A mind full of pastel and culinary wonders
Hello, everyone. I’m excited to write a little more than usual today, since I have more to say!
My artwork will be featured in Filter Feeder!
I’m very pleased to share with you that two of my climate change-related artworks will be featured in the upcoming March edition of the nature+community-oriented zine Filter Feeder! In the words of founder Arya, “We’re all filter feeders in our own way — trying our best to strain out the most joyful and useful pieces possible from the waves of media, conversations, and interactions that flow through our days. This newsletter seeks to make sense of how those pieces may come together, particularly when related to science, art, and environmental justice.” She always has lots of interesting things to share, so I’m honored to be a tiny part of this project. When I have more details I’ll share how you can get a digital (and maybe physical!?) copy!
New art: “Colon Stew”
In continuation of my quest to draw IBD-related art, this one came to me one day very randomly: a demon eating colon stew…that is, stew made with a (humanoid) colon. I colored this with marker pens, a medium I don’t use very often; I wanted some bold colors without too much effort.
Fun fact: the coloration on the colon (the squiggly orange stuff in the pot) is based on a photo of my actual colon once it was removed from my body. Gross, I know, but that’s the point!
This piece not only showcases me processing medical trauma, but also my abiding love for Delicious in Dungeon / Dungeon Meshi. I’m only on Volume 6 (somewhere towards the last third of the first anime season), so no spoilers please! It’s one of the most hilarious manga I’ve read in a long time, with great art, super creative story ideas, and fun characters. They cook a lot of weird monsters and other things found in a dungeon — it’s basically a quest story where each chapter centers around what they decide to cook along the way.
Lots more weird IBD-related art on the way…
Website update: new collage feature page!
A teeny bit of housekeeping, but I thought I’d share that my website now has a page of my favorite collage pieces.
Current inspiration sources
I mentioned Dungeon Meshi already, but here are some other things I’ve been enjoying lately.
- Old school Sailor Moon anime. I wasn’t allowed to watch Sailor Moon as a kid (I’ll probably write about that in detail eventually), so watching it as an adult is the ultimate inner child comfort activity. I also find it necessary to watch something that promotes the power of friendship and compassion in these increasingly bleak times (and the pastel aesthetic is healing, too).
- Speaking of Sailor Moon, a playlist honoring the 90’s anime. It’s such a vibe!
- This incredibly validating piece by Charlie Jane Anders about how curiosity can serve us when hope maybe can’t
- Weird furby creations…like this, this, and this…maybe it’s more nostalgia-fueled coping, maybe it’s yet another example of how I gravitate towards the combination of the utterly strange with cutesy aesthetics.
- My spouse and I have been on a queer documentary kick. We really enjoyed the intersex documentary Every Body, and I’m still thinking about the message of Framing Agnes, which was as much a meditation on mid-twentieth century trans Americans as it was the limitations of archival records.