This was a freebie commission for Glen's brother's wedding reception (it's going out as a...oh it's hard to explain, but it's gonna look cool I think.

I got Glen to hold it for a sense of scale.

Hee. And hey, look, I do something other than animals and people!





( More madness under the cut. )

Opalescent Rooster

Man, mad detail. It's ready for colouring now. Woot. :)





( Detail under the cut. )

- On hold -
27.5 x 39 centimetres (11 x 15 inches) on
cold-pressed illustrator's board
waterfast, archival fineliner, pencil, watercolour pencil, acrylic, gouache

No prints will be made available (or if there are, they will be very small versions), because I cannot get a high enough resolution picture of the final. Apologies.

( Full process and large image with details under the cut. )

This picture is now ready for colouring. And I'll do no more ink work on it, dammit! Except for signing it. At some point.





( Six pictures under the cut, starting from basic sketch to finished inkwork. )

One of the things that's hard to find in contemporary shamanic practices (especially if you're not a Core shamanist), is a sense of community. Whether that be online, or in person.

Practicing as a shamanist can be a lonely path in general. I mean on the outside looking in, it sounds like a crazy religion. You have a person who talks to spirits and land-wights, who believes in gods and the power of sacred animals, who often works to shepherd dead spirits to their resting places, to heal the soul, to travel to invisible worlds that are more commonly accepted to be fantasy or make-believe, rather than the real places a shaman knows them to be. Being a shamanist often involves not just working with pre-existing spirits and deities, but meeting new ones, and bringing their stories back into the world. It is always about walking a fine line between respecting the past, and being a pioneer at the front of spiritual practice.

And any pioneer, in any walk of life, can be difficult for others to accept.

But I'm not talking about a sense of community outside of shamanism here, I'm talking about a sense of community within shamanism. I have this dream, you see, of being able to sit down with a group of people; either online or off, and discuss the ethics of tricking soul fragments into the body. This example, is just one of the many things I devote a lot of thought to, and wish I had more input on. You see, some of the more ancient shamanic cultures simply tricked, connived or plain trapped soul fragments to force them back into the body. With contemporary psychology - or at least, with my limited understanding of it - being as it is, forcing anything back into the body presents problems. How to reconcile the differences? I'd love to brainstorm with other experienced contemporary shamanists... but... where are they?

I've been a shamanist for about 8-9 years now. I run my website; wildspeak.com, I've been a member of countless forums, both shamanic (including the once excellent, but now very quiet English-speaking Kondor forum) and general pagan. I used to be active in the Western Australian Combined Covens community (where I only ever met one other neo-shamanist, but I'm sure there are others), and I'm not exactly new to the crowd. And I can say that I don't know of any community setting where a group of contemporary non-Core shamanists could talk about the ethical dilemma I raised above. Hey, if you know of any, tell me!

I have people in a one on one setting I can talk to, via email. But no real sense of community with it. Once Google Wave comes out, of course, that will change. Because then email / community will be one and the same, and I'm hoping to see some changes in the way the often-solitary-but-community-driven shaman / shamanist responds to this kind of technology.

The things I'd like to do with groups of contemporary non-Core shamanists is extensive. I'd like to see new or learning shamanists experiment or offer soul retrieval / depossession to other shamans/ists with experience (who require it, by the way, not people who are splitting their soul for 'learning purposes'), so that both can go through the process together, and learn together, and create a bond. I'd like to see ethical discussions about the best soul healing techniques, and like on the old Kondor forum, discussions about the best ways of getting from place to place in the Otherworlds, and the best ways of settling down disgruntled spirits of the dead (which, in the past, has ranged from cupcakes, to tea, to chanting, to talking to them, to bringing touchable, affectionate animal spirits along with you). I'd like a community, or communities that worked to solidify otherworldly UPG, while at the same time; show fearlessness when it comes to bringing new UPG to the table, as is our responsibility as story-tellers and makers.

For now, I'm limited to writing posts like this one, and often resolving these issues by myself. Shamanism is a lonely path, my friends; but it should never be this lonely.

Click Me! Click Me! Click Me! Click Me! Click Me! Click Me! Click Me! Click Me! Click Me! Click Me! Click Me!

Snow White and Rose Red

This picture broke my brain in all the right ways.





( Snow White and Rose Red; check it out, yo. )

Now, onto my next project!

For a short time only, DeviantArt is offering FREE shipping (globally, ANYWHERE, on ANYTHING) on its prints. This is for the next four days only.

So if you were thinking of getting some of my artwork in print format for Christmas, now's the time to do it!

Snow White and Rose Red

Detail shot.





( Full image, and two more detail shots beneath the cut. )

On the edge of a poor village, bordering the forest, lived an old man and his spoilt daughter. The daughter only ever ate one thing; rabbits. She begged her father for rabbits all the time, and refused to eat anything else.





( The rest of the story, and the large picture for details are behind the cut. )

A print is now available for Everest and the White Fox:

The black and white for this was an utter bitch, and probably the most intensive inkwork I've had to do for a while. The photo does none of this justice, but that's okay.





( Larger one with epic detail under the cut. )

There's a thread in Pagan Forum that I can't reply to (keep getting a text-based error message, boo), so I'm going to write my reply here. Because...well...I do't know what else to post about today.

Anyway, the base question was 'is art useful?' Most people replied that aside from it being kind of aesthetic and mostly nice to look at, it mostly wasn't practically useful. One artist even replied that he thought the process of art was useful for him, but that he didn't see why it mattered to anyone else.

I wrote this:

I think art is useful, including on a practical level. I'm going to stick to the visual arts, because it's what I know and it's what I've studied.

Art is mentally stimulating. Anyone who has ever owned an animal responsibly, or been interested in animal research, knows that mental stimulation is very important to prevent degeneration of mental AND physical health. For monkeys in a zoo, mental stimulation might come in the form of hiding their food. For elephants, it might come in the form of training them how to paint and select different colours. And of course for humans, it comes in the form of everything from reading to writing to viewing art to having conversations and so on.

Art that is purely aesthetic can stimulate endorphins and even adrenalin in the body. Endorphins are important for those prone to depression, and a person who has enough inspiring art in their lives tends to be healthier than someone who doesn't. This is why some therapists are now starting to implement 'inspiration books,' where the client actually cuts out and pastes down all the pictures that make them feel good or safe; in other words, trigger chemical reactions that start to help ameliorate the worst affects of depression.

Art therapy itself, as a separate form of therapy, has shown immense success where cognitive forms of therapy have failed, particularly in child and adult survivors of sexual assault - one of the most damaging forms of harm out there. In that sense, art is not only aesthetic, but absolutely, definitely, practically useful. Especially when one considers that many survivors of sexual assault (particularly childhood sexual assault) are not really useful members of society themselves, until they have processed the harm they've experienced.

Art therapy is a mechanism that enables many to end up making money / providing shelter / finding healthy relationships for themselves. It is a nonverbal way of expressing an atrocity that frequently resists verbalisation, and all of the art therapies - journalling, dream work, sandplay, dance, music etc. - are considered extremely useful, if not indispensable, in the arsenal of a trauma counsellor for that reason.

Art on a political level is useful in getting people thinking. Recently, there was a controversy in Australia regarding a photographer who had, as one of his subjects in an exhibition, photos of naked children. The continent got involved in a very inflammatory debate about whether this was child pornography. Kevin Rudd himself, our Prime Minister, even got involved. The art itself was instrumental in getting many people to decide whether the line between art/harm was, and where they stood on the position of child pornography in general. People who would never go to an art gallery usually, or weigh in on the subject, became suddenly vociferous about expressing their beliefs and their stance within the community. It strengthened some community bonds and weakened others. Without the art in the first place, this continent-based debate would not have occurred.

The visual arts are also something that present an idea 'instantly' (though repeat viewings enrich the meanings behind something). Unlike a book, which requires the time taken to read it. Or a song, which requires the time taken to listen to it. Art is received in the brain in the first instant that it is witnessed. As a result, the physiological and chemical responses we have to it, tend to be pretty immediate. Most people know almost straight away if they love, hate or 'meh' a picture. In that sense, art can deliver instant messages in a way that even conversations cannot. It makes it very useful as a delivery method in our communication systems - this is why so many graphic designers exist to communicate meaning through art in advertising, logos and so forth.

*

Anyway, now I'm off to have a shower.

My life has been hijacked by strange rabbit things.

As it's going through a dust storm rather unlike any other

Australia is seriously just one of the most awesome places in the whole world.





( These photos are not tinted or doctored! )

Feeling very bad for the asthmatics in Sydney though. Take care of yourselves!

I toyed with the idea of calling it 'deer little brother,' but I thought that would be lame. So I didn't...

Dear Little Brother

Based on the fairytale, 'Little Brother & Little Sister,' told by the Grimm brothers.

The sister holds her brother, wounded in the hunt. She looks out onto the world, defiant but also resigned to a cruel fate; dependent on the bounty of the the wild to survive, and the mercy of others.





( Larger and more awesome pictures under the cut. )

Two White Ravens

My 'take a break' artwork! I heart this piece, it was spontaneous, though it was a theme I'd been wanting to express for some time. And I've been obsessed with white ravens for a long long time. Both for shamanic reasons, and because well - white can be shiny and iridescent too!





( Larger pictures behind the cut. )