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Various stars & moon details from my gouache paintings 🌙✨

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𓆝 𓆟 𓆞

post/artist

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@3deifiedart

why are you as an adult open-mouth coughing all over the place

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Moonrise Phyllis Shafer — 2015 oil on canvas

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TW: suicide, violence, death.

This past week I went to two vigils, having never been to a vigil in my life prior. Both were for trans people.

One was a trans person who very publicly completed suicide at a parking garage both my husband and I park at for school. There wasn’t a mention of this person being trans for a couple of weeks in any aspect even though she literally wrote a suicide note sent to the Trump administration detailing many things wrong with what’s happening in this country. She also wrapped the trans flag around her body, something many people ended up seeing. The family is being odd about her name publicly being out and I don’t want to tread around that issue, so I won’t say her name (at least for now), but I did want to at least mention the fact that there was little to no publicity about this.

The other trans person was Sam Nordquist. I am now seeing a lot more publicity around him, which I am thankful for. He deserves to be remembered and mourned. For those who don’t know about him, I won’t get into specific details, but will at least mention that he was brutally tortured for over a month with his body being found somewhere that’s roughly an hour from where I live.

This circles back to the fact that I went to two vigils for trans people who died in the past month and geographically were pretty damn close to me. It’s terrifying. Regardless of the nature of their deaths being different, it’s just more proof that we need to be there for each other as a community. There’s a lot of fear and hopelessness going around, which I wholeheartedly understand. But if we are going to survive as a community, we need to have solidarity. It’s going to take us all working together to fight this fight. And as always, my DMs and ask box are open to anyone who wants to talk.

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“Someday there’ll be a celebration throughout Oz that’s all to do with me.” 💔

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i feel like this is important enough to put on here.

if you have any videos on youtube make sure this is unchecked

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Ari had gotten a deck of queer Tarot cards and she was basically doing a three-card pull. She was giving us tarot readings. She was very in her element and I was like, 'You should do this for a living.'

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Fiyeraba parallels (7/?) ━ Fiyero pushing people away in Dancing Through Life vs Elphaba pulling him back

His fluidity, ease, and elasticity speak to his ability to maneuver and avoid. He’s quite avoidant. He has these bright, shining moments with everyone but never really allows the other person to land it with him. (...) Elphaba has a calming presence on Fiyero and allows him to be himself. It’s a real privilege to meet someone who sees you for who you really are. - Jonathan Bailey

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Gustave Moreau - Study for Lady Macbeth - (1851)

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Fiyeraba + text posts (12/∞)

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A Crash Course to Kendrick's Super Bowl Performance, from a Black Woman

Note: this does NOT go in depth into all of the song's lyrics. I don't have time to recount two decades of his discography. This is just a summary of the performance itself.

Let's start with the first visual we get:

UNCLE SAM - most notably recognized from WWII American wartime propaganda, Uncle Sam is the personification of American patriotism and freedom. The term "uncle" is also evocative of Uncle Tom from Uncle Tom's Cabin, an abolitionist book that aided in inciting the Civil War. Uncle is also a very common term (both endearment and derogatory) towards Black men (eg. "unc"). Samuel L Jackson was fantastic.

Uncle Sam also resembles a circus ringleader, notable for my next point:

THE GREAT AMERICAN GAME - no, not Super Bowl. The GAG is us the people being pitted against each other: through late-stage capitalism, through the culture war, through class warfare, through being built of the backs of slaves. We are all players in the GAG because none of us on this site were the oligarchs seated at the inauguration.

This is also seen as Kendrick's stage was a Play Station controller. Not only did it remind of circus rings visually, but it was a game battle stage. The Great American Game is a battle royale of the commoners for the amusement of the rich whites.

Remember the foods / Them color was tin and brown / But now they 100 and blue - For this I'll just say, look what the last election said about lowering the price of eggs... and look at the prices now.

The revolution about to be televised / You picked the right time / But the wrong guy - Election 2024 once more.

THE FLAG DANCERS - yes, the dancers formed the US flag... off of the backs of Black people. Not a single white person in sight, and that's true of the cotton pickers in the fields. Plantations are part of how the US came to economic prominence after being a "backwater" colony. Remember tobacco? Cotton? Our bloodlines do.

The red and blue dancers are also notable for representing the Crips and Bloods, two infamous street gangs. The dance in Not Like Us is the Crip Walk. I recommend researching more on your own time about them, but just know they are a large part of the stereotype of Black people being "ghetto."

TOO LOUD, TOO RECKLESS, TOO GHETTO. Do you really know how to play the game? - This is exactly what Black people, especially Black men, get told all the time. It's why we change our names on resumes if they sound "too Black." It's why we codeswitch in non-Black company. This is especially rich considering how non-Black people love our culture and love to make money off of us, as the latter part of the quote points to. And it's even more profound during the Super Bowl-- the NFL is majority Black players.

STREET LIGHT A CAPELLA -- "thug" stereotype dancers to counteract the a capella connotations, with Uncle Sam then saying that Kendrick figured out "bringing other street guys around being a culture cheat code." Yes, this is a direct hit at Drake (listen to "Not Like Us") but also politically. Look up "model minority". Notably I would point to Candace Owens, or the Miami Venezuelan political group that's been in the news recently, especially as this directly led to Kendrick being surrounded by...

DANCERS IN WHITE -- it's white America. That's... that's the allegory.

NOT LIKE US TEASER -- Kendrick says "Not Like Us" is "their favorite song." -> he means white people specifically here. It comes after he's surrounded by all white dancers, the women around him who are his call and response are also in white (my opinion, they represent the industry). He's saying "Not Like Us" is the favorite of yts because it is about BLACK MEN FIGHTING. This again is reflected in the video game stage and ringleader Uncle Sam.

SZA -- instead of giving what they want, we see SZA. She's one of Drake's exes and Kendrick has always supported her.

ALL THE STARS -- This was in the first Black Panther movie, which I recommend you watch. Rest in Power Chadwick. Notably, this movie was incredibly mainstream as a major Marvel movie, and then we have Uncle Sam say...

"THAT'S WHAT AMERICA WANTS: NICE AND CALM. DON'T MESS THIS UP" -- translation: Marvel (the industry, America, etc.) wanted a safe, semi-pop song because white American likes safe pop songs, not Kendrick's usual heavy rap style about his life as a Black man! Don't mess up what you've got going mainstream for having this "Black rap feud" with Drake, who is an R&B model minority to white people because he's safe.

So what does Kendrick say?

IT'S A CULTURAL DIVIDE / IMMA GET IT ON THE FLOOR -- He was warned not to be political or apologetically Black for this Super Bowl performance, but he is using this big stage opportunity to speak out.

40 ACRES AND A MULE / THIS IS BIGGER THAN THE MUSIC -- 40 acres and a mule are what the freed slaves were promised. Instead, this land went to white sharecroppers. Research Jim Crow laws.

THEY TRIED TO RIG THE GAME / BUT YOU CAN'T FAKE INFLUENCE -- rig the election, rig the industry like with model minority Drake, rig the Great American Game with culture war to distract from active class warfare.

NOT LIKE US -- the only thing I'll mention because it made me holler is Serena Williams crip walking on Drake's metaphorical grave. She's another one of his exes.

TURN THE TV OFF -- exactly like he said! The TV is a distraction, the Super Bowl is a distraction, the mainstream news is often a distraction. Turn it off and get with your people!

GAME OVER — could not see this on my stream but at the end of the performance, the lights in the stadium spelled this out. The world is watching, America…

In conclusion, Kendrick Lamar is a visionary and thank you for coming to my TED Talk.