10 Years of Art

Hello my friends!

This will be a longer open letter where I’ll just be reminiscing about the last 10 years and answering frequent questions that I get. I’ve broken the topics up if you are only interested in any single thing. If you’d like to read something like this then I welcome you to continue on!

2015 Learning to Draw

I didn’t start learning to draw until I was already an adult. I was taught that drawing talent is something you had to be born with. I remember stumbling across an article at work that said you can improve at anything or any skill given enough time and effort making honest attempts at improving.

And I was inspired by this, eventually spending what little extra cash I had (around 20 USD) on an old used Huion pen tablet that they don’t even make anymore. My first time drawing I drew a slime girl, a girl in a bikini, and then attempted a self portrait before I just gave up. It was too hard!

I ended up coming back and trying to draw again 2 years later because I was feeling especially alone. I remembered how nice everyone was, and I wanted to be a part of that kind of community. I have been drawing ever since and I’ve met so many wonderful people along the way!

Evolution of Art After 10 Years

My art has changed almost completely since I first started. I used to draw exclusively fantasy art, then I experimented with NSFW art. NSFW art always interested me because it’s such an interesting topic and an almost taboo way of expressing yourself. I had some confidence issues with my body at the time as well, so I really enjoyed drawing women in different shapes and sizes.

I drew lots of different kinds of art during my experimental stage and over time settled on softcore pinups being my focus, as well as nature backgrounds it was what interested me most!

Art & Pride

Maybe I was a late bloomer but I didn’t realize I was a pansexual woman until later in life. Growing up in a small town I had never met another person in the LGBTQIA+ community. Drawing really helped open my eyes, and just talk with people. It was nice not to feel alone!

I am very devoted about being an ally for the community with my art. I frequently get fearful messages about whether or not I’ll stop supporting gay rights or posting with the pride flag in my signature, ect. The answer is always no, I won’t stop supporting. Even in real life I've taken quite a few steps to improve and join local pride communities, it's something I am very passionate about!

I have to reiterate that I AM a part of the LGBTQIA+ community. I’m a middle aged lady that draws naked ladies for a living, sometimes I’m not sure how that doesn’t give it away lol!

Why haven’t you taken commissions lately?

Honestly this has been a tough thing to answer. I’ve taken a role in real life that requires a lot of time and effort to do. Sometimes I have to move very quickly and I’m unable to draw for a week or two at a time. But I’m financially stable for the first time…. ever in my entire life! I was even able to get a small surgery last year that I desperately needed.

So unfortunately when I’m done working it’s been difficult to get the drive to draw consistently. The last thing I want to do is make my lovely commissioners wait on me. I will open commissions in time, I love drawing for others, but I just don’t have an exact date.

Leaving Twitter

As some of you may be aware I have completely removed my account from twitter awhile back. I kept getting flagged, temp bans, ect for posting with a pride flag in my signature. The final straw was when I was banned for posting my Transgender OC Delilah holding a Trans Pride Flag during Pride Month for ‘spreading dangerous ideologies’.

I didn’t want to be a part of that kind of website any longer, it was grossing me out honestly! But I do have a Bluesky now, and I’d love to have you follow me on there for exclusive art variants, and even some old art posts!

My Bluesky Account: https://bsky.app/profile/isyld.bsky.social

What happened to your Gumroad sets?

I do get posed this question a lot, I had hundreds and hundreds of unique pictures, variants, tutorials, and handwritten thank you cards that I designed on Gumroad before the ban on NSFW art. As sad as it is, a lot of that artwork is just gone to the void. The stuff I do have I don’t know where I’d just dump 100s of variants of the same picture in an old artstyle that I’m not overly fond of viewing.

Maybe if there is interest or I feel up to it I can dump images on Bluesky sometime, we’ll have to see as I go through my old hard drive!

Creating Sunny Macchiato & More Sunny Facts!

Did you know Sunny is short for Sunflower? Sunny’s first appearance was only 4 years ago, in April 2021! Isn’t that wild? She absolutely took over my art page, usurping my ORIGINAL original character Isyld who was later redesigned into Jasmine the squirrel dragon.

During that time I had just started to dip into furry art. I was experimenting a lot with different character designs. When designing Sunny I actually wanted to make her a representation of me, and I wanted her fur to be bland and normal, her hair to be generic, ect, because I always have viewed myself as a very basic, generic, boring, ‘normal’ person. But I gave her little spots on her fur with hearts because it reminded me of coffee foam.

Sunny lives in a trailer park because for most of my life I’ve bounced around housing, never having a place to call home. When I designed Sunny I was renting and living in what was essentially a storage shed / garage, always afraid of when the landlords would cut the lease. To me, Sunny represented freedom and stability in a way. She was always happy even when I wasn’t!

All in all, thanks for all the love over the years!

As silly as it may sound I think that the art community, and expressing myself through my art has changed me quite dramatically over the years. I’m 10 years older, I’m going gray, I’ve only got enough possessions to fill a suitcase, and I’m happier than I’ve ever been. Life has started turning around, even though it took 10 years of work to do so!

Sure there were haters and jerks, and I would occasionally get mean mail & messages, but overwhelming you all were sweet and supportive of me on all my journeys. So I guess I wanted to write this letter as a sort of thank you!

Thank you to everyone who comments, likes, and shares my work. Thanks to you who are simply watching from afar. Thank you to my commissioners and those who’ve gone the extra mile to support me. I couldn’t have done this without you, and I am so thankful to have you on this art journey.

Here is to the next 10 years, I hope you’ll stay with me!