Lunamal

With Graduation right around the corner, I cannot help but think about the future and where my art will go from here. This is becoming a very hazardous idea because I also have my senior show to prepare for and I am not sure if this work will fit in with the rest of my work in my show. Thanks to my ADD I cannot focus on one body of work for very long before I get distracted with a new idea. So, I am letting this distraction last until I need to really sit down and create more work for my show in December.

As some of you know, I have been working on a project called "Sketching Daily Challenge" (read all about it in the previous posts). These self and peer assigned challenges were meant to get me sketching again, and not just sketches for the next project. The fact that they sparked a new idea for my body of work was simply chance and I am so glad for it.

I have had the idea for a while that I would create an illustrated series after graduation. I wanted to create a new world and creatures to inhabit that world. I already had the idea of a planet with 6 moons and 7 seasons but more on that later. But what appeared in my Sketching Daily Challenge was something I did not expect. The creatures appeared at random at first including my little turtle-squid (still thinking of a good name for him) who appeared in Scribbly Drawings. The fun part of the scribbly drawings exercise was that you don't know what you are going to get until you see it, and he was a very pleasant surprise.

Then I was given a challenge by a friend of mine to combine my two favorite animals into one "Ani-Morph" and I created Cheeratah, who is my first official creature. He is a Rat-Cheetah hybrid who can run long distances without much effort because of his skeletal and muscular system. And with the creation of Cheeratah, my mind started going. More creatures began appearing in my mind and I had to call these strange anomalies something, but what.

That got me thinking of the world I had already created. The planet (not yet named) is a unstable wasteland of rock that is subject to its moons. Each moon holds an abundance of potential, but the season that plagues each of the six moons is to chaotic for life to be sustained. Something magical happens when a moon gets to its closest orbit to the planet. The moon's environment is reflected on the planets surface and turns the wasteland into a lush environment. The rotation of the moons creates the seven seasons seen on the planet. While each change is very chaotic it is a lot more stable than each moon's surface. This strange union allows life to thrive on the planet.

The seven seasons begin with a form of winter when the ice moon is visible, and is followed by a rainy season which leads to global flooding when the ice melts and the water moon is visible. After the water moon leaves orbit the windy moon. Despite the harsh winds the ground is rich after the mass flood and as the water soaks back into the ground, plant life begins to grow and a time of harvest begins. After the wind moon, there is a brief period where no moon is present in the atmosphere. During this time the planet begins to revert back to it's wasteland core and the planet dries out and is baked by the sun. This ends when the jungle moon eclipses the sun and a darkness falls on the planet and once again life can return to the planet's surface. With the arrival of life, the presence of bio-luminescence appears to give light to the darkness. After this a magnetic moon comes into orbit and the geography of the planet is drastically changed and cliffs and mountains begin to form across the planet. Following this moon as the mountains come crashing down, life in caves begins to flourish as a crater moon appears in the sky. These caves become havens for the ice moon that follows.

So then what do we call these strange creatures that inhabit the planet? I have decided to call them Lunamals (Loo-nuh-muh) because the moons are the link to their survival, and it sounds really cool. The Lunamal have all adapted to living on this ever changing environment and have adapted in very different ways from the animals on earth.  These creatures are survivors in a hostile world.

So while creating the Lunamals, another idea came to me. AJ thought of a way to push this planet beyond an idea. What if I created work that could be housed in a museum setting? What if we were to discover this world what artifacts would we bring back? Why not create a gallery that resembles a museum where these creatures and this planet are the exhibit? Can you imagine the possibilities?!? This completely blows my current body of work out of the water and my mind is itching to create the art work behind this idea! I don't know how it would fit in with my senior show in December so I am probably going to have to put this idea on hold until I graduate, but can you imagine the possibilities?

More than ever before I am ready to graduate and ready to see where life takes me. It is funny how a great idea, a spark of creativity, creates and easiness in our hearts and minds. I don't fear what is before me anymore as I look into the future. Now I strive forward towards the light at the end of the tunnel ready to fly across the canyon in my way.