These are six of my personal favorite Macoto artworks… I really love fairy tales so I tend to gravitate toward those pieces, but I really love all of his work!
Tag: fairy tales
Starbucks inspired mermaid for Sketch Dailies!
RGB series
Here’s a thing I’ve had around in my head for a while!
Okay, so I’m pretty sure that by now everyone at least is aware of Steampunk, with it’s completely awesome Victorian sci-fi aesthetic. But what I want to see is Solarpunk – a plausible near-future sci-fi genre, which I like to imagine as based on updated Art Nouveau, Victorian, and Edwardian aesthetics, combined with a green and renewable energy movement to create a world in which children grow up being taught about building electronic tech as well as food gardening and other skills, and people have come back around to appreciating artisans and craftspeople, from stonemasons and smithies, to dress makers and jewelers, and everyone in between. A balance of sustainable energy-powered tech, environmental cities, and wicked cool aesthetics.
A lot of people seem to share a vision of futuristic tech and architecture that looks a lot like an ipod – smooth and geometrical and white. Which imo is a little boring and sterile, which is why I picked out an Art Nouveau aesthetic for this.
With energy costs at a low, I like to imagine people being more inclined to focus their expendable income on the arts!
Aesthetically my vision of solarpunk is very similar to steampunk, but with electronic technology, and an Art Nouveau veneer.
So here are some buzz words~
Natural colors!
Art Nouveau!
Handcrafted wares!
Tailors and dressmakers!
Streetcars!
Airships!
Stained glass window solar panels!!!
Education in tech and food growing!
Less corporate capitalism, and more small businesses!
Solar rooftops and roadways!
Communal greenhouses on top of apartments!
Electric cars with old-fashioned looks!
No-cars-allowed walkways lined with independent shops!
Renewable energy-powered Art Nouveau-styled tech life!Can you imagine how pretty it would be to have stained glass windows everywhere that are actually solar panels? The tech is already headed in that direction! Or how about wide-brim hats, or parasols that are topped with discreet solar panel tech incorporated into the design, with ports you can stick your phone charger in to?
(((Character art by me; click the cityscape pieces to see artist names)))
We are The Muses. Goddesses of the Arts and proclaimers of heroes.
Calliope, Clio, Terpsichore, Melpomene, Thalia
Some Selected Readings I’ve Come Across Recently:
- Spears, Sorcery, and Double Consciousness (Part 2) (Part 3) – a series about African-inspired fantasy and the Western vs Non-Western writer.
- Sexy Loki, Queer Tricksters, and the Problem with LGBT Villains – an opinion piece on how lgbt+ villains are written and used in fiction.
- Postcolonial Fantasy and African Against the Word “Tribe” – a discussion on the use of the word “tribe” in fiction, especially fantasy.
- The “Other” Histories of Fantasy – about (the lack of) non-European settings in fantasy and drawing from history.
- Fantasy’s “Othering” Fetish – about the portrayal of POC in fantasy, particularly how they are “othered”.
- Green-Eyed Asian – about giving POC traits that are more common in white people in an attempt to “beatify” or “exotify” them.
- Respective Portrayals of Asians in the Media and How to Balance Them – a primer on stereotypes and portrayals of Asians and Asian-Americans in American media.
- No Queens in Afrika: Women Rulers in Sword & Soul and Other African-Inspired Fantasy – about the use of the word “queen” in relation to non Western European (mostly African) female rulers.
- Tropes of Women of Color in Sci-FI – an eight-part series looking at five tropes that surround women of color in sci-fi.
- Why Sci-Fi Keeps Imagining the Subjugation of White People – an article about the popular topic of colonialism and anti-colonialism in sci-fi.
- On Black Women, Teen TV, and Fantasy Space – a short article about the desirability of black women in fiction and its relationship with women being validated “through heteronormative romantic success”.
- On the Erasure of People of Color from Dystopian Fiction – about the absence of POC in speculative fiction, particularly futuristic settings.
- Mary Anne Mohanraj Gets You Up to Speed Part I (Part II) – a two-part essay about race and racism in fiction and about writing a race other than your own.
- You’re Hurting My Head Again SF/F – a rant on erasing an entire race for the sake of an alternate history.
- Diversity and Disability – about the lack of representation for disabled people in YA fiction and the two tropes that often surround disability in fiction.
- No, Really, Stop Raping Your Women! – disputing arguments that favor rape and sexual assault against women in fantasy.
- Monstrous Females and Female Monsters – on the difference between the portrayal of male monsters and female monsters, and on what makes a female character a monster.
- How White Writers Should Address Racism – a short post on how characters address racial and ethnic prejudice in fiction.
- Dystropia: Why the Sassy Gay Friend Isn’t Progressive – an article on writing “sassy gay friends” and how it can turn bad quickly.
i want realistic modern fantasy like
someone finding a dragon egg and livetweeting the process of trying to hatch it (with no prior knowledge on how a dragon egg should be hatched)
a guy selling an enchanted sword on craigslist
a tattoo artist who does spell runes but for really mundane stuff like conjuring a bound demonic pen or for summoning your keys
summoning a demon for the vine
selfies with mermaids
prank calling wizards
Because of the fact that I live in basically the desert, it is never moist enough for mushrooms to grow and therefore I never was able to see a faery ring. So I decided to make my own, and I am really happy with how it turned out. Now I get to see a faery ring every day!
I realized I never really got in depth with my character designs and that left some people feeling a bit confused. This was a really fun project though, and I’m overwhelmed at the amount of positive feedback I got from it. Thank you! I hope this little explanation helps.
This is set in the Philippines during the Spanish Colonization era. I have no specific date, but it’d probably fall in the 1800s. I wanted to make it a point that they were all Christian so I made them wear scapulars. (despite how unchristian the step mother and step sisters act haha)
The style of clothing is Maria Clara.The dress takes its name from one of the protagonists in Noli Me Tangere, one of the most important pieces of literature in Filipino History. Although not shown here, I drew Cinderella with glass bakya ( wooden slippers) To push the design more.
The step-mother and sisters were based on Doña Victorina, also from Noli Me Tangere, who was described as a social climber who would powder her face extremely white to make her look ‘mestiza’ or western. There was already that belief that being of Spanish or descent means you are wealthy.
For the fairy godmother, I based her clothes on traditional Maguindanao clothing, although I did take a lot of liberties with it. Instead of a fairy, I turned her in to a diwata which is the closet I could think of to a Filipino version of a fairy.
Lastly, the Prince, I envisioned as someone who came from a sultanate, hence his middle eastern inspired clothing. Honestly, I just didn’t want her to end up with a Spanish prince. ( happy endings with your colonizer felt odd to me)
This is an illustration I did for the August 2014 issue of Popular Science Magazine. The assignment was to show a scifi take on human aging in the future. I wanted to do something relatively positive, so I drew a lady whose life has been been prolonged through cybernetic enhancements and augmentation, so she gets to spend time with her great-great-great-great grandchildren.
Thanks to AD Michelle Mruk!
LemonGrenade 