Fanart

[ataratah]

Recently, I read a fic by lotesse called Airy Cages Quelled. It was an AU of the fourth book in the Prydain series, Taran Wanderer, and it was basically the best thing ever. I've always loved that book (ymmv, but it's one of THE formative stories of my childhood), and in the fic, lotesse turns the story on its head, and tells it from the perspective of the canonically absent heroine, letting her do the rescuing in a way that's... well, I'm not sure why the original story didn't tell it that way to begin with.






The books already have pretty good cover art, which will probably always be what I picture in my head for the characters, rather than say, the Disney versions, so I'm not really sure I'm doing the story or the character justice, but I was definitely inspired to try.

If you know the book though, you should definitely go read the fic.

Comments

[lotesse]

Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. Um. <--- this is me sitting up speechless in bed, and then grabbing my cat and making these sort of "urk"ing noises into her fuzz.

This is so beautiful. The colors are wonderful - they're very clean and crisp and pure, and remind me more than a little about the sort of color palettes you see in early modern and mediaeval art - something about the blue & gold, I think.

I love her hair. I love the shape of her face. I love how breathless it all feels. I love that I see more detail the longer I look.

I'm going to link this all over the internet tomorrow - I'm too sleepy right now to trust my coding skills - and, like, make icons with it and just generally stare at it in bemused joy - but, oh, I think I'm the happiest fangirl on the planet right about now.

[ataratah]

Yay, I'm so glad you like it! There were lot's of other very visual moments in the story I thought about doing, but this part, where she's feeling everything out, felt the strongest to me.

Thanks again for writing it! ♥

[reflectedeve]

Ooh, bb, this is gorgeous. You've done a marvelous job with the coloring here; I love the effects that make it look a bit like paint! There's something in the spareness (and vibrancy) of the coloring that makes me think of medieval art, as lotesse says, which is just perfectly in tone with those stories. Really lovely costume design, too. I haven't read the fic (yet), but that definitely looks like Eilonwy to me ... there's a determined, focused look to her face that's rather spot-on for the character, particularly later in the series.

[ataratah]

Thanks, bb! As you can imagine, there was a lot of tonal control involved! And for some reason, residing it for the web washed out her skin, but... I'm so glad that you can recognize Eilonwy. That's more or less exactly what she looks like in my head (except sometimes then she's wearing armor).

eilonwy finely drawn

[auroramama]

Hushed, focused, on her knees interrogating her future... this is glorious.

Re: eilonwy finely drawn

[ataratah]

Thank you, I'm glad you like it!