Four Great Calamities

Unofficial Heaven Official’s Blessing art This art is an accompaniment to my Four Famous Tales piece. The main thing I wanted to highlight in this piece is simply the four calamities being in their element. I wanted to get that dark and imposing feel of all four of them together while still keeping their personalities visible through the art.

Kaizenix

Unofficial Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint art In this piece, I studied J. C. Leyendecker’s art style with ORV’s characters as the subject. I admire the way Leyendecker rendered his figures, clothing, and gold and wanted to emulate that in my own art. I wanted this piece to convey a sense of royalty and sophistication.

Kisses for San Lang

Unofficial Heaven Official’s Blessing art One of my favorite pieces of all time. This began as an art study of @washanapple’s art style with reference to Andy Warhol’s (if I’m not mistaken) Whitman’s sampler magazine illustration. The only thing that I could think of during the process of drawing was love, love, love, love and everything it entails. It’s the gentle sunlight beating down on your back as you bask in a lover’s embrace. It’s the petals falling and tickling your nose like a lover’s kiss. It’s a lover’s nimble fingers entwining with yours and suddenly you never want your hands to be empty every again. It’s warmth and light and beauty and good. It’s about being in love and loved back in return.

Four Famous Tales

Unofficial Heaven Official’s Blessing art This piece was meant as a straight accompaniment to my Four Great Calamities piece. I wanted it to have a bright and much lighter palette compared to the Calamities, just to further highlight the differences between the gods and the ghost kings. And for each person I found it important to really make sure their expressions are on point and an accurate reflection of what was happening during each of their moments. Resignation and calmness for Yushi Huang, determination for Pei Ming, relaxation and aloofness for Shi Qingxuan, and ease and serenity for Xie Lian.

Love made them gods

Unofficial Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint art The relationship between Kim Dokja, Yoo Joonghyuk, and Han Sooyoung in the 1864th round and their constellation/outer gods counterparts have always been one of my favorite things to dissect in this novel. It’s always fascinating to me how they are, to a certain extent, their own greatest nightmares and also their own greatest salvation. They are doomed by the narrative they’ve so carefully crafted to save one another. The hands that created the apocalypse are the same hands that lovingly gave them all a second chance. Love for a stranger, love for a hero, love for a reader, love for a writer, love for a companion. Love made them gods. Love made them monsters.

The heart bleeds (dream)

Unofficial Clear and Muddy Loss of Love art The first part of the The heart bleeds piece. I’ve always loved the juxtaposition between Qi Yan and Jingnu’s soft and gentle moments of falling and being in love and their more manic moments. It was extremely jarring to see how their love could be so pure and powerful yet at the same time the most wretched thing to ever exist. They are each other’s greatest source of happiness. They are also their own greatest sorrows and madness.

Written in blood

Unofficial Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint art In this piece my goal was to explore the dynamics between Han Sooyoung and Yoo Joonghyuk as writer and protagonist with Kim Dokja as reader. It has always struck me as heartbreaking that both Han Sooyoung and Yoo Joonghyuk would choose to sacrifice the world and also themselves thousands of times just to save one person. In this piece, I wanted it to be a striking image. I want them to look to the reader (Kim Dokja) and make it seem as if they’re saying ‘Look at this, this is the price of your salvation. Your salvation is written in blood.’

The heart bleeds (nightmare)

Unofficial Clear and Muddy Loss of Love art The second part to The heart bleeds

What withers you will wither me

Unofficial Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint art “Time that withers you will wither me. We will fall like ripe fruit and roll down the grass together. Dear friend, let me lie beside you watching the clouds until the earth covers us and we are gone.” — Jeanette Winterson, Written on the Body The first time I read this quote I immediately thought of Yoohankim. I had thought that it fit them so well and at the same time not. Like an object that feels so close yet so far, the image feels so likely yet so out of reach as if it should never happen—like a fantasy or a dream. Something you would wish to never wake up from. Let me stay in this dream with you. Let the earth cover us until we are gone.

Seasons change and so do we

Unofficial Heaven Official’s Blessing art

Somewhere in time

Unofficial Heaven Official’s Blessing art Another one of my favorite pieces. The process was somewhat experimental, especially for the mural. Since this took up a reincarnation concept, I wanted to convey a feeling that was a cross between ‘frozen in time’, deja vu, and the odd kind of feeling you would get when you come across a liminal space. Toeing between the lines of then, now, and never—here, there, and nowhere all at once.

© 2024 Eileen Widjaja 黄爱凌