my dream is still to do art for stories and books
i was rewatching the rite of spring segment from fantasia and i've got to wonder. Why Did We Draw Archaeopteryx Like That. i remember toys having that same, boomerang arm shaped pose too. it's like a monkey lizard more than a bird.
Ooh okay this is a fun one cause while it technically is an Archaeopteryx and is listed as such in the production draft, I don't think the design is based on Archaeopteryx at all!
To me, this "Archaeopteryx" almost exactly resembles something else, the fascinating historical phenomenon called Proavis.
Proavis, or Tetrapteryx as some four-winged interpretations were called, was a hypothetical prehistoric creature that was proposed in the early 20th century as a best guess at what the unknown ancestor of birds could have looked like. The illustration above was drawn in 1926 by Gerhard Heilmann, a Danish artist and amateur scientist who argued that birds evolved from non-dinosaurian archosaurs like Euparkeria. In his 1916 book Vor Nuvaerende Viden om Fuglenes Afstamning and the 1926 English translation The Origin of Birds, he presented Proavis as the imagined midpoint between a scaly ground-running archosaur and Archaeopteryx, which at the time held the title of The First Bird.
Other versions of the same hypothesis, like William Beebe's Tetrapteryx above, were published and discussed around the same time, but it was Heilmann's Proavis that gained immense popularity to the point that bird evolution was considered essentially "solved" for decades. It was also painted by Zdeněk Burian, one of the Old Greats of palaeoart, which kept the concept alive in dinosaur books for decades as well.
Of course further study has shown this hypothesis to be incorrect and that birds are instead members of Dinosauria (and honestly Heilmann either missed or ignored a lot of evidence for a dinosaurian origin of birds even in the 1910s), but the Proavis to me remains a beautiful and fascinating concept that represents scientists and artists striving to understand the prehistoric world and the passage of evolution, much like we still do today!
And of course, its popularity in the early 20th century put it at the perfect time for Fantasia's artists to take... let's say heavy inspiration from Heilmann's imaginary Proavis when depicting a creature that was intended to be Archaeopteryx the whole time! The pattern of feathers matches up almost exactly, although the larger leg wings might have been inspired by Beebe's Tetrapteryx as well:
So to get back to your original question that led to this whole deep dive, artists didn't actually Draw Archaeopteryx Like That except when they were mistakenly drawing something that wasn't Archaeopteryx at all! If you want to read more about the Proavis and Tetrapteryx I recommend this Tetrapod Zoology blog post by Darren Naish, he does into more depth about the history of the concept and some of the unusual evolutionary ideas that Heilmann used to arrive at this weird and cool imaginary creature!
had we discovered Microraptor yet, and just misidentified it, or is the fact that we just HAPPENED to discover a small, gliding dinosaur with four feathered limbs a coincidence?
Nope, Microraptor was completely unknown and wouldn’t be discovered for around 80 years!
Beebe’s Tetrapteryx having four wings was actually based on his observations of bird embryos developing winglike feathers on their legs which were then lost, and drawing the conclusion that they must have had a four-winged ancestor.
Not only is this in line with our current understanding that ancestral states are sometimes reflected in embryonic development, but he was actually entirely right! While Microraptor wasn’t part of the direct lineage that led to modern birds, much closer genera like Anchiornis and even Archaeopteryx show that long, stiff feathers on the legs are indeed the ancestral condition of modern birds!
^ our current view of how Archaeopteryx looked based on more recent reexaminations of the fossil material, from Longrich, 2006.
Important hot tip for literally anyone purchasing art
If an artist you rly like doesn’t have a public commission sheet or perhaps you have an odd but reasonable request your best friend will be “I will gladly compensate you for your time.” Literally the moment an artist sees that you’re actually going to pay them for whatever weird request you’ve got, they’re like a million percent more likely to respond positively to whatever your weird request is. For example: I love birds, and I was seeking out a nice state bird cross stitch pattern that wasn’t too complicated. I found one I liked on Etsy, but it was actually selling the finished product (a gorgeous quilt for about $2000) and not the charts, which was what I wanted. No problem! I messaged the seller and said “hi! I love your beautiful quilt, but I am actually interested in the cross stitch charts. Do you still have them? I would be more than happy to compensate you for the trouble.” I have no doubt that this lovely woman has been demanded for free labor countless times. It has happened to every quilter on planet earth. She told me that she would mail me HER ORIGINAL HANDWRITTEN CHARTS for about $30, since she drafted them herself and wasn’t planning on making another quilt. I gladly sent $50 her way and told her she could just scan them for me if that was easier for her. Artists are, by and large, lovely people who want to help you. Please, just promise them that you will fucking compensate them for their time and labor.
☝🏼☝🏼☝🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼💖
I lost a lot of my raw files of artwork that I've had for the past 7 years 🙃🙃🙃🙃
I'm fine
Ranger Rick's Nature Magazine; March 1979 edition. Illustration by Peter Zallinger.
How do you take photos of paintings? How do you price paintings? My cat will not help me in any way.
Figured that maybe I wouldn't hate my bolder ink nibs so much if I just got to know them better, and started an experimental ink drawing to give them a proper try.
Turns out that not only was my hatred of them entirely justified, the feeling is also mutual. Currently fighting my way through the rest of this with the same sunk-cost-fallacy fuelled resentment as my father raised his family.
Okay I don't hate the end result as much as I hated making it, but ultimately the creation process sucked so much ass that I don't think I'll do that again.
hi i hope you don't mind me asking! who are some of the artists that inspire your work and if any art movements too, which ones? i absolutely adore your work and wanna dive into the artists that inspire you because you fill me with so much inspiration 💫
Duilio Cambellotti
Paul Jouve
Norbertine Bresslern-Roth
J. C. Leyendecker
Théophile Alexandre Steinlen
Akseli Gallen-Kallela
Harry Clarke
Nico Marlet
Mike Mignola
Carl Otto Czeschka
Alphonse Mucha
Klaus Haapaniemi
Sanna Annukka
Takato Yamamoto
John Bauer
Ivan Bilibin
Gennady Pavlishin
Evgeni Rachev
Ludvig Hohlwein
Tove Jansson
Just to name a few that have influenced me a lot and continue to live in my head permanently! Sorry about the long post, I thought it'd be helpful if I included examples.
My favorite art movement is art nouveau, I like poster art and antique fairytale illustrations a lot, and in terms of art history I'm most interested in renaissance, early baroque and gloomy 19th century romanticism.
A gaggle of Ammonoids. Can you name them all?
Why yes I can, they’re The Boys!
Ah yes, how silly of me!
I'm not great at naming but I tried my best:
Norman Lindsay (Norman Alfred William Lindsay) (Australian, 1879 - 1969) - A standing female nude with raised arms
picture resolution 1245 × 2264
More by #norman lindsay enjoypaitings
The Bather, now in mini fig form! I’m very humbled by the response to this piece, created years and years ago. I’m happy my intent was clear: to show the classic bather trope with a twist, with an aim to show the female form in a nude state not with the aim of titillation/presenting vulnerability but to project strength. The response included fan art by 3d artist Thorbjørn Barone, which was licensed and is now being sold as a mini!
Please take a look here if you’re interested: https://www.mrleesminis.com/product-page/the-bather And thank you all again for the response!
The Bather
Tried for a twist on the classic art history trope of the bather :)
This piece now has a mini fig! I want to thank everyone who has liked, reblogged and shared this piece. Thank you all for letting me know what it has meant to you. It’s now available as a mini figure, ready for pre-order! I have a lump some licensing fee for this, no royalties, so I’m spreading it mainly for those interested :) Preo-order here - https://www.mrleesminis.com/product-page/the-bather