollock or Lee Krasner, yet he is able to name them. Homer wears ridiculous anti-intelligence well. The other gag that works through its sheer obviousness is how $21,000 in today’s money is $21,000.

The rest of the segment maintains a steady comic balance. Burns’ tycoon hires Homer’s Diego Rivera to design a mural for Rockefeller Center. It is the biggest building for seven blocks, but they are long blocks filled with people bumping you. After promising to sell out and also be the model for the Atlas statue, Homer gives the mural a red spin in honor of his wife. She earned his artistic respect by painting her misery. He pays her back by sleeping with other women and realizes his true place in art. This is a fun nod and show of respect for Rick and Morty. The Simpsons doesn’t often give props to their competitors, usually they find a way to lampoon them.

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

Vincent Van Moe’s rendition of “Barry, Barry, Night” closes out the episode on a high note. Actually a half moaned baritone, but satisfying in the comedy sense. The perennially sad bartender, who Lisa pegged as a poet several seasons ago, admits he’s been using the darkness of his soul to water down the dregs, and bemoans there is something growing on his eggs. It is both funny and poignant.

“Now Museum, Now You Don’t” works as a variety show, even though it follows through on one concept. It’s not a side-splitting episode, but the segments allow it to be a varied one. All three segments were well produced, funny and had enough historical trivia to keep it clever.

The post The Simpsons Season 32 Episode 3 Review: Now Museum, Now You Don’t appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/34GNlt2

[auburnfamilynews]

Or... multiple times, but whatever.

This week’s theme on SB Nation is “Times Sports Made You Cry”, and it honestly shouldn’t be difficult for Auburn fans to find something to fit the bill.

From the relentless heartbreak we’ve suffered to the sheer joy of certain seasons and marked victories alike, Auburn fans have always had a reason to shed a tear. Obvious answers come to mind — 2004’s undefeated season, the 2010 national championship and Cam Newton Heisman Trophy win, the miracles of the 2013 season. If you’re a little older, you may draw on some of the wins of the nineties where Nix hit Sanders a couple of times, or Jarrett Holmes field goal going through for the SEC West. And if you’re even older, you may harken back to The First Time Ever in 1989, Pat Dye’s rousing locker room speeches throughout the eighties, Punt Bama Punt, or a hazy visual of Shug roaming the sidelines as the ultimate man of honor.

I’m not going to go with anything super different for my personal reflection, but it might be a different perspective on something that we’ve all seen from a million angles. Here’s when Auburn football made me cry...

THE MIRACLE AT JORDAN-HARE

You’ve seen it from every different angle. This film may have been just as dissected as the Kennedy assassination, only for very different reasons. It’s also possibly the most stark 0-to-60 moment in terms of crowd noise that Jordan-Hare has ever seen. It wasn’t the slow build of the Kick Six, but a cacophony of ear-splitting deafenation when everyone saw what wildness had transpired.

And here’s with the narration, Rod Bramblett’s finest call in my opinion, even higher than the Kick Six.

That hits differently today, just a day after the one year anniversary of Rod and Paula’s passing. I remember listening live, producing the audio of the live radio broadcast for the Auburn Network that evening.

We were all very cautious in 2013. It’s hard not to be a little suspicious of success just a year after the worst season in modern Auburn history. The success in Gus Malzahn’s first season surprised many people, especially when the roster was nearly identical to a team that gave up the year before. Wins over ranked Ole Miss and Texas A&M squads were great, but we knew that we still weren’t at the level of an Alabama yet. Finally, sitting at 9-1, we entered the Georgia game ranked 7th in the country, and we still controlled our own destiny in terms of the SEC race.

That Georgia game was so frustrating. We got up 37-17, absolutely dominating the Bulldogs, before the bottom started to drop out. Aaron Murray led three touchdown drives in the fourth quarter, with the go-ahead score controversially coming on a quarterback dive on fourth and goal. Trailing 38-37, Auburn had just one shot left with less than a minute to play.

It was here that we thought “Okay, well, good season. Nine wins, maybe ten if we get a good bowl opponent, and that’s solid. Great when you consider that it’s only Gus’ first season.” For me, I was too young to remember 1993, but 2004 was a dream, and I never imagined that things could get so good as they did in 2010. The only problem was that as an Auburn fan, I’d seen one year where we did our business actually get rewarded with the proper accolades. We basically forced ourselves on college football in 2010 by going undefeated, and everyone hated us for it. Growing up before that, Auburn football was doing what you were supposed to and ending up as the bridesmaid watching someone else realize their dreams.

Maybe I thought that we’d never have a center stage moment again. Maybe 2012 still stuck too darkly in my mind. It’s all possible that one awful season made me lose true hope that things could be great again. Whatever the reason, Nick Marshall and Ricardo Louis brought back the utter thrill of being an Auburn fan.

I never actually saw the play until replays hit after the game was over. I was too busy smacking Brad Law on the back as he sat near me, and then realizing that I needed to edit the radio call down to something usable for other networks to play. Moments after Auburn clinched the win, the South Carolina broadcast played Rod’s call coming out of a commercial break, since they had a vested interest in the game at the time.

It wasn’t until a little later that I actually started to tear up, though. I’d grown up on Jim Fyffe yelling about Sanders going up over Tommy Johnson, and then really gotten into the broadcasting niche with Rod’s Go Crazy, Cadillac masterpiece. I realized after sending the audio file of the highlight to a distribution list that I’d had a small part in a piece of history. It was almost like you’re the guy who hung the Mona Lisa. A great artist had done his part, but you’re the one who has to frame it and show it off.

After celebrating the win, Brad Law said to me “Man, I can’t wait to hear that call,” and when he listened through a couple times, turned to me and simply said “You just edited a piece of history. That’ll be played at every Auburn game for the rest of time.” The gravity of the moment hit me, and I shed a tear.

BONUS TEARS: 1996 OUTBACK BOWL

Ohhhhhhhh, baby.

So here’s the deal, I was six, and a young Auburn fan. I really didn’t remember watching any games and caring until the 1995 Georgia and Alabama games, which Auburn won.

“This is great, Auburn never loses,” is absolutely the thought that goes through a kid’s mind when he sees his team go 2-0. It’s so easy to be an Auburn fan!

Instead, I got a rude awakening and true initiation into the Family on New Year’s Day 1996. For Christmas that year I’d gotten an Auburn football uniform, complete with pads and helmet, along with a football signed by Terry Bowden. They were my most prized possessions. I was wearing the uniform, pads and all, and clutching the football at kickoff of the Outback Bowl.

It’s shocking that the game was as close as it was for more than a quarter, and Auburn really did control the line of scrimmage for the first fifteen minutes. If not for the wet field, we may have really created an actual lead early on. Auburn led 7-3 a few minutes into the second quarter, and then gave up two more field goals and a late touchdown to go into halftime down 16-7. The third quarter was a bloodbath. 27-0 in the quarter, and Auburn trailed 43-7 before getting a late touchdown from Kevin McLeod to finish the game.

Long before we scored our final touchdown, I took my Terry Bowden football and went to sit on the front steps of 1044 Magnolia Curve and cry. Stupid Nittany Lions. When my dad found me, he was not consoling in the slightest. I learned that we do not cry over football games, and I was treated to a laundry list of Auburn losses that were way worse than the dumb Outback Bowl. Happy New Year.

from College and Magnolia - All Posts https://www.collegeandmagnolia.com/2020/5/26/21271400/that-time-auburn-football-made-me-cry