As a person who doesn't know how to talk well I get misunderstood all the time but as much as it drives me crazy I don't think it's as deep as your case (":

i didnt want to believe this for a long time-- it feels a bit more cynical than id sometimes like-- but i think i increasingly realize now that actually "looking" at art is a skill many people simply do not have, because they dont understand its a skill you have to foster and build in the first place. the same way that many people will simply Watch Movies and then either put it out of their mind or immediately search "ending explained", ykwim, i think people will often look at a piece and 1) expect a wider answer to reveal itself to them immediately, and 2) shut down/deflect with humor when this inevitably doesnt happen.

the relationship between artist and audience is such a weird tightrope to begin with, but it is especially weird right now. visual art is increasingly part of peoples identities and how they communicate them to others at large in social spheres, which makes art a hot commodity in the personal Consumer/Identity sense -- but it seems like such an uphill battle right now to get that wider culture at large to engage with art critically. "what do i like about it" becomes the more important (read: profitable) question, and "what was the artists intent and how did they achieve this message in their medium" becomes a question people treat as snobbish or bookish rather than The Whole Point. its scary! and very strange. the muddying of the personal with the commercial, ultimately punishing anything personal that cannot slot in to a commercial function.

especially frustrating because, the way i see it, art is a means of extending a hand. the artist begs to be met halfway in their message, and the piece is their conduit to let that happen. it is a disheartening and frustrating experience when that vulnerability and that fervent expression is met with some "me and the boys at 3 am eating beans!!!!" type shit

and again, this feels like a more cynical answer than i wish it was. the way i have gone about these sorts of communication pitfalls has been to simply stop making art with these types of audience members in mind altogether, and commit instead to both myself and to the few who i know will resonate beyond the cursory level. i explain myself less, speak thru my pieces more, and accept with gritted teeth that the main message will inevitably be lost to a wider audience-- and that ultimately, that's okay.

and FWIW-- its a really kickass piece. i wouldnt claim to know all of your intention, but thinking thru the lens of home as a place of release/relaxation made it click for me. peeing is a pretty vulnerable body-state, and your body has to feel safe in order to do it. being away from what youve come to understand as home makes that need for release so much more pertinent. it burns much worse once you know theres an alternative!!

anyway. hope this isnt too long. love your work

The “me and the boys at 3 am eating beans!!!!" problem you’ve described is the really the cause of me writing this journal and I think you covered the whole issue well enough.

But yeah it’s such a strange time indeed! I’ve had occasional thoughts, but it never kicked in until you said it. I was not exactly there and I’m probably romanticizing things - but I think the early phases of online forums/image boards was the golden age where there was this fine ratio between people being critical of art and the effects of globalization didn’t really impact the way we observe art YET.

Basically what mechanical reproduction did to religious art - holy mary paintings etc that were once only visible in churches - when it hit the art books something sacred was finally seen by the public eye for the first time and it was amazing at first. But after a while, the magic dissolved and the sacredness lost its effects. And I think the same is happening online, kind of. The times are moving forward and people are acclimatizing, and there is some sort of back-firing happening because people are not responding to things the same way as they used to. Maybe I went off the track, but that anecdote came to mind.

Anyhow thanks for what you wrote. It was something I needed to hear.

I'm a lurker but I want to mention I like the artwork, both the composition/colors and its boldness. The first thing that sprung to my mind is that the rabbit looks like a gardener standing over his plants but cultivating them with piss, or in other words waste. Maybe my association totally misses the mark.

But for my experience, I don't know about twitter but when I first started posting here I was surprised how many of my pieces were favourited/liked in a fetish context. So from then I decided I'm only okay with posting something as long as I'm okay with "death of the author", or offering the piece as a mirror for the viewer.

Good observation regarding the gardening! Its something that happened by accident, but afterward I became aware of it and drove that concept a bit further.

I had the same discovery regarding people liking posts for fetish context when I started posting art in the early times. And I think after digesting that I've come to terms with it. But it's interesting how this internal conflict resurfaced when I tried to post art that comes from personal roots - and when I think back on it, I probably shouldn't be looking at that as my art becoming devalued, it only got a new branch of appreciation I guess.

Ouh, personally, I respect and appreciate art that feels like a moment of life and you can simply take it how it is. It feels natural, and invokes thoughts/feelings from the viewer. Bathridden and Insomnia are two other examples outside of Homesick where I got this impression.

Based on above, Homesick is a moment where this individual is simply relieving themselves in a spot they can, it's not catering to some kink or 'acting' for the viewer. I think it's neat because it has an urban, almost graffiti vibe, but there's the natural aspect of being nude, doing something normal, and the painted flowers overlaid.

I'm not sure if my perspective makes sense or it's what you were going for, but that's my interpretation!

I feel generally people in the fandom disregard a large part of artistic language when creating visual art. Because of the nature of the Furry fandom, it is intrinsically personal, and individual identity is tied into every piece of work. But oftentimes this means the subject of the peice becomes the most important part; it essentially becomes not much more than an idealized "photograph" of a person that they can put on their wall. Because of this, abstraction is avoided, because it abstracts the subject. Artistic symbolism, playing with perspective, media, etc. also completely loses any kind of abstraction in the intensely individual nature of most pieces of furry art. I think your work in particular brings back the artistic language, symbolism, and abstraction, without losing that identity, and so people really like it.

I was about to write something similar - you summed it up much better than I could have.

The fandom was founded in serial art, which has remained a major component of what guides viewers and creators. Buncha low-brow comic book nerds since our foundation; we like stories and gags and stupid fur puns (and tiddies and dicks), we like characters we can relate to or fap to or even imagine ourselves as, and seeing them in adventures and stuff.

Oh that's not to say there's no artsy-fartsy side. Even early on, amidst all the brush-and-ink art there were dabblings in proper-like paintings in acrylic and oil, and experiments in surreal and such. And there are certainly a good portion of the members who enjoy seeing that sort of stuff in the mix. But it's never really been the core, driving factor of the fandom.

So it is an audience thing. Like, you can go to ComiCon and show off some Sorayama amidst all the TMNT and capeshit and whatever, and you'll likely get a good response. Good luck trying to lead a discussion on, say, Barnett Newman though.


For wolfeblock, since I'm too lazy to make separate replies: I don't intend to discourage you--keep on posting what you're motivated to create! I just suggest tempering expectations. I'd originally put off looking at Homesick 'cause it looked like something which'd take a bit of time to go over; now that you've called specific attention to it, I took the time and..I'm afraid I don't really get it. I'm not great with symbolism though, and you admit it's a pretty personal piece, so it's one of those cases where I just accept that it's beyond me. That's cool though, not every artwork is going to click with every viewer, and by extension some will take different meanings from your intended ones rather than just walking away baffled. If your intentions are important to you, include some Cliff Notes. Elsewise, art will be interpreted by the viewers and there's not much to be done about it. (FWIW, I do enjoy your expressiveness in general though, from gesture and figure to composition and lighting, which is why I watched you in the first place.)

As to your question, ha, yup I've had a few misunderstandings. "Furvert," who was my sole character for a good while, has made me subject of assumptions over the years. I've had people hate me immediately simply due to his name. I tend to communicate in dumb jokes and references, which often don't seem to go noticed (or maybe behind their screens people are just rolling their eyes and going "Oh god shut up you idiot"). I don't really care, I'm having fun, and if anyone else gets my doofiness and enjoys it too that's a bonus.

After reading the first few responses in this post I realized that I didn’t really know who in particular I was asking this question to. Asking one group of people the response I got from completely different people.

But the question of the audience is a good point. I admit I fell into the trap of expectations on the first day I posted that picture, and you’re right - why would I go to a Comiccon to discuss Barnett Newman? But I think what happened is that these online platforms have no ‘separate rooms’, and there’d no wall or doorways between artsy-farty and Comicon. The walls are blurry and you never really know who you’re talking to or who you might get the response from after you throw your post in there. It's such a vague entity - like a fog - and how do I know who to talk to through art, unless I have a few predetermined people in my mind beforehand? (Rhetorical)

But at the same time, I'm aware of the habit I have. I think it is my goal - in a way - to go to this kind of place and talk about Barnett Newman. I want to dig hard and try to find the right people in the wrong place. Because I think I never would have been able to do what I did, had I been in the right place to begin with. But yeah, this is a walking paradox - and I am kind of punching myself through that.

Anyhow, good points you made!

Heh, I noticed that straight off, though it's not like there aren't plenty of FA folks on X and other sites too. I suppose I could've tracked down your post there, dug through the replies, and tried to sort out who those people are, but Real Life has been keeping me especially busy lately. There is loose segregation on these sites though as people congregate per their interests. More like a party where little conversation groups form rather than hard-defined rooms.

Creators generally want to be noticed. Trying to stand out by being way different can be frustrating if it doesn't get enough response. Not trying to be different leads to one of the old fandom complaints, that the furry art is/was pretty incestuous. A handful of styles which are emulated by many. Somewhere between those extremes you'll find your balance.

I think a lot of us grapple with the feelings of being chronically misunderstood and outcast. Otherwise, why would we be here, among our fellow weirdos who don't "fit in"? But even so, it can happen among weirdos, too. I sometimes feel a wave of disappointment when folks read my work very differently than how I intended it, especially when a lot of thought was given to the meaning and symbolism... but over time I have grown accustomed to other people reading things differently, and I try just to relish the wealth of different types of replies things get. Some folks are reading surface level and enjoying it, some folks are digging deep and deriving their own interpretations, and I'm glad for all of it. If someone really GETS a piece? That's even more reason to celebrate. I guess this is just another extension of my efforts to reduce emotional attachment to things and letting them go and taking them as they are instead. Acceptance instead of attachment. That is not to say that I want to be totally detached from my work, because I always want my work to feel like I've got skin in the game, but once you release a piece into the world... it becomes something new to everyone that sees it, and that's something I love about art.

What drew ME to your Homesick piece was definitely the visual languages. I love works with a wide variety of mark making, lots of textures, a piece that feels busy but still well considered as far as balance and composition is concerned. My eye moves up and down the piece very organically. I love the pops of blue, I love the sense of the figure almost existing in a real scenario (a graffiti'd wall with the sky peeking out above) or NOT existing in a real place, but instead reading it as abstracted. I like that back and forth. So that's why I liked it!

I am so glad you posted this, because it made me look more carefully at what is probably the most challenging painting of yours that I've seen.

I think the piece has a real hook. It's a beautiful abstract rabbit man peeing with a striking magazine design. I don't think it matters if initial reactions are superficial and silly. The piece made an impression. People will remember it. Many of them will come back to it. And they will think about what it means and what makes it so memorable.

Of course, a handsome nude male is going to catch my eye, but more than that was the pose. I know that pose. It's the pose of a guy who just got up in a beautiful open space where he's completely at home: like a big, lush backyard or favorite camping spot. A perfect place to feel the morning breeze in one's fur, stretch one's back and empty oneself out without the least hint of self-consciousness.
But something is off. The background is artificial and lurid, the vegetation is graffiti, and the whole scene is on...a magazine cover? It doesn't really make sense. Yes, it's a nude guy, but the nudity is not magazine nudity. It's the basic unselfconscious nudity of a sapient animal going about his life. It's worth noting that the figure is a humanoid rabbit or hare--an animal that more than most absolutely does not belong among graffitied streets with lurid neon colors.

Is this guy trapped, longing to just take a comfortable open piss in his own skin in a place where he belongs, yet caught in a place where he absolutely doesn't? Or is defiantly being what he is, not caring how he appears to others or how they represent him?