Peacocks are hilarious, really. They really are just like

it's funny, I was talking to someone last night who didn't really know what an illustrator was. so when I introduced myself as one, he gave a speech that would've probably gone over well with a gallery artist, but which was precision-tailored to make any illustrator within a 50 mile radius go into eyes-glowing-red kill mode.

his speech was about how there is a difference between craft and art, and that people can practice craft (as in, skillfully execute a painting) without it having any artistic merit.

so I'm someone who gets paid to paint waffles for restaurant menus and dinosaurs for museums exhibits, and AHHHHHH! AHHHHHHH! you can't make art without it being something something you've made. does that make sense? like every illustrator I know has an individual way of approaching any given imagery that is informed by a lifetime of inspiration, and of passive intake of culture, and of the specific mistakes they make because of whatever their particular mass of grey matter deems as important thing to render or unimportant, just fuck it up.

I can make something that is informed by both a century of Canadian print-making and by my own particular neurosis, and it can also be commissioned commercial imagery that I regurgitate without care because I want to pay my mortgage. everything is art, nothing isn't art, art is something sticky and impossible to shake off of you.

anyway he got very wide-eyed and said "I'm sorry if I offended you," so today I feel a bit bad for having gotten so, uh.... excited.

Just a big pile of Shen Qingqiu/Yuan sketches and what not from twitter! He's so fun, and wow...such a huge loser. Had lots of fun drawing my take on him!

🌊

The devastating difference between how much time it takes to write something vs how fast people read it lol

Sometimes you just have one of those moments where the progress we've made as a culture get thrown into stark relief. You look at something and go "Holy shit, that would never have happened when I was a kid."

Today, I had one of those moments when I realized that the teenage boys I'm working with are just. genuinely, openly enthusiastic about going to Build-a-Bear for their outing.

These are sixteen and seventeen year old boys! They just had a whole conversation about what to name their "cute", mostly new squishmallows! They're genuinely excited that they're going to Build-a-Bear this weekend and asking other kids to pick up specific accessories for them!!

Holy shit, that never would've happened when I was 16. None of the boys would have dared to be visibly interested - and neither would most of the girls! There would have been a million gay jokes and "Haha, you're a girl" jokes and "What are you, a baby?" jokes. Teenagers weren't even supposed to care about anything back then!

Less than 15 years later, and I'm watching three 17 year old boys treat all that as not even worthy of comment.

So let's call that a reason for hope. Even when the kids aren't alright, in some ways apparently they are alright. Go Gen Z, honestly. It's so lovely to watch you guys just openly doing and saying stuff that, when I was a teen, would've been a social death sentence.

Hmmm. Do I want to potentially fuck the tags up on my fic to try and reorder the relationships again? AO3 refused to let me last time I tried, but we have very definitely arrived in QiJiu town and this bus ain't going nowhere.

I also should honestly just redo my summary and general tags, because the general theme of the story has moved past the original gimmick, but I don't really know what new thing to put there.

At least the title can stay as is, because connecting through creative pursuits and understanding each other - being in tune if you will - is still the driving theme and eventually we will get back to some music. There will be a concert sooner or later - SQQ promised an event to the BZP servants and it would be a good opportunity to pay them back the wages that were stolen from them.

I need to think about things...

Shen Qingqiu (Shen Jiu) from my fic, In Tune, dressed down for a lazy day recovering from his recent qi-deviation.

Technically unfinished, but I ended up cropping this from a slightly bigger picture for now, because I lost the reference I was using for the outfit. It's never a guarantee that I will still have the drive to finish this by the time I find it again and I wanted to celebrate getting 1000 kudos on the fic with something at least.

what if i just rest my eyes for a second

in my head the star wars equivalent of tswift is some human woman named tay’lor spiff or something and her stans are losing their minds over theories that she’s secretly a jedi singing about the horrors of war, even though she’s from a neutral system that hasn’t seen so much as a moral panic in 50 years

Haven't seen one of him yet but DAMN.

Contrary to popular belief, abandoned WIPs are crucial to the writer ecosystem, as they become the fertile soil from which completed works grow. Without them, the landscape would be sterile and barren

flushed emoji flushed emoji flushed emoji ourghh hes so handsome and tasty

I feel like YQY ghostwrote this ask. XD

Thank you, anon! <3

young artist posting your work online, heed my warning. im holding your face so gently in my hands, you have to stop caring about numbers right now and start caring about making the weirdest and most self-indulgent art you possibly can

Shen Qingqiu (Shen Jiu) from my fic, In Tune, dressed down for a lazy day recovering from his recent qi-deviation.

Technically unfinished, but I ended up cropping this from a slightly bigger picture for now, because I lost the reference I was using for the outfit. It's never a guarantee that I will still have the drive to finish this by the time I find it again and I wanted to celebrate getting 1000 kudos on the fic with something at least.

i hate when i send someone a meme in another language and they're like "uhm... translate? 😒" fucker i sent you a meme where 90% of the words have an english cognate and/or you don't need to know what they're saying to find it funny. can you at least TRY