MONK BY THE SEA (1810) by CASPAR DAVID FRIEDRICH
FRIEDRICH depicts a monk in a black robe, standing on the white sand of a beach, gazing out over the turbulent waters. The figure is diminutive in the painting, a dot against the vastness of the ocean, representing nature and the divine. In this image, FRIEDRICH is appealing to the divine
The atmosphere of the painting is dark and ominous. The seas are outlined in a dark gray, cloudy fog that gradually fades into the blue sky atop the painting. The majority of the painting is composed of the sky.
The low horizon and the vastness of the composition draw your gaze down to the lonely figure. Only the head and a hint of color in the red of his hair and beard stand out against the black of the sea. The black of his robe stands out from the light sands.
This painting illustrates a recurring theme in his work: the small, stark figure of the human against the magnificence of nature. He used awe of nature to illustrate his ideas about the divine power and humanity's connection to the divine. FRIEDRICH was well-known for his paintings of solitary souls against the grandeur of nature.
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I recently illustrated a memo game "Endangered Animal Babies" for Treecer. This memo game contains 72 unique illustrations and 36 endangered animal species. Each pair consists of the parent and the baby animal and all the illustrations were done in watercolor.
I'm really grateful for this opportunity and very happy with the outcome of the game! The game is sold by WWF Finland and Treecer at the moment.
SET 1| SET 2 | SET 3 | SET 4 | SET 5 | SET 6 | SET 7
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monk and survivor except monk is totally not just recoloured survivor
based on white and yellow sea bunnies CUTIES
the series continues,, i am yet to draw inv, riv, gourmand and hunter as slugs
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scugs based off that one twitter post
https://x.com/erratic_pulses/status/1770480212876185898?s=46&t=A9Fe-Lu4uvp0j9eCV9JRaw
rivulet, gourmand and spearmaster are such ❤️❤️
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Funky Queer Sci-Fi and Fantasy to Read this Pride Month
It goes without saying that one should read queer books all year, but Pride represents a perfect opportunity to wave the flag for fiction with LGBTQIA+ protagonists and themes. So, amidst the flurry of recommendation posts, I present my own pile: specifically of genre fiction!
From urban fantasies about lesbians dealing with vengeful gods to far-future solarpunk road trips starring non-binary monks and everything in between, here are some novels I hold as exemplary examples of imaginative, speculative queer storytelling from the past few years.
Keep reading...
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Sea Bishops & Sea Monks
Ok, so, two of my favorite obscure medieval sea monsters are the Sea Bishop and the Sea Monk - basically what you'd get if mermaids were Catholic. The above examples are particularly monstrous, but sometimes they look a bit more civil.
And you know me, I love obscure monster from myth and folklore, especially when they're really weird and kinda goofy. So obviously I've been trying to figure out how to adapt these two into my fantasy setting. The obvious route would be to make them specific variants of mermaids, but that feels a little underwhelming, so I thought on it and waited for a bit.
Well, inspiration hit recently.
I'm not sure if I've mentioned it, but I've been playing a new video game called Baldur's Gate 3, and one of the side effects of that is that I've been reminded that squid people are pretty fucking cool as a concept, and, as it goes, that made me want to figure out how I could put my own twist on the trope. And as I was thinking of how I could make a squid person that stands out from other pop culture squid people, it occured to me that having a squid head... kinda makes you have the same silhouette as a person wearing a bishop/pope hat. Like some sort of... sea bishop. And sure, design-wise this would be a bit more of a departure from the source material than I usually take when making a Midgaheim version of a mythic creature, but a lot of the key features - the big head, the bishop hat, the flowing cape, the spindly legs - are still there, just in a remixed way.
and fuck you, I want squid people dammit
So these are Midgaheim's take on Sea Bishops - roughly human-sized relatives of krakens, who use magic to help them breathe and walk on land and are prone to disguising their inhuman anatomy with flowing robes. They're very smart and can be dangerous enemies when provoked.
While digging up pictures of Sea Bishops to see if my take was justifiable enough by the loose standards I adhere to with Midgaheim beasties, I found that fucking terrifying picture of the Sea Monk you saw at the top of this post, and immediately my brain went, "Oh, that's a shark. That's a shark that's trying to look like a human so it can get close to you. That's fucking terrifying." And, well, it's pretty hard to lose that mental image once you have it, and it basically made Sea Monks feel more concrete in my mind. They're human-imitating magic shark people. I made mine a bit less horrifying (by basing them on one of the cutest animals on earth, the great white shark), but there'd be at least a few other species of Sea Monk beside my example here, and at least one would have that ghastly "deep sea creature dragged to the surface" look of that medieval drawing up top.
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I know that medieval art has some fun depictions of various animals. Are there any fun depictions of squid (or similar creatures) in old-timey art that you know of and would like to share (either from medieval art or another time period)?
YES, I have a couple
One is the depiction of a Sea Monk , there's a squid in there (but it looks pretty damn good honestly!)
and then my other favorite is from a drawing of a "giant squid" that washed up on an Irish beach
Illustration of “monster” washed ashore in Dingle Bay, 1672
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