Well the second MtG card dropped and caught me off guard two weeks ago, though I shouldn’t have been surprised because it was the first day of Aquarius season which is MY sign and season hah. First off, yeah it’s an island, I suppose it’s the obvious choice for what seems like the wettest watery sign except GASP Aquarius despite the name, the associated symbols and myths, is an AIR sign.
For most of these how to reference the sign elements visually was obvious. If it’s earth and you incorporate trees, plants, minerals you get the picture. If it’s a water sign make sure there’s some water, fire, also easy. But air is harder to depict in still images, and what I landed on is this sky element which has a lot of implied movement to it. Like I said previously part of my brief had been to draw as much as possible from my previous sky series, so I plucked the sky technique fom this piece as I also felt it tapped into the 70’s psychedelia vibe I was also supposed to be evoking. You can expect the other air signs (Gemini and Libra) to incorporate this element as well.
The thing I found most interesting in the brief in regards to land types was the association of Islands with “illusion” so another consistent element with the islands will be this idea of the juxtaposition of the surface with what is invisible below it. Probably because this is my sign it’s the one I got the most pop psychology with, and I wanted to play on the stereotypical attribute of both being inscrutable on the surface yet plugged into big complex and expansive cosmic ideas. The vessel of Ganymede the water bearer is represented by the clay covered peak above the sea with water trickling down to join the larger body of water it’s connected to below.
For as long as I can remember I’ve been fascinated with the idea of hidden and sunken underwater cities. When I was a kid my grandfather would take me out in a rowboat and I would watch the ocean floor slowly become murky and disappear as we got further out and I would imagine little invisible worlds and fantasize about going to live there. I actually did an early painting based on Poe’s The City in the Sea a very long time ago, which was flawed in a few ways, but which I reworked in several ways here. Also I just like eels.
Also did you know that Maya wrote horoscopes to correspond with all of these? They all dropped at once and you can read them here!
In non MtG news, I was asked to put together a flyer for the Monthly Fund, a local music series, which has previously raised money for a group I’ve worked with for years Shut Down Berks as well as a ton of other Philadelphia organizers/groups who I think do great work. I was happy to oblige and snowed in last weekend so I knocked it out really quickly. The border is painted and the text and neon orange elements are collaged in digitally from some ink blob textures and hand drawn text I made. The idea is that at a later date I’ll be able to return to all the blank space I left in the original painting to complete it as a personal piece though I’m not quite sure what I want to do with that yet.
