Unpolished - representations of self

[liesk.livejournal.com]

Apparently, it just “is.” But if that’s all I let it be, I become far too restless. Being animal when one is human is something that must be complimented by art. I don’t mean anthropomorphic art, because it doesn’t satisfy for very long. For me, therianthropic anthro art tries to capture too much at once and as a result displays very little about what it means to be animal. At best it shows the phantom body – what it looks like, at least – but not what it is like to experience those limbs. What I mean by art is the variety of mediums in which animal becomes aestheticism – from a painting to a dance to a millisecond where it all just shows in the right amount.

I’m still searching. I’m not good enough yet to truly explain how I am through art. The more I practice, though, the more I can feel my fingers grasping onto the elusive bit of reality I’m trying for. I suppose I’ll be done when I create something as a result of being.

I guess that means that art is like entropy. In a closed system, there will always be more of it – because existence can’t just stay as it is, and it can’t fold back into itself. It inspires and replicates itself, although those replications come with mutations that make it seem sweeter or better or just different – and that’s okay with me.

Sometimes I get depressed that this feels like a pipe dream and I’m just confusing myself by trying to really do anything with my therianthropy (because it is confusing, in much the same strange and beautiful way as a dream is), and makes me wonder if my need to create from it is just a way of trying to keep it in the forefront of my mind in order to validate it. I figure it’s probably a part of it. Yet, I think it’s an important undertaking for me. I feel like if I can just accomplish a way of translating it as art, that it will be so much more worth it than just letting it be.

I wont be satisfied until it moves me.

Comments

[aloiis.livejournal.com]

"For me, therianthropic anthro art tries to capture too much at once and as a result displays very little about what it means to be animal."

That is very true. Yet I also keep trying harder and harder again. I think I'm close to it, somewhat, by working on my Monsters in Love concept, which was first intended for gender-things... and with my project of animal folklore and related illustration as well. I just need to keep working on it, but I feel it's taking a different turn than when it was just like elaborate furry art. I don't know.

Your entry makes a lot of sense to me. :3

[liesk.livejournal.com]

As far as I've gleamed from what you've written about your goals for Monsters in Love, it definitely sounds closer to the mark. I'm interested in seeing where it goes, whether it takes a more animal-oriented angle, or gender, or both.

This also reminded me that I wanted to ask you about if/how phantom body and such changed with caracal's phasing out, and representing that, because in our past talks you've mentioned how you've been trying to draw yourself since childhood, and how some of the pieces up on your deviantart would be your last in that line, although I don't know if that's something you're especially concerned with any longer despite the change.

[aloiis.livejournal.com]

Phantom ear sensations (which are the most, if only, clearly recognizable physical aspect as caracal for me) shut off like the other phantom bits when I disconnected/went depressive last autumn for the reasons you know, and I didn't feel much for months after that. When things slowly got back to "normal" is the moment I really noticed things were different, but perhaps it has started to fade much before I disconnected and I didn't notice (though it sounds weird to me). I don't think I'm feeling them anymore right now, but at the same time it's so much part of my self-image that I'm wondering if they're really gone or not. I'm relly not sure, I just know I don't identify as caracal like I used to.