I feel chatty today.

one of my good friend on DA, torture=device, a few journals back, had discuss quite elaborately on drawfags, which is pure genius writing on identifying the disease of the DA art community and i really have to stress that on deviants that do warhammer arts and the such. if you have not read his journal and never heard of who he is, man, you are missing out on a very talented artist. [link]

me and him are worlds apart in terms on our views and personalities, it is been a great opportunity to know him and share his artistic experience and most currently, his journal i am mentioning: the drawfag. even though some stuff doesn't immediately makes sense and jam-packed with emo-ness.

Let me start by saying that DA drawfags are stagnated artist drowning in their own pool of confusion and ego and the notion of artistic improvement seems like a quest that is so not within reach. Drawfags, ok they cater to their circle of fans and peers who acknowledge their stuff is gold and constantly begging the artist with stupid request and art challenge that ultimately make the already shitty art of the drawfag even worse, hitting rock bottom. This can be seen on a lot of DA space marine artists who keep on producing static, non-improving arts of SM of the same pose, same color, same style, same composition again and again and they use very heavily on art reference. Most of the time of other better artist's art and the worse of all, copying and referencing from GW codex, oblivious to the fact that they have committed plagiarism and when their "art" was view by more experienced artists, they have no idea that those better artists are shaking their heads mockingly and condemning his art to oblivion. Now I am not against referencing, in fact i used it a lot and i encourage it, because it teaches noob artist to be better. you can't run before you learn how to walk. But~~~, if the artist stay in that comfort zone of referencing other people's shit and refuse to grow a backbone and challenge himself to produce his own creative stuff, then you basically know who i am referring to.

Drawfag are those people. They have no chance of creative growth what so ever, because they are just dancing monkeys catering to his legion of fans. whenever he want to do something that is "him" or something to break out of his fandom norm, he feared that he might lose fans over that and thus, he weaken, and continued to produce the same old shit again and again. Which is why he need help in doing his art, he NEED the reference, because he have no hope to draw due to lack of artistic confidence and the skill that is to be developed.

now i pity them, because yes, i used to be them. We are all drawfag when we start to become a little bit famous and there are fans hanging around our page and start suggesting what to draw (what to please them, more like). Yes, it is good feeling that your work is being enjoyed and people like it but at what cost? at the cost of you becoming a robot/vending machine that takes other people's desire first over your own when you are the one drawing? that's too bad. I used to enjoyed it, surrounded by fans, worrying over how much pageviews i got and so on. But a drawfag will realise at one point that all he is enjoying before is all a illusion and when he look into his art, he puked over the grossness of artistic lacking. To those like me, who had been awaken, i applaud you, to those that are still in the illusion, read on and wake fuck up.

so the drawfag realized, his ultimate goal is self improvement and not popularity. he began to become serious, arrogant, and unapologetic toward his fans, they are dragging him down and preventing him from growing. he needed the push, a kick up his arse, to propel him on a track where he can draw confidently, creatively and self satisfied (note: not fan satisfied). His fans became his biggest enemies, they began to badger him, to pull him back into doing what they want him to do, they fear that the drawfag might change into someone they no longer recognise and oh! familiarity is so seductive. this is the stage where a lot of drawfag failed and a few break through. the drawfag think to himself, yeah, but they are friends and it is so hard to gain popularity and peers, might as well do the same shit like always. And so they failed epically. But those that break through, they emerged a different men. yeah, they lose friends and fans, it is the price they are willing to pay. They start all over again, starting to draw stuff that they really like and improve with the scale they never did before and got good, becoming the artists who are worthy to call themselves as "artist".

Melancholic? yes, it is. the factor that govern this is "peer group". If the drawfag continue to mingle around with the same old insecure, lousy shitty DA artists (most of them can't even draw) he called fans, his art will stagnate and ultimately dragged down to the same level as his peers. That is why he have to stay away from his fans. As you no doubtly browse through some really awesome artist on DA, you realized that he is being a real asshole to a lot of people. Not replying comments, being arrogant and act like a big jerk. Well guess what, coz he is surrounded by sea of people who are below his artistic level! if he bother, they are sure as hell gonna bring him down. That is why so many good artists align themselves ONLY with great artists because of that "peer theory". Their artistic skills are almost the same and together they help each other to grow and become better. It is like being in a boat with the same people, moving at the same direction.

All artist are narcissistic and selfish for their own agenda and desire, i truly believe in that. Call me arrogant (i will love you for it ), but i have my desire to grow which is more important than pleasing fans. You are probably shouting your head off at this point: "But you are still drawing warhammer shit! you are no better than those people you mock!" Yes true, i did. It is something i like to draw, but did i prostate myself to start drawing space marine and taking request? no. Drawing warhammer (imperial guard) is something to challenge my skill on dynamism, facial emotion, lighting shadow and shading and more stuff which is on level a lot harder than just drawing 40k superman in a curve armour. And i dare say i attempt creativity in a lot of my work whenever i am possible. All in the grand desire to become a greater artist.

this has been a long text wall, and a bitter pill to swallow (if you are the doomed drawfag and you have endured thus far to read on) and i choose to quote this from Marko Djurjevic, an artist i recently admired.

"Having your work misunderstood happens all the time. At a certain point you have to realize that you can't please everyone. So many times whenever i think a picture is great, some fans is going to come along and say the picture i the ugliest thing he has ever seen. And whenever i hate a picture some fans is going to say it's the best cover ever. If you try to direct your talent in accord with the taste of other people, or by what people see in your work, you are just going to go crazy. There is not going to be anything left in your work that is YOU."



and so, began the new chapter in my life. ^^