(R) Nunc Stans (Sketch for SunPraiser)

CW: discussion of death

It's-a me, the bakery. Delightedly, I bring to thee a little silly heresy. Well, maybe heresy 500 years ago lol.

Before I dive into the context of this picture, I just want to explain the title.

Everything Everywhere All At Once (caution, maybe this is a spoiler?) is a good phrase to remember what Nunc Stans means as a concept spanning many texts over many centuries. Although the movie uses the multiverse trope and waves a hand at timelines and plausibilities, the underlying idea is that of the title itself. The main character, rather than being broken like her daughter by the incomprehensibility of her attained Vision, succeeds in her task of reunion through familial love. It was a wonderful movie, but if you are curious about these ideas specifically, I also recommend reading Alan Moore's Jerusalem, where all of its core concepts, especially the "bagel," are explored more thoroughly - and in a context that is viscerally personal to the author. Including much of his family, across generations. I feel like EEAAO was either directly inspired by Jerusalem or, what I may prefer, creators are independently speaking about the value of spirituality (here specifically its angle on Fourdimensionalism / Eternalism) to this ailing age where, urm, money is grinding us up. Or is it the decay of culture betraying the end of an era, or a beginning? Or is it really just Twitter. Hahaha.

I want to hold on to this, want to believe in it. The past is not the past. I write this text in the same moment as I wrap up my grandmother's wine glasses in January, whispering "I love you" like a mantra. Lock her door one last time, give a silent kiss to the  corridor that smells of the best and brightest days of my childhood. Somewhere in a different year that I can't yet see, I organize my mother's funeral the way she organized that of hers, alone. Their strong hands on my weak shoulders. I was always the type to dwell on these things, and I could go on for hours. About the erosion of relationships, peace, culture, compassion and the mind itself, how everything is sand running through our fingers, and how painful and exhausting and beautiful life is, and how grief makes it worthwhile with a sudden blow that never stops. I want to hold on to the idea that death contains renewal. But ngl, grief is grief. Without work like this and a good bit of freedom, things would suck right now. I want to express my gratitude for your support here, and for this job in general. That does help.

An interesting tidbit. The last major vacation that grandma, mom and me went on would have been Austria, in the August of 2021, where I am dealing with my first ever physiological issues. One night over some wine, I talk to grandma about how it's so strange trying to earn a living from an online community, but that there is one of them I may see in person. He is the first fur I meet off the internet like this, as he happens to live near where we are staying. It's a total coincidence, and it becomes a perfect afternoon. We do also talk about our grandparents, sitting outside in the sun. And he becomes the first other fur to draw on my iPad, and it's for him that I draw again for the first time after my pain break, worried about the future - where he happens to win the first prize of this raffle two weeks after her passing.

To be totally honest, I did want this picture to be a little bit more than just a couple construction lines and blinky dots n shit. But when it comes down to my use of Tarot, I still don't trust myself to fully understand their import. Nunc Stans helped, in a vague way. From Cycle to Cycle Solyr twists, oscillating between 2d and 3d. Some construction lines and compositional points are highligted in a way I felt to be similar to how Gothic Architecture bares its construction - though it doesn't look alike, of course. The large Star of David, as a qabalistic device, resulted from my inclusion of what was originally meant to be a plot triangle - as narratology was one of my entry points into spirituality. So it was also kind of a coincidence. If you wanna know more about the egg, it's just in there for fun. It glows with the colours of what I believe to be the King Scale, but I'm not at a level where I can throw around mystical stuff with any kind of authenticity lmao. Overall, the picture is more of a "there was an attempt" type situation. But the momentum of the coincidence, the thoughts it set in motion, the immediate way it connected my grief to my work, that was what mattered to me. And I'm happy to say that SunPraiser, as a fellow enjoyer of metaphysical and spiritual ideas in furry art, took it in a positive way. But at the end of the day, I did take the risk of going too far knowingly. That is another thing loss teaches. I have to become who I am. Make the art I do with conviction. Stop obsessing over people's opinions of me. And that is, by the way, what Artistic Freedom has been too. Another piece of the intuition puzzle. Now for some more puzzling.