marrael

Full term! I'm doing better with this pregnancy than Sarah Palin at state governorship, hahaha!

Last week's gynae appointment had the doc estimating the baby's weight at 3.2kg (just over 6 lbs.) which he says is the average weight for Asian newborns. Guess we're in the above-average-size zone already, though this girl is half-angmo. (Though, from the way some of our neighbours and my relatives talk, they keep calling her "angmo baby" and it's a little irritating because it's like ignoring my half of her genes... and who's the one doing all the work?)

Discomfort is almost continuous now. The nausea/heartburn/bloat I was feeling weeks ago hasn't let up even though the baby's head has long been engaged (at least 2 weeks now). The doc was surprised to see the baby still riding "high" in my belly, and that she could still kick and move her feet (ow) and not just in a limited squirmy manner (foetal position? No, this one's a flippin' cancan dancer). October 17th is almost looking too far away for my comfort, but there are plenty of reasons to wait till the 20th/21st, like my father returning from a meditation retreat and Jason finishing his exam-marking (though why his silly employers can't arrange alternative help or deadlines, no-one knows--though I suspect the answer starts with "stu" and ends with "pidity").

Am really not up to a lot right now as my body gets lethargic/sleepy/breathless/gaggy all at random times. On the amusing side of things, the Buddhist monastics that my father is with (they're in Washington state, like, half the world away) have just told me to definitely let them know when I go into labour, even if they're on retreat. And they want pictures too.

WellPoint cuts workers health benefits
http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20091003/BIZ/910030367/WellPoint+cuts+workers+health+benefits

To those employees getting dropped or their health benefits cut:

Well, now you know what it feels like, assholes.

(No, I cannot feel sympathy, not yet, even knowing that the ones who suffer/will suffer are a different group from the ones who make these decisions. These people at Wellpoint thrived and profited and were rewarded for denying people coverage. It's due to pure willpower I'm keeping the f-word out of this post.)

WHAT A COOL TITLE! I thought. Actually, I still think so. It's nothing if not evocative. I would love to read the anthology, but the cover... Oh, the cover. You can see it on John Scalzi's blog and I thought it was a joke (thanks, Genreville).

I think spongmonkeys are funny, and I can get with their aesthetic on YouTube, Quizno's commercials and the "French and Saunders" opening. But books? ...Books are sacred, damnit.

Anyway, I got the itch to sketch. In under 20 minutes, here's an alternate cover idea I would have offered as one of the sketches if I had been the designer.



Again, sorry if this is bad form. But the title is so cool. And those two animals have strong graphic elements/silhouettes.

Also, there ARE Xs for the raccoon's eyes and OF COURSE the cover still deserves drippy blood.

(Added note: I usually come up with multiple designs/sketches, and that's the usual way to work. So, I do wonder what were the alternate ideas offered for the DAW cover, if any, and what those looked like.)

... and so that I can make a bit of noise on this LJ using my Muppets icon.

Revealed: millions spent by lobby firms fighting Obama health reforms
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/oct/01/lobbyists-millions-obama-healthcare-reform
A bit duh, but has good numbers provided by the UK paper.

Chicago loses the Olympics and my wingnut coworkers CHEER!
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/10/2/788946/-UPDATED:-Chicago-loses-the-Olympics-and-my-wingnut-coworkers-CHEER!

Whut? What's even more headscratching is how the blogger had an email sent to him with the following text:

Hi Eclectablog!
Read your post on the Daily Kos.
Really classy; nice combinations of four letter words. You must have been an English major at some liberal college.
Probably got all A's.

Bob

That's a winger insult? The sarcasm's kinda contradicted by the liberal college reference so as far as I can figure, Bob wound up saying: "You're smart. Haha!"

Also, it's jlundberg's birthday today! (October 3rd, because those of us in the East are in the future.)

And, estimated due date for the baby is exactly two weeks from now (Oct 17th, Deepavali/Diwali here in Singapore). Though, only 2% of babies are born on their EDD, while 80% are born within the 10 days before or after the EDD. Truth be told, I think a Diwali birthdate would be uber awesome (even if the holiday moves from year to year). I really should make a proper LJ post about recent goings-on, but I'm too busy cherishing my Last Few Weeks of Freedom.

Parting funny video:

Via telemann:

Representative Joe Wilson can be emailed here, or reached at (803) 939-0041, (843) 521-2530, and (202) 225-2452. His Democratic opponent in 2010 can easily be donated to via ActBlue.

Belated thanks to all who sent birthday wishes in Twitter/Facebook/phonetext. (And hey, I didn't know I share the same birthday as Stephen Fry!) I was quite bad in returning messages as my birthday present to myself was painting time (for myself, no commissions!) off the computer. And it was awesome, though the little 4" by 6" piece I worked on turned out more problematic than expected and had to be attempted twice. Hahaha! Can't have everything go right on my birthday. (In which case, it didn't anyway, but that'll be grumbled about elsewhere.)

The weekend felt long and busy but in a good way--birthday plants were bought, the maternity ward at Mount Alvernia was toured, yummy meals were devoured, multiple cakes were cut and eaten, packages were received, some housework was done--and if you're wondering about that last thing and how it is "good", trust me it is when one's energy levels become highly erratic.

I have more to be thankful for (than to grumble about) but I don't often mention that--It's not that I don't regularly think about it, but somehow when I get on the Interwebs, it's to run into more US healthcare idiocy or the latest SFFcommunityFAIL or the difficulties faced by friends that I'm quite useless helping with either due to distance (usually) or that it's something quite out of my experience. Sometimes I post comments, sometimes (by the time I come in) there's not much to add and other things to do... like getting off the computer and feeling happier for it. 2009 has been a good year so far, even if most of my LJ posts (especially the ones with the "pregnancy" tag) have been unfortunate work-related rants inspired by the touring job that I don't have to deal with now (thank all the gods). My mind's gone into an odd state---a constant awareness of my luck and how good it is--not enough to win the lottery (the luck I have has never included gambling luck) but to be surrounded by people who are good to me (now that I'm not touring, haha), are supportive, warm and helpful (strangers too) and wherever I am at any time is a good place to be (with the exception of the MRT trains at peak hours).

Since my pregnancy posts have been mostly negative so far, I'll start the exception in this post. ( Behind cut so macho men don't have to read )

And that's all I could think of to cover for now.

To see the "birthday piece", just click below:

( Tweets behind the cut )
Follow my tweets at Twitter

( Tweets behind the cut )
Follow my tweets at Twitter

Sorry, I really do need to get this off my chest.

Lots of my pregnancy/baby shopping and purchases so far have been through online classifieds, forums and eBay.com.sg. Much of the items picked up in this way are reduced in price, while, though nice, isn't my only reason--I declutter regularly, I know what it's like to struggle with usable items that one can't personally use anymore, so I like helping people who are smart enough to realize someone else out there can use it. Lastly, it's just the more carbon-conscious thing to do, and some items I actually prefer secondhand because they'd have a higher chance of having gone past their chemical off-gassing period. I won't have to wash quite so obsessively to get rid of flame-retardants and crap.

( Rant behind cut.... )

What's sad is that, I've done at least five purchases through these ads now, and it's more often the foreigners/locals who've lived abroad who get their ads right. It's really not all that difficult. I really don't understand this level or distribution spread of clueless-ness posting ads online. The energy and time I'm putting into this online secondhand shopping is starting to be not worth it.

They're giving Liar a new cover. Yay!
Although, some of the remarks about cover art/design as a "marketing tool" strike me as kind of silly or irksome. I'm not complaining about changing art to incorporate more diversity, but switching a pencil from a boy's left hand to his right in the cover art so that it'll appeal to a wider audience? REALLY? OMG I can't connect to someone who holds their writing instruments in their SINISTER hand!

http://www.100abandonedhouses.com/
Some of those houses are gorgeous.

Republicans Propagating Falsehoods in Attacks on Health-Care Reform
Well, duh. But at least someone in a newspaper finally says it out loud. (via sinboy)

Wait, the name "MammothFAIL" was claimed already...
TOC: The Mammoth Book of Mindblowing SF edited by Mike Ashley
The comments are still coming in.\n
This is why Science Fiction can’t have nice things Because the title and footnotes make me giggle.
OK, so it's been about a decade since I read (and enjoyed) Paul di Filippo or SF on a regular basis, but still, it was enough to do a *headdesk* as another writer goes down in flames... and bad metaphors. (The worst was reading the email exchanges between him and rosefox: "...are people too" and "The best part of beating your head against a wall is how good it feels when you stop.")

Singapore's national day is coming up August 9th. The comments on this page make me proud:
God sneaks into our classrooms
On the other hand, the people on the Straits Times STOMP site? Not so much.

I just woke up less than an hour ago, am functioning (barely) with no coffee, and found out from John Douglas, World Fantasy Awards Administrator, that I am among the 2009 nominees for Best Artist.

OMG NO WAI

But I'm on this page so it must be true! http://www.worldfantasy.org/awards/

Will un-friendslock this when it sinks in. I've already burnt my toast this morning...

Edited to add: A huge THANK YOU to all those who had a part in this. I have no doubt this must have been because of the Field Guide to Surreal Botany, and all you contributors and supporters were a huge part of it!

Or, this modern fantasy novel is Empty of Inherent Existence. A quick book review.

I remember my Clarion experience including at least one discussion on what Buddhist SF/F would look like... well, now I know what a Buddhist modern fantasy novel looks like. And, it is glorious.

(UK cover shown on left. The American book cover looks like crap. I remember seeing it before now and filing it under "WTF". Thank god the local bookstore had the UK version.)

I actually rarely read fiction anymore, but a surfing session brought this book to my attention when I was looking at (how the hell did that happen) my usual blogs on the environment/globalization effects. What got my attention was that the protagonist of the book was a fox spirit. And not just a fox spirit, but one of Chinese origin. (I'm so used to Japanese ones appearing in fantasy, I've felt like Japanese culture now owns the creatures, while seductive supernatural females of Chinese fantasy will have to be confined to ghosts and snakes. Anyway.) This ancient fox spirit was now working as a prostitute in modern Russia.

I was sold. (Again, thank goodness it was the UK version we found here. You all now know my shallowness with book covers. Janet does not like ugly books.)

Checking online, there are two great reviews of the book out there already:
Demonic Muse (NYT review)
Pinning the tail on the fox (Ursula Le Guin's review in the Guardian)

I'm really glad now for the NYT reviewer providing more info on the writer's background and previous books. Victor Pelevin's book is originally Russian, and I kept wondering during my reading how much might have been lost in the translation to English. But the English version reads beautifully. The whole entire book is smooth and consistent in its odd, flippant, yet endearing tone. Really darkly hilarious and clever in a lot of places (I lost count how many times I exclaimed aloud while reading) and in others, I would stop reading because I was afraid the magic would pass away too quickly. (In fact, at one point, I stopped 10 pages from the end. But the ending did not disappoint.) It was perfect. In all its layers. In how the weird, almost clinically-written romance was still touchingly sweet. And I also understand now why I'd found it on the environment/globalization blogs. And as for the Buddhism bit, it still astounds me that this book combines the concept of Emptiness and shapeshifting exquisitely, and it is about Enlightenment/Liberation.

(There was the one part of the book that didn't work for me, and it was where the protagonist was explaining her name. I've ranted before on how most Westerners screw up Chinese names and name conventions--and there are one billion of these names on the planet!--and I feel that there's a FAIL here over the way A Hu-Li and her fox sisters are named. "A" being the impossible name. I still wonder if the naming mistake was Pelevin's or the translator's, or the problem with trying to make the Chinese name sound like a Russian expletive.)

Anyway, for what it's worth, I recommend this book. I don't know that it'd be everyone's cup of tea, but it rocked my world because it hit everything I wanted from a fantasy book but didn't know I did, or that it was possible. I really can't give it more praise than that.

Alas the American cover is still atrocious.

Sigh.

http://justinelarbalestier.com/blog/2009/07/23/aint-that-a-shame/

(via shvetufae in this post, which I also recommend)

Fantasy book covers are the topic of this post. Before I begin, I feel I should make a couple of things clear: Taste/art is subjective, and this is just one gal's opinion. Secondly, to get right into it, bad covers aren't always bad because they have bad art. And, good art doesn't always make good covers. 'Cause there is art on one hand, and then when it's on a book, it isn't just art anymore, it's design. That design is the outer package of the book, the outer skin for the writing and world within.

Covers should do the following, in this order:

• Look good. (Duh. More in a bit.)
• Convey the title and author's name (Duh again. But I've seen effective exceptions that still worked because they rocked Rule #1).
• Carry art that effectively conveys the atmosphere and/or the world/characters in the book.

These three objectives can be met an infinite variety of ways when you think about it, and are equally applicable to all books. Except, for whatever reason, a lot of fantasy book covers tend to give themselves away as fantasy book covers from miles away. It's due largely to the artwork--the often brighter-than-life colours, the fantasy beastie/characters looming, frozen in a dramatic moment, all combined to scream In Here Be Fantasy! (Unicorns can be particularly embarrassing. I blame My Little Pony.)

Here's a radical idea: I don't think all, or even most, fantasy books actually require the dramatic/fantastic scene illustration as the cover art. It is (too) common; for me, it's not a done deal that the fantasy element must be shown on the cover INYOURFACE, or be realistically painted, or be a scene in the book. (In fact, the last thing is kinda boring. If writers strive to show, not tell, I feel covers should intrigue, not show. I actually dislike most literal covers. I will more happily accept a scene that happened off the pages, 'cause that always feels like a bonus.) So, should the obvious/cliche fantasy element or scene be sidestepped in the art, the art can still capture the feel of the book without being literal. I do love (accurate) portraits that look like portraits (and POC looking like POC), but I also love dramatic landscapes and cityscapes. And I love painterly realism, but I also love art nouveau, art deco, German expressionism (dark and tortured stuff), and riffs on classic art masterpieces. I am partial to books that look like artifacts from their own world. And there are historical fantasy novels (where the fantasy's kinda minimal) that I thought would have been wonderfully presented like an illuminated manuscript frontispiece, textures and patterns and jewelbox colours conveying the richness of the character interactions within.

Maybe some (or all) of those ideas sound gimmicky, I don't know. I don't think every book needs to be uber-unique; but there are definitely a lot of books out there I wish had had more thought put into the cover, because the contents deserved better.

Anyways, here's a smattering of the books I've owned because it was their covers that sold me 90% of the way:



There are a couple of non-fantasy books hiding in there. Because I think their design would work equally well on fantasy novels. None have realistic looking art. (I kinda eschew photorealism on fantasy covers... I want to imagine the book's scenes myself!) And only the first book has a painting that looks really modern fantasy art (and it's an award-winning piece IIRC). The last book, which is fantasy, has been published with several covers. Here's another one it's had that I would never have touched:

Not because it has a sweeping pink sky (I had said I like dramatic landscapes). Not because I think the art is bad or especially cliche (it is a little, mostly because of its overwhelming pastels). Not because it makes me think fluffy romance novel (even though I know it isn't). But because (apologies to this book designer AND cover artist) it looks fluffy (not my thing) AND its cover does at least two things that, for me, put it in the category of not-great fantasy book cover design. (Time now to find your your favourite hated book covers to check which crimes they've committed.) And here's my list of the habits of not-so-successful fantasy book covers:

• Full bleed artwork with no visual separation (borders/frames/lines/boxes) of the text from the art. The art goes to all four edges of the cover. Sometimes, it's even a full wrap to the back. All the text is set directly onto busy artwork. This makes the small text hard to read, at the same time the designer often makes the title a heavy visual sledgehammer (size- and font-wise) to stand out against the art. This doesn't always look bad, but I've learnt more often than not, it's a quick way to make even good eye-catching art look like a cheap and cliche fantasy cover very quickly, quicker still if the next thing is also done...



• Bright-colour text set directly on bright-colour art. Oh, I've seen this done sometimes to brain-melting effects. Neon green text on magenta skies. Red text against deep emerald forest. Yes, it's great someone knows their complementary colours, but sometimes, white, black, or a bleached/subdued colour next to a strong one gives a calmer (and classier but equally contrasting) effect. (In art terms, contrast, which designers/artists want in order to make a cover pop!, can come from differing values/chroma, not just strong-colour-vs-strong-colour.)

(And, no longer just based on this example alone:)

• Distracting novelty font face is used, and/or more than one novelty font face. Drippy fonts should always be out unless it's a joke or for kids. Fonts that are easily recognizable or comparable to one used by a movie/computer game, also out. One novelty font is more than plenty. It's often overkill on long titles. If a second typeface is desired, then the second should be unobtrusively normal.


• Plain bad art. Oh, I'm not covering cliche or offensive art yet. I just mean plain bad art, which should never be used for covers: (TURN BACK NOW) [Amazon link opens in new window] I warned you! (If you've never been exposed to Poser in fantasy art before--thankfully rare in paper publishing--I apologize for this brutal deflowering.) There's really not much more detail I can go into about bad art, just to say that there are some things out there that make pics of overdone boobtastic fantasy females look like the work of Leonardo da Vinci.

These have been my main four things I think fantasy book covers should get away from. I haven't and don't formally define great book covers, often it's a matter of just flipping these four wrongs around. Almost everytime I find a great cover, it's got the text tastefully (sometimes creatively) laid out, on evocative artwork, the colours are well chosen, and often there are either borders or framing effects on the edges of the cover/artwork/boxed text, and I think these four guidelines are just about right (assuming the designer has also got his/her design basics down). All in all, I think covers are just more successful when it appears the designer approached it as packaging design (good contrast, colours and composition with all the elements taken together), and not just fantasy art with text added, slapped onto a book.

ROF has recently made me think of adding one more though:

Cliches! Armour on a female body that mysteriously leaves the cleavage uncovered, or heroes facing off big ugly foe, the spaceship in space, or the angsty male hero looks angsty, or the sexy female protagonist is sexy, or the mysterious mage is mysterious and makes magic. But I may half-mean the rule against cliche art in jest, because some of them do wind up reasonable covers if no other design wrongs are committed. I feel cliches actually adapt and change somewhat (though pin-up fantasy art is one of the exceptions), and what is done to death for one may be sparkly new to another.

Cliches changing, new cliches emerging? Here are some amusing parting links:

Scifi Guy looks at urban and paranormal fantasy book covers:
http://www.scifiguy.ca/2008/10/urban-fantasy-paranormal-book-cover.html

The use of photography clip-art in book covers means sometimes you see double (while we're still looking at meesterious nekkid bodies with tattoos):
http://lurvalamode.wordpress.com/2008/12/08/bdb-doppleganger/

And one of my favourite sites where bad covers get trashed, and paranormal/fantasy romance book covers come up often enough:
http://www.smartbitchestrashybooks.com/index.php/weblog/comments/they_make_lead_sunglasses_dont_they/
http://www.smartbitchestrashybooks.com/index.php/weblog/categories/category/covers_gone_wild_non_snoop_dogg_edition/

I probably don't sound very fantasy artist in this entry, because I'm not selling the genre very well here, am I? I just think illustration and book design are separate things, amazingly, and some of my graphic design experience and a LOT of my personal reader/viewer tastes are in this post. And while I like fantasy art, I know it sounds strange that I don't think all fantasy books need it. But there ya go. Apologies go out if any of my examples of what doesn't work, offend.

Thoughts/comments/flames/silence? (It's now past 1am for me; time for bed.)

I've been glad to see the topic of sexism in fantasy art being discussed lately (beginning with Tempest's post about the covers on Realms of Fantasy, then on Doug Cohen's LJ, then Jim Hines'. This post processes my own thoughts on the subject (some have long been simmering away) as someone who started off a fantasy reader, then also a fan of fantasy art, then also an artist, and then, occasionally, an art director at Two Cranes Press.

Becoming a "full time" fantasy fan when I was 13 years old (as opposed to just being partly committed to it), I took (I think) a rather holistic approach to the whole thing. I had opinions about plot, the writing, the characters and world building, I had opinions about editorial decisions in the industry when I ran into writing that was pretty atrocious, I also loved imitating cover art, interior art (where applicable) and book design, and analyzing the problems when I thought a book looked bad. Poor Jason knows I can get really anal about books when we're making them. As "practice", we stand in the SF&F shelves in bookstores and analyze covers, which I'm pretty sure must be annoying for anyone unlucky enough to be in the vicinity when we're at it.

In that sense, yeah, I'm shallow. I do judge books by covers and design. (On a small tangent, I think good covers are even more important for small presses and e-publishers. It's one of the fastest, most direct ways to project that you've got quality control.)

Now, to the art.

When I started making my own fantasy art, I looked at a lot of it. The libraries and local budget bookshops carried (American) fantasy art compilations where Frank Frazetta, Boris Vallejo, Julie Bell, and Rowena Morill were hailed as the masters of the genre. Their work occupied the majority of the pages, while other artists like Bob Eggleton (think big spaceships) and Michael Whelan maybe got one or two pieces published, with the more testosterone-y stuff having been chosen for display. I decided very early on that while Vallejo and Bell painted anatomy superbly, I was not a fan of their work. Which set me against almost everyone else I knew in my teens who looked at fantasy art. ("You don't like Boris Vallejo?" has been said in disbelief to me more times than I can count.) I did like the better Dungeons & Dragons art I saw during the 1990s, and I really liked the art books coming out from Paper Tiger, a UK publisher, that really opened my eyes to different styles and media in fantasy art (including collage and colour pencils--still damned unusual today). The UK books also tended, generally, to have less cheesecake and beefcake. Strange, yeah?

My sensitivity to sexism in fantasy art got heightened when the Internet came along. I think I joined Elfwood when it was still just elfwood.lysator.liu.se ( ;) ) and the artists on it were still only in the double digits. (Over 10 years ago.) This was the site for aspiring fantasy artists everywhere to upload their work, and as membership ballooned, so the number of pictures of buxom beauties in magic underwear. It became a bitter joke that their magic floating boobies were what made them fantasy. Although, some people meant this quite in earnest.

"It's fantasy. What are you getting upset about?"

Look, I get it about the beauty of the female form. They're just curvier, even when they're skinny, they're visually appealing... while guys are just (again, this is going to sound very familiar to poor Jason) icky and rough looking and have too many difficult muscles to draw, unless you're painting lithe, waxed elves, or a guy in spandex.

I also get that it's fantasy. But it seemed no excuse for artists (especially male artists) to invent women from their imaginations where the only ones worthy of being depicted were of chest size 40DDD and in worlds where gravity was 1/4 that of earth's, and the climate always too warm for the ladies and freezing for the men, if one had to judge from the clothing. But voicing these criticisms on Elfwood was actually bad, very bad. Worse when the artist in question was, by all evidence, a nice and approachable guy. There was a picture I once saw on Elfwood that nearly had in tears and screams, I was so angry. It was this:

White, plain background (because painting backgrounds is for the professionals). Ink and colour pencil drawing of four characters, all standing together. Three females, one male. The females are all young, lithe, curvy, and naked (full frontal) and looking at the viewer. The rightmost female is partly leaning upon the lone male. He is completely clothed, from neck down to his feet, because he has been given full military dress. He might have been holding a weapon.

I think the picture would have been less offensive to me if the man had been completely absent. Because what it said to me was that the women needed Mr Man to defend them, and this Mr Man was entitled to, and lord and master over these three women, who were happy to be completely naked in his dressed presence, because it would please him and they owed him the sight of their young, perfect, and perfectly identical bodies. There was just no story I could come up with for the picture that wasn't sexist and demeaning to women. And it pained me to do so to a nice and approachable guy, but I posted an anonymous comment that tore it apart. On both technical grounds and what it implied for the sexes. (It didn't change anything. He never got it. From ink and pencil, he would later go on to working in Poser, and his 3D model women were always naked and in sexual poses. Look, today I recognize his right to make porn. But that's what it is to me, porn.) To this day, I don't regret my comment or that it was anonymous, because the answering flames my comment received were fucking vicious. With the "it's fantasy" defense coming up in almost every flame, and "But the artist is nice!" in every other. No one would talk about gender equality. (Maybe I shouldn't be too harsh on this fact. I bet the majority of us on Elfwood were in our teens. But couldn't it have been used as an opportunity to recognize what sexism is?)

As an artist, I've dabbled in erotic/cheesecake art. Rarely, though--if artists paint what occupies their minds, then, well, draw your conclusions about me from there. In my darkest hours, during my desperate episodes of trying to work out how to sell more, to become more prominent and popular, I've done pictures which were what I thought people wanted to see. Unsurprisingly, it's not very satisfying painting stuff you don't believe in.

Now, to the present. Barely clad women still vastly outnumber barely clad males in fantasy art. I bet you most artists would be found guilty for this imbalance (for reasons I've mentioned above, for me personally), but they are not the only ones guilty. Art directors and publishers are as well. There are fantasy art books dedicated to the female form, and few (if any) for the male. As I've mentioned in Doug Cohen's post, it's not that I want to see more fantasy beefcake (though I've joked about it--it would be great to see how male viewers would react to being as constantly sex-objectified as women are in fantasy art), it's just that such art really makes the fantasy art genre and the fantasy fiction genre look bad when such misogynistic and shallow visual representation is accepted as the norm. I think everyone (artists included) could benefit from recognizing this. It's also not merely about the female being painted more often than the male--it's about whether the picture also tells you she has a story and brains, or is just "o hai do u think im hot?"

You can tell this subject is near and dear to my heart.

(I didn't even get to female objectification in advertising and popular culture, or the history of calling females vain because male Renaissance artists kept drawing them naked and looking in mirrors, or the label of black women as wanton sluts during America's slavery era when the female slaves were deliberately presented nude at auctions. I think this rant has been long enough.)



In my next post (because now I've got to go work on a painting and aurgh, do the housework), I'm going to go into what I think makes a good fantasy book cover, and just how I'd like the fantasy genre to be visually represented at the bookstore. Because it still is the section of the bookstore I feel a bit embarrassed being seen in. I'm not the only one, right?

( Tweets behind the cut )
Follow my tweets at Twitter

( Tweets behind the cut )
Follow my tweets at Twitter

( Tweets behind the cut )
Follow my tweets at Twitter

( Tweets behind the cut )
Follow my tweets at Twitter

( Tweets behind the cut )
Follow my tweets at Twitter