Magnolia - [ FFXIV Commission ] (Patreon)

FINALLY, something to show for all the work that's been going on behind the scenes. This one took an unfortunate amount of time to finish given the anvil's worth of art block I got slammed with.

What is art block, you might ask? And if you didn't, you're gonna hear it anyway.

Art block is the equivalent of sleep paralysis for art. It's like when you want to do something, you want to move, but you can't. This can happen for a myriad of reasons - not knowing what to draw, personal life issues, burnout, etc. It doesn't have a conclusive shape - for some people it just means being unable to start a drawing at all, for others it means not being able to find satisfaction with anything.

For me with this piece it meant that while I continued to work on it for days and days and days, I simply didn't appear to be making any progress. It was almost like my brain glitched and I continously kept going over the same lines, or changing things that didn't need to be changed because I couldn't find the momentum to continue other parts that needed more work. And in my case, this is decidedly because of burnout and mental exhaustion due to the collective mess that this year has been.

But, thankfully, I found it in me to break that chain and now I'm back and on it. I'm hoping (and praying to some unknown entity) that July allows me to center myself and really be as productive as I know I can be, so please look forward to it! (And if you're waiting on a reward, a commission or otherwise please bear with me - it's coming!

If you got this far, thank you for reading and as always, your thoughts on the piece are welcome and loved!