#slowly reconnecting with my art and creativity

[aghhtdraws]

Just one kiss for good luck? A moment of your time, sir Sogeking...

random SanUso from this week bc I haven't drawn any fanart in so long, it just called to me ;>w>

a few days into february, i caught up with One Piece for the first time since 10 years ago and One Piece has been on my brain for the past 3+ weeks now (after I finished watching OPLA haha)

Anyway, I don't post a lot of ship art, but this is an old ship I liked in the early days of browsing FF in the mid-00s or so and it's been popping up in my head that these characters still feel sorta close. This art isn't much but I just wanted to play around with inks and colors a bit. It's cool seeing so much fanart of the ship these days!!! I like Usopp, he's a fun character, and Sanji's just the sort who gives a shit a bit too much. They can be fun and silly together, caring but also daring in different situations. It's a fun dynamic!

anyway smth possessed me to draw this just because I could. busting out of the art block like HEY….I'M HERE….

#sanuso #usopp #sanji #sogeking #aghhtdraws #skidoodles offline again bc i'm anxious abt everything else #haven't been drawing anymore which feels weird but I guess it makes sense for now #slowly reconnecting with my art and creativity #tagramble #didn't put the longer ramble into tags bc tumblr has been wigging out on me #doodles #posting this before I take it back haha

[tswaney17]

Like Dad

Happy @azrielappreciationweek, Day 7: Free

I was very excited to bring back my Oh Baby AU for this week. I'm slowly coming out of my creative funk, and I hope to be back to posting on the regular here soon! 💕

Catch up here: Little One, My Son

My fanfic account: @tswaney17fics​​​

My ao3 account: tswaney17

Please let me know what you think about this update. I love getting your feedback. Constructive criticism is always welcome. 💕

Trigger warnings: none

Word Count: 2,224

This fic will be posted on AO3 only. Read here.

Azriel slid Rosalie’s plate back in front of her after cutting her roasted chicken up into more manageable bites.

“Thanks, Daddy!” she announced, spearing a piece of meat and popping it into her mouth.

He leaned down, kissing the top of her head.

“How is training going?” Elain asked her elder sister.

They were having their weekly family dinner at Rhys and Feyre’s manor. Since they all started having children, the sisters pushed to keep up these traditions so the cousins could grow up together. Or at least they tried to as much as possible. Occasionally, one group wouldn’t be able to make it, like when Amren and Varian were in Summer, or Cassian took his lot to the Illyrian Steppes. But, for the most part, they all showed up for this set-aside, few hours to reconnect as a family.

And it worked. Kaden and Nyx were as thick as thieves, and Rosalie and her younger cousin Sutton were already the best of friends. He loved seeing their children together. It reminded him much of his childhood with his brothers. The bond formed through centuries that could never be broken.

Tested, yes.

Broken, no.

Read More

~~~~~

Remember, sharing is caring! Please reblog if you liked the fic. It helps spread my work and I truly appreciate it. 💕

While I have moved these fics to AO3 only, I am still going to utilize a tag list here on Tumblr. This as a permanent solution and may change in the future. For notifications, you can follow and subscribe to my fanfic account where I will be reblogging updates and snippets only. You can also find me on ao3. If you would like to be added to my tag list, please leave a comment on this post.

My fanfic account: @tswaney17fics​

My ao3 account: tswaney17

Taglist: 

@nikethestatue

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@123moiaussi

@duskwhisperer

@zdenkah

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Some tags seem to not want to link, which could be related to your visibility settings. Sorry about that!

#azrielappreciationweek2023 #azrielweek #azriel shadowsinger #azriel #elain #elain archeron #elriel #elriel fic #elriel fanfic #elriel fanfiction #tswaney17 #tswaney17fics #tay writes #my writing #fanfic #fanfiction #elain x azriel #elain x az #azriel x elain #elain and azriel #azriel and elain #acotar #acomaf #acowar #acofas #acosf

[ojcobsessed]

Helming Jamie Childs' new crime-thriller, the actor talks tuning into a character, writing out their history and embracing the spontaneity of his own.

BY SOPHIE WANG

In early January 2022, as the rest of us added layer upon layer, watching the temperatures drop to zero, Oliver Jackson-Cohen travelled north of his London home and jumped bravely into the North Sea. “I’m really proud of the whole movie, but I’m quite proud that we all made it out alive, really,” he tells me nine months later, home safe with rays of morning sun separating us from the realities of his time filming, Jackdaw.

The debut feature from TV writer and director Jamie Childs (The Sandman, His Dark Materials), Jackdaw tells the story of Jackson-Cohen’s Jack Dawson, a former motocross champion and army veteran who, in an effort to support his younger brother, agrees to pick up a mysterious package in the North Sea, only to find himself tricked and his brother kidnapped. Subsequently, Jackdaw — as he’s better known — embarks on a one-night, breakneck journey through Northern England’s rust belt on his bike, reconnecting with his past as the subtleties in his complex backstory and familial history slowly unravel against a backdrop of nail-biting action.

The nuanced portrayal of such a character could possibly only be achieved by Jackson-Cohen, who seamlessly masters the art of tuning into his character’s psyche. Since a childhood trip to see Home Alone in the cinema, the 36-year-old has been fascinated by the possibility of disappearing into someone else’s world and delving into their stories. Subsequently booking his first job at 15 years old, the London native has spent the past decade and a half immersed in alternate worlds, from the horrors of 2018’s The Haunting of Hill House and 2020’s The Invisible Man to the post-WWII reality of Man in an Orange Shirt and the 19th-century Yorkshire of last year’s Emma Mackie-led, Emily. He mentions twice in our chat that at this point in his journey, he feels “like 150 years old”, and it’s hard to be surprised. Between time-travelling, fronting countless stories and embodying dozens of different people, he’s lived many lives.   “I always think it's quite funny that this passion was born as a kid and here I am as an adult doing it,” he laughs. “I do sometimes think: ‘Is that the smartest fucking thing?’ Because when you're a kid, you have all of these ideas and they're not the smartest ones.”

Though some of his childhood plays (written and directed by him and his friends) may have had “zero plot”, as Jackson-Cohen tells me, and it took him a bit of time in his early twenties to figure out the projects that would resonate with him, it is safe to say that his childhood dream was definitely not a bad idea. “I think with any passion that stems from childhood, the drive is so insane. I think with anything creative, you have to have this insane determination, regardless of where it stems from. It's just this weird drive forward that you kind of can't stop.” He pauses. “I feel like I've had many iterations of a career. I look back at the stuff I was doing in my early twenties and it was very much what I was told to be doing. I think it takes time to make mistakes and learn from those to actually find out what it is that resonates with you. Ultimately, I think it probably has something to do with exploring something that I'm not looking at in myself and being able to unlock that, to explore that with a character.”

Hearing this, it is easy to see why the Jackdaw lead would be a perfect fit for the role. However, he didn’t originally believe the part should be his. “I'd met Jamie Childs on a job I was on before and we got to know each other genuinely,” he explains. “He started to talk to me about this idea, this script that he was writing and when he was finished, he called me up and asked if I’d read it. Then he went, ‘Will you play Jackdaw?’ And I immediately said, ‘Jamie, I don't think I'm the right person for that. Do you know who you should hire? You should hire this person.’ And he was like, ‘No.’ And I was like, ‘No, do you know what? You should hire this person...’ And I kept throwing ideas at him.” Eventually, perhaps after exhausting every other option for Childs, the actor agreed and dove headfirst into the lead, making it implausible that his alternative suggestion could have embodied it so definitively.

“I feel like all of us jumped in because of our belief in Jamie,” he says. “And I think to have your protagonist be someone that is flawed and vulnerable and not your [stereotypical] sort of action hero was such a clever move on his end. It just felt like nothing I'd ever been a part of before. And there was something in that script about someone feeling like there isn't a place where they belong and being thrown into a position of having to care for someone and the tragedy that's gone on with their mum… all of that became a really interesting thing to play around with.”

Building out a character’s story is one of the most exciting parts of the job for Jackson-Cohen. With Jackdaw, this meant lots of meetings and discussions with Childs and co-star Jenna Coleman, who plays his love interest, Bo. “We sat down and hashed out when they were together and how long they were together and what happened and when the last time they saw each other was,” he says. “I think what’s so clever with Jamie is that he doesn't really over-explain, but he drops these pebbles as you go. And I think they're quite effective. It’s like, you know Jack's been away in the army. You don't really know why, but whatever it was, it wasn't good. So it was trying to figure out, 'okay, what was it?' And I don't think you necessarily see it on screen, but for me, my favourite part of it is trying to write out a life for them.”

For Jackson-Cohen, with any story he portrays, getting into character isn’t necessarily about becoming someone else. Rather, it’s about tapping into what’s already within him. “It’s like when you're in a music studio,” he says. “You've got all those dials and it's about turning something up that exists within you that you don't necessarily tap into and turning certain other things down. It's all coming from you.”

“In real life, I rarely get emotional, and I think it's because I have this outlet,” he continues. “There's this space where you can go and it's safe to experience and feel all of this stuff. It’s this weird, playful safety bubble that you get to go off to and play around where, ultimately, it’s real in the moment, but it's not real in your life.”

However, sometimes his body doesn’t register the difference between his own experiences and those of his character. “I played a character in the past who was a heroin addict and that was really hard [to get out of] because you are left with this inherent heaviness of all the stuff that you've created and felt in your head,” he explains. “Or earlier this year, I did a film set around the beginning of the Holocaust. And so you’d come home at the end of the day and you’d know it's not real, but your body can't really tell the difference. So you get these weird sort of hangovers if it's incredibly heavy and emotional. You know it's not real, but your body's playing catch up.”

“The older I get, the more embarrassed I get to say that this is my job because it's such a fucking stupid job. But also, I absolutely love it.” He laughs. “I feel so unbelievably grateful that I get to do this as a job. I always eye-roll when actors say things like, ‘Oh, it's such a privilege,’ but I do feel incredibly grateful because I get to go off and explore these parts of humanity that I would never otherwise.”

While he might endeavour to plot out the history of his characters, Jackson-Cohen’s very much letting his own future write itself. “Part of the exciting thing about being an actor is that you don't really know what's going to come in or what you're going to read that's going to excite you. I want to be surprised. I'd love to work here, in small filmmaking, with first-time directors, telling stories that people may love or hate, anything that's trying to say something a little different.” He pauses. “But until I read it, I won't know.”

Jackdaw is out in UK cinemas now and Wilderness is available to watch on Prime Video!

#oliver jackson-cohen #oliver jackson cohen #jackdaw film #wilderness tv #the world will tremble #interviews #2024 #jackdaw

[theshelbyslimited]

KIA ORAAA (HELLO)

It has been SOOO LONGGG since i've been properly active on here and it'll probably remain that way until December once this final term is over (the pros of having summer at the end of the year is that everything finishes in time for Christmas).

I'm too lazy to fully explain what's been going on bc life has been all over the place but I'll bullet point some 'highlights' (WARNING! IT'S LONG! I WON'T BLAME YOU IF YOU DON'T READ IT ALL)

I've been attending groups at this local 'foundation' that offers wahine/women's groups for those in my area. A Creative Cooking class that's been so much fun and surprisingly beneficial (I'm definitely not the Gordon Ramsay I had myself convinced I was just bc I could make an omelette 🤣), a general Monday Boost group which is basically a space for wahine/women whether they are māmās/mothers or just women seeking a safe space to be around likeminded ppl (we've done some fun stuff in that one) and two more that i'll extend on in the next bulletpoint.

I've been slowly reconnecting my native indigenous realm. So little fact that may not be entirely known is I'm a wahine māori, I'm of indigenous roots to Aotearoa/New Zealand. Although both of my parents are Māori, colonization had a deep impact on my whānau/family went it came to passing down the reo/language and culture. My Dad knew Te Reo Māori and was planning to teach it to me but he passed away before it could happen and my Mum never learnt it as her father/my poppa was raised during the time where our people were punished for speaking their mother tongue at school or even in public space, therefore influencing him to not teach it to his children. As I've gotten older, I've yearned to connect with Te Ao Māori (The World of Maoridom) and connect with the deeper roots and strands of my identity as an indigenous woman. A lot of the women in the groups I've been attending are also Māori/indigenous women so we've all been journeying through, trying to connect with Te Ao Māori in a way that isn't pākehā-fied or basically milked down to fit the white standard in our country. I decided to do a free online Te Reo Māori course I discovered online after reestablishing my deep want to know the language of my ancestors and it's been so fulfilling (I have the worst memory though so utilizing it isn't going too well so far). I've been attending a group called 'Aua Hoki' which basically means 'I don't know' in the sense where we do different things every group class regarding Te Ao Māori whether it be: digging into our whakapapa (our genealogy/lineage), waiata (song/music), pūrākau (stories) and Toi (Māori arts). This particular group has helped me connect so much more with my ancestry and I feel like I've found that part of me that's been missing for so long (partially anyway). I've also only recently started going to a Raranga group. Raranga literally means 'to weave' which is basically what we've been doing and although it's a lot harder than I thought it would be, seeing the end result of ones own creation can be so fulfilling.

I've been HELLAAA baking. I posted before about how baking has become a thing for me but holy shit, my whānau/family are loving it so I'll probably keep it up just for them. It's been interesting trying different recipes whether they be sweet or savoury and being able to share the kai/food with those I love. I think my personal favourites because they're so deeply ingrained in my whānau/family are: Fry Bread and Māori Bread (feel free to look them up). They're basically the same dough but one, you fry and the other can simply be baked in the oven. Such recipes have been baked and cooked all the way back to my Great Grandmother and perhaps, even before then. I think I enjoy those the most because I feel like I'm continuing that tradition on for my generation and hopefully one day, I can pass it onto someone of the next generation.

I think I've rambled moreee than enough. I am so sorry for how long this is, when I get started I just can't stop sometimes 🤣 Aroha nui (much love) to you if you actually managed to make it to the end of this and read every single rambly thought of mine.

I'm sending so much love and awhi (a way of saying support) to every single one of you, it's nearly December (what the fuckkkk 😱) so thank you for being with me throughout the duration of this crazy year. We're in it for the long run now and I know we'll all make it through, I'll make damn sure of it. I'm only a message away for ANYONE who may need someone to vent to, some words of love or just a friend to kōrero/talk to.

Stay safe angels ❤️

C x

#theshelbyslimited. #c's vents. #might be deleted idk. #I AM SO SORRY FOR HOW LONG THIS IS 😭 #txt.

[luciehercndale]

hey there! realising, long story short, that i really need to get into creating art as a way to regain my sense of autonomy and get into motion the habits leading to the mental health benefits down the line. but i'm honestly so stuck, even creating graphics for my profile here on this site seems like so much effort that I feel like it'd be more of a task (and the minute I start thinking of something like that I go into Fawn Mode and lose all creative ability) rather than something fun to do. i've got a million fragmented ideas of things i think would be fun to do in theory, but in practice whenever i remember the real world and its demands i immediately go numb and lose interest and it's just hard to connect with my creative side.

just reaching out because you are so brilliantly artistic and i can tell that everything you put out is such an expression of who you are. and i also know you're very open to the 'what is good for my brain' conversations. so if you have the bandwidth to give advice/suggestions can you think of any low-demand/low-effort ways to reconnect with my creative side and build my confidence to feel safe to express myself (i know it's in there somewhere!) are there any things you've found you can still do when you have limited spoons? or are feeling too tense or tired to think properly? tysm xx

hi!!! I'm glad you reached out to me because I love giving creative advice <3 creative block often happens to me too and sometimes I can't really help it and that's okay. Sometimes we need to recharge in order to feel creative again. If you're looking for a creativity boost that works for writing and editing pictures, I try to look at Pinterest for inspiration. I usually start with a word that maybe stuck in my brain or simply something I like (like purple for example) and it's a chain from there lol more images pop up and I add the ones that speak the most to me to a board (like an aesthetic board). Or I start from a song that stuck in my head and won't leave me. What I can do about it? What does inspire me? Bc sometimes there is a story behind that! Another way is to try to write freely too and without thinking about punctuation or grammar. Stream of consciousness-like. Just write about what comes to your mind after choosing a picture you really like or a concept or starting from a song you like. But this last bit may not work all the time because if you feel stuck, it feels like you can't bring anything outside of your brain on to the page.

Since you love to read, I would also suggest two books. The first is "Drawing with the right side of the brain" by Betty Edwards and "The artists' way: a spiritual path to higher creativity" by Julia Cameron.

The first one is more about drawing but I think it can also apply to writing as well because the author explains how the sides of the brain work and how you can "unlock" your right side to visualize what you wish to create on paper with more clarity. She is convinced that even the most talented people sometimes use the left side more and this hinders their creations and doesn't help to unlock their full potential. I think you might love this since you like neuroscience :)

The second book by Julia Cameron could also be helpful because it's like a weekly course and every week she asks you to do some tasks in order to slowly reconnect with your creativity from inside of you. I still haven't read this but someone said it wasn't bad especially if you are trying to find yourself and your muse.

I hope these help 😀

#posta

[flower-zombie-rob]

I just woke up so my brain isn't exactly formulated — BUT STILL!!

I know it's easier said than done, but try not to worry about notes. All of us do, so you're not alone in the slightest, because it's awesome when people love something you make and soul crushing when something you worked so hard on doesn't seem to "hit" right. It doesn't make you any less of the wonderful, creative artist that you are, and I sincerely love all of your work. I know I don't reblog all of it (I'm just super busy) but know that I'll be eating your art in the corner, SILENTLY IF I HAVE TO. /pos

So, my advice, draw what makes YOU happy. Draw the most feral, self indulgent stuff that you want to see in this world! It might not break 100 notes, but what's the point in being miserable? Make whatever you want!! Egos being egos (maybe even KISSING /j), OCs vibing, something else entirely! Notes go up and down, it's natural, but it doesn't measure your worth or skill in the slightest. Boost it however many times you think is right because your work is WORTH A DARN and it deserves to be on our dashes one hundred times. I love your art sincerely and I'm sorry that you've been feeling so low about it – just know that me and dozens other people love your art no matter what, and it'll be okay. 💕

Thanks so much geeky youre really really really sweet to me and this helped me a whole lot. My motivations been slowly getting tied to what people like to see rather than what i like to see, which obviously has been making everything i do on here feel pretty worthless when the notes indicate that nobody likes any of it. But it makes me forget that people lurk and people don't reblog but they still see it. It makes me forget that I still have followers that havent left for a reason and that I did the drawing in the first place because I wanted to draw something, not because I wanted other people to reblog one of my posts, and that gets lost when i get hung up on how many people saw it and what people like and stuff like that. In the near future I'm hoping to just sort of start doing art again for me which includes a lot more oc's and ego content i wasnt sure would take off and just things that make me happy again to reconnect with my art. Thanks so much 💚💚

[alisondraenvs3000blogposts]

Unit 07: Nature Interpretation through Music

Blog prompt:

Where is music in nature? Where is nature in music?

As a follow-up (focus on the above two before you tackle this one), what song takes you immediately back to a natural landscape? What is the context? Share it with us – I would imagine many of these ideas may have similar underpinnings of a campfire, roadtrip, backpacking journey, etc.!

Earlier on in this course, we talked about how art implements itself in nature interpretation. Music is a form of art; it is a specified art form. Music can relax, instill fear, pose emotions, create societal shifts, create peace, teach, and so much more. It is no wonder every TV show and movie relies on music to create atmosphere and add deeper connections to storylines.

I watched this in another course that I am in this semester and thought it fit perfectly with this weeks content and how music cam help with activism in advocacy for animal and ecosystems:

Where is music in nature?

Music within nature can be found in the singing of birds, the whistling of wind, the music of crickets and toads on a summer night, in pouring rain or light showers, in waterfalls, in hurricanes or tornadoes, etc. Just as any art form, music is perceptive, meaning nature's music can be captivating in different ways depending on its listener.

Where is nature in music?

Nature in music is usually found in instrumental music more than anything. This music may be implemented during yoga or meditation as it provides a calming atmosphere that makes the participant feel like they are reconnecting with themselves and possibly even with nature just by hearing nature's sounds alone. In the same light, instrumental music may be used in documentaries to add atmosphere to what is being taught, for the purpose of making people feel like they are there with the videographer capturing the documentary. 

Originally, I clicked on this video thinking it was only going to be about the sound of butterfly wings, but it ended up developing into much more than that. Paul Cheese, the speaker in this TEDTalk, shows how, on his travels, he was able to capture moments in what he calls audio photographs. As the video goes on, one can see how he is able to capture nature around him and implement it in his music.

In this week's reading on Courselink, this is similar to Ben Mirin (DJ ECOTONE), who uses wildlife samplers in his beatboxing.

I grew up in a small town, constantly surrounded by nature. I am blessed to be able to go for a ten-minute walk from my house and find a beach. I walk into my backyard, and I am  surrounded by trees. It does not take much for me to reconnect with nature when I am at home. That being said, there are varying songs that I put on, and I instantly want to go outside. To me, being in a natural landscape does not have to be this lavish camping trip or rock climbing hike.

The first song that I think of that connects me to nature is Rooftop Dancing by Syvan Esso. There may not be any sounds of nature in this particular song, but the lyrics of this song instantly make me want to go outside. It reminds me of the joy I used to feel as a kid playing outside with my friends; this was back before electronics were as much of a thing as they are now. Instead of calling or texting friends, I would just go and knock on their doors, and we would spend the whole day outside using our imagination and creativity to keep ourselves busy.

Rooftop Dancing by Syvan Esso, alongside any instrumental song with nature sounds, reminds me of this very specific memory I have of laying on my back deck at home. This was back when I was in high school; it was summer break and 5:00 a.m. The sun was slowly beginning to rise, and as it was, I could hear everything begin to wake up with the sun. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a huge flock of blackbirds flew overtop of me and then over my house. If I were sitting up instead of lying on my back, the birds would have hit me square in the face. Whenever I tell this story to people, they always say if you recorded the moment, but I'm actually happy that I did not. It is my favourite moment I have ever experienced in my life, and I am happy that it is one I have just with myself in my mind.

I know that I was only supposed to choose one song, but I find it hard to, so in addition to this list, I also find that a lot of folk indie music reminds me of nature and makes me want to be in nature. Again, these examples may not use nature sounds in their work, but they still place me mentally in an outdoor landscape. Some folk indie artists include The Lumineers, KALEO, Bastille, and George Ezra, amongst others.

I honestly love music; it can connect us with each other and with nature in so many ways. I think another point that is important to add is that humans are a part of nature, and so us creating music, either through instruments, singing, or both, is us showing our nature in music and our music in nature.

#nature #music in nature #science #envs3000 #Youtube

[mortimermcmirestinks]

I love Twitter.

I love how it's full to bursting with so, so many artists, poets, essayists, and philosophers, all regularly checking, so if you shout out to the guy who wrote your favourite episode or the lady who drew your favourite picture, they might respond. if I draw a fanart of Ezri Dax right now and post it to twitter, there's a very good chance that Nicole DeBoer will see it and maybe even like or comment.

I hate Twitter.

I hate how the very structure, the bones of it, the muscles and sinew and code, all drive the conversation toward hatred and vitriol, because that's what sells. I hate how it rips apart anyone who goes there for parts, and I hate how it only shows you things that will make you angry because when you're angry, you're engaged.

I love TikTok.

I love the low barrier of entry for art. I could make a TikTok just for silly funsies and make a silly little joke and then immediately meet five hundred people who all laughed at my silly little joke. I love how easy it is to find and explore different ideas and stories and works of art, and I love how the rigid restrictions of form promote creativity in creation.

I hate TikTok.

I hate how it erodes attention and I hate how it promotes unhealthy lifestyles. I hate how it encourages every kind of opinion for content, with the good opinions and the bad opinions at the same volume, and I hate the lack of transparency about how anything works makes it insanely unreliable -- using TikTok for anything beyond brief, momentary giggles feels like trying to tightrope walk over quicksand during an earthquake.

I love Facebook.

I don't use Facebook anymore, but I love how my parents can reconnect to people they haven't spoken to for fifty years. I love how they talk excitedly about "remember Jerry? he's on Facebook!" and how they talked to him for hours about his new wicker business. I love that the structure makes it so easy for them to communicate with others from their lives.

I hate Facebook.

I hate how it's slowly pulling apart my dad's ability to concentrate. I hate the structure of the site putting ideas and images and thoughts into the minds of millions of people to dangerous result. I hate how they have a vested interest in dismantling democracy and harming people, and I hate how it's so ingrained in our world that there's nothing we can do.

I love Instagram.

I love all the art, and the comics, and the videos, and the comedy, and the memes, and the screenshots, and the designs, and the photography, and so, so, so much more. I love how easy it is to scroll through and see all the creation going on from the people I follow.

I hate Instagram.

I hate how it makes people envious and needy. I hate how the structure of it makes you addicted and weakens your self-reliance and confidence. I hate how obsessed it is with visual appearance and superficial things, and I hate how all the things I love about it are such a small part of the platform.

I love Reddit.

I love how it's full of a thousand little gardens of fandom, with each garden full of its own flowers and fruits and succulents. I love how easy it is to find and connect to other people with your interests. I love so much of the long, winding, rambling, silly, memey conversations in the comments. I love the AskReddit threads on ridiculous topics and I love the stories I read on WritingPrompts.

I hate Reddit.

I hate the culture of dickish egocentrism. I hate the Musk fandom. I hate the smug self-righteousness. I hate the fact that the people who run Reddit keep trying over and over again to reinvent and intrude on the users on the site, and I hate the anti-progressivism that seeps into every corner of it.

I love [tumblr].

You know why I love [tumblr]. I love the art, I love the fandom, I love the culture, I love how the shitty design of the site makes it so much healthier of a place than other social media, I love the customisation of posts, I love the energetic nature of people here and how willing they are to support newer people. I love the memes. I love Out Of Touch Thursday and I love Neil banging out the tunes. I love writing my Shakespearification posts and I love when people reblog them with excited tags. I love how so many of the people here have their eyes wide open to the injustices of the world and, weirdly enough, I love how the absolute lack of mutual respect here makes it so that nobody's afraid to voice their weird-ass opinions about how Spider-Man would make a great My Little Pony, and I love how immediately twelve people will not only jump to their defence but will make fanart. I love the sheer, unrestrained, and genuine creative energy.

I hate [tumblr].

I hate how it's so small and weak now that so few people see the art and the fandom. I hate how the culture is slowly seeping out into the wider world and weakening. I hate how the shitty design of the site is slowly making it unsustainable (for the love of Jesus, please give [tumblr] your money). and I hate, I hate, how the fact that so many people on this site have their eyes wide fuckin' open means that the injustices of the world are laid completely bare to see, and if you spend enough time here, you'll learn all about all of the genocides and gentrifications and political collapses and destruction and bigotry that so many people experience every day, being posted on this little hellsite because that's all they can do in the face of existential horrors.

oh, and I hate the antivaxxers and terfs. fuck terfs and fuck antivaxxers.

and more than anything else here,

I hate how capitalism did this.

There's nothing to love about capitalism here. Capitalism is why artists on Twitter can only do art in their spare time because they're struggling to survive and capitalism is why Twitter spends so much time making people miserable to drive engagement. Capitalism is why professional TikTok creators are so scared about the unreliability of the platform and capitalism is why TikTok sucks "content" from everything you create on it. Capitalism is why my parents are so tired that they wind up spending time on Facebook and capitalism is why Facebook has so much power to fuck up democracy. Capitalism is why art is such a small part of Instagram. Capitalism is why Reddit is trying so hard to reinvent itself. Capitalism is why Tumblr has to pathetically beg for money. Capitalism is fucking vile.

#long post #fuck capitalism

[rockislandadultreads]

“She Can Go Her Own Way” Book Recs

My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh

From one of our boldest, most celebrated new literary voices, a novel about a young woman’s efforts to duck the ills of the world by embarking on an extended hibernation with the help of one of the worst psychiatrists in the annals of literature and the battery of medicines she prescribes. Our narrator should be happy, shouldn’t she? She’s young, thin, pretty, a recent Columbia graduate, works an easy job at a hip art gallery, lives in an apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan paid for, like the rest of her needs, by her inheritance. But there is a dark and vacuous hole in her heart, and it isn’t just the loss of her parents, or the way her Wall Street boyfriend treats her, or her sadomasochistic relationship with her best friend, Reva. It’s the year 2000 in a city aglitter with wealth and possibility; what could be so terribly wrong? My Year of Rest and Relaxation is a powerful answer to that question. Through the story of a year spent under the influence of a truly mad combination of drugs designed to heal our heroine from her alienation from this world, Moshfegh shows us how reasonable, even necessary, alienation can be. Both tender and blackly funny, merciless and compassionate, it is a showcase for the gifts of one of our major writers working at the height of her powers.

My Name Is Lucy Barton by Elizabeth Strout

Lucy Barton is recovering slowly from what should have been a simple operation. Her mother, to whom she hasn't spoken for many years, comes to see her. Her unexpected visit forces Lucy to confront the tension and longing that have informed every aspect of her life: her impoverished childhood in Amgash, Illinois, her escape to New York and her desire to become a writer, her faltering marriage, her love for her two daughters.

Knitting this powerful narrative together is the brilliant storytelling voice of Lucy herself: keenly observant, deeply human, and truly unforgettable. In My Name Is Lucy Barton, one of America's finest writers shows how a simple hospital visit illuminates the most tender relationship of all-the one between mother and daughter.

The Light of Paris by Eleanor Brown

Madeleine is trapped—by her family's expectations, by her controlling husband, and by her own fears—in an unhappy marriage and a life she never wanted. From the outside, it looks like she has everything, but on the inside, she fears she has nothing that matters.

In Madeleine’s memories, her grandmother Margie is the kind of woman she should have been—elegant, reserved, perfect. But when Madeleine finds a diary detailing Margie’s bold, romantic trip to Jazz Age Paris, she meets the grandmother she never knew: a dreamer who defied her strict, staid family and spent an exhilarating summer writing in cafés, living on her own, and falling for a charismatic artist.

Despite her unhappiness, when Madeleine’s marriage is threatened, she panics, escaping to her hometown and staying with her critical, disapproving mother. In that unlikely place, shaken by the revelation of a long-hidden family secret and inspired by her grandmother’s bravery, Madeleine creates her own Parisian summer—reconnecting to her love of painting, cultivating a vibrant circle of creative friends, and finding a kindred spirit in a down-to-earth chef who reminds her to feed both her body and her heart.

Margie and Madeleine’s stories intertwine to explore the joys and risks of living life on our own terms, of defying the rules that hold us back from our dreams, and of becoming the people we are meant to be.

On Swift Horses by Shannon Pufahl

A lonely newlywed and her wayward brother-in-law follow divergent and dangerous paths through the postwar American West.

Muriel is newly married and restless, transplanted from her rural Kansas hometown to life in a dusty bungalow in San Diego. The air is rich with the tang of salt and citrus, but the limits of her new life seem to be closing in: She misses her freethinking mother, dead before Muriel's nineteenth birthday, and her sly, itinerant brother-in-law, Julius, who made the world feel bigger than she had imagined. And so she begins slipping off to the Del Mar racetrack to bet and eavesdrop, learning the language of horses and risk. Meanwhile, Julius is testing his fate in Las Vegas, working at a local casino where tourists watch atomic tests from the roof, and falling in love with Henry, a young card cheat. When Henry is eventually discovered and run out of town, Julius takes off to search for him in the plazas and dives of Tijuana, trading one city of dangerous illusions and indiscretions for another.

On Swift Horses is a debut of astonishing power: a story of love and luck, of two people trying to find their place in a country that is coming apart even as it promised them everything.

#fiction #adult fiction #womens fiction #chick lit #to read #tbr #female main character #library books #to be read #reading recommendations #Book Recommendations #book recs #booklr #book tumblr #themed reading

[hogwartsfirebolt]

Aaaand we’re back!!! I can’t believe it’s been a year since the last time I found myself typing one of these, but here we are, and WHAT. A. YEAR. Full of the highest ups and the lowest downs and through it all, so, so many wonderful stories that have made this my best reading year in fandom, ever. If you’re interested, in no particular order, I’d like to share some of my absolute favorites with you ❤️ Banner art is by the immensely talented @upthehillart and with nothing else to add, here’s my

FAVORITE FICS I READ IN 2019 PART ONE

1. Grounds for Divorce - @tepre - 122k - Malfoy finds a coin. Harry finds a letter. A story about histories, a story about families. A story about a lemon tree somewhere in Upper Egypt.

This is the only thing on this list that is actually in order because DAMN. Because HOLY SHIT. This is my absolute favorite fic of all time and that’s not... I’m not exaggerating. I have INFINITE things to say about it, and actually, I have. Let me refer you to my long, gushy rec specifically about this masterpiece and just BEG you again to read it because it’s beautiful and it will change you and and and-

2. amid this warm and steady sweetness - warmfoothills - 21k - Harry is not living in a period drama, no matter what his friends or his new house or Malfoy’s sudden affinity for horse-riding might suggest, and if one more person uses the word courting, he’s going to start hexing people.

This is just beautiful. Every word feels like it’s been laid down with gentleness and the entire setting is vibrant, sweet, so lovely it’s almost palpable. I had never read anything for this pairing that was modeled after a period drama, and it was perfectly done, it made me laugh at the outfits and the teasing and the ridiculous situations all around, and go “awww” when it became sweet and now I just want to keep it close inside my heart. You simply have to read this. 

3. Star Quality - who_la_hoop - 118k - Two years after the war, and Harry’s content with his life. OK, so it’s a little annoying that he keeps winning Witch Weekly’s Most Eligible Bachelor award, and he’s really not looking forward to the unveiling of an enormous gold statue of himself, but he loves his friends, and he loves being an Auror. And if he yearns for something more, something he can barely bring himself to think about, well, he’ll probably get over it. No one’s happy all the time, are they? But then everything changes, and Harry’s thrown into a new and dazzling world he’s not sure he can actually escape from. And as time goes on, he starts to wonder: does he actually want to?

Incredibly creative and executed so masterfully that I couldn’t stop reading and finished it in a day. Features a fed up Harry (always appreciated in this house), alternate realities, concerts, retail jobs, wishes upon stars, balloons, boys not knowing how to communicate but still inevitably falling in love, and just hours and hours of FUN. 

4. And One To Play - @tackytigerfic - 21k - Draco Malfoy and Harry Potter are the best team in the Auror Department, even when they're driving Gawain Robards up the wall. When Malfoy is injured on a mission, it causes Harry's magic to go haywire. Meanwhile, a mysterious criminal is draining people's magical cores and turning them into Squibs. Can Harry stop blowing Malfoy away in time to solve the case? And will Malfoy ever stop trying to get the last word?

GUYS THEIR DYNAMIC IN THIS ONE IS JUST PERFECT. The author wrote this absolutely incredible relationship where they trust each other and have so much fun and are so perfectly attuned to each other and I just sucked it right up because it’s so good. The case is interesting and engaging, Harry’s little predicament makes such a mess, and still their dynamic and friendship is the backdrop of it all. This fic is a really, really good time all around. 

5. That Old Black Magic - @bixgirl1 - 77k - Centuries ago, marriage contracts were the norm — ready-made alliances between families, expected and complied with, without complaint. But norms have a way of changing, and when a long-dormant contract flares to life, Harry has to navigate an unexpected splintering of the path he'd thought would be easy after the war... with Draco Malfoy.

Reading this was one of the best moments of my entire year. I read it in a day, couldn’t put it down because the writing and the pacing and the dynamic are so incredibly good it blew my mind a little bit. It’s a slightly different take on the arranged marriage trope than what I was used to, and I loved it so, so much. It might be my favorite fic of Bix’s, ever. 

6. On a Clear Day - saras_girl - 41k - Draco Malfoy is waiting for his real life to begin, and it appears that he’s not the only one. Coffee, charity, and the wisdom of the elderly.

!!!!!! That’s all I can think to say!!!! In trying to read ALL of saras_girl fics I have found such ABSOLUTE GEMS and this is definitely, definitely one of the best of them in my opinion, it’s just so incredibly lovely in every way and I’m so weak for when they slowly let themselves be vulnerable with each other the more they get to know each other, and help each other be brave and !!!! again. This paints it so beautifully I just want to read it again and again. 

7. Renaissance - dysonrules - 33k - Harry awakens after a long sleep to find things terribly changed. He's not in an alternate universe... it just seems like it.

Surly, moody Harry is a weakness of mine, and the way he navigates the extremely difficult situation he finds himself in in this one was so interesting to read. I always do love Draco being capable and good at what he does, trying to become a better person through his work. A really, really good fic with fantastic characterizations and a plot that kept me on my toes the whole time. Definitely recommended. 

8. At the End of the Day - sara_holmes - 7k - No brooms, a distinct lack of balls, no comprehension of the offside rule and a Malfoy who apparently has magic feet. Harry never knew this stupid game could be so much fun.

This fic is so light, so lovely and young that I went back to it over and over again during the year. It carries that feeling of tentative new beginnings, letting go and reconnecting with those around you after going through terrible things, all of that in a way that never loses sight of the fact that they’re still teenagers and still deserve some fun and light in their lives. So, so cute.

9. take my hand once more - @candybarrnerd - 8k - Harry finds himself standing in front of the door to the Room of Requirement with no memory of having walked there or having walked past the required three times either.-Everything feels like it's falling apart, his second marriage is failing, and he would actually kill for a decent nights sleep, which must be why the Room of Requirement provides him with the solution of a bed when Harry steps through the door. When he wakes though, he finds it's so much more.

Oh god I ache just remembering this. It’s so, so good. Every word paints every feeling so effectively that I felt it etched into my chest and all of Harry’s love for Draco was mine and his sorrow was mine and what he felt after the Room of Requirement gives him what he needs is what I felt too and I was just broken and repaired completely in 8k words in the best way ever. You MUST read this now. 

10. Eternally Consistent - @alychelms - 44k - Draco Malfoy and Harry Potter assumed they would never be anything but civil enemies, until Potter lands on Malfoy's doorstep, bleeding, covered in curses, and acting very strangely indeed.

THIS IS EXCELLENT, REMARKABLE, EXTRAORDINARY!!! Omg every word, I swear every word had me on the edge of my seat and you see that time turner tag? Do you see it? It’s played in the BEST possible way, the case is so freaky and incredible and the work with the destroyed time turners and those... wizarding physics applied to it were so incredibly interesting. The characterizations are delicious, every moment Draco and Harry work together is fantastic, and in the end, when everything falls into place, it’s perfect. I LOVE THIS SO MUCH. 1000000/10. 

---------------------------------------

Each of these fics is incredibly close to my heart and I enjoyed them immensely. I hope they bring you all joy as well, and I’m ALWAYS here to gush about any of them ❤️ Happy holidays!

#drarry #drarry fic #drarry fanfic #drarry fic recs #ficrec #2019rec #draco malfoy #harry potter #drarry rec list

[dumparchivesblog]

Hello! Ngayon lang ako uli nakapag-sulat dito. Sana matuloy tuloy ko uli. Grabe, sobrang saya ko lang the past few days. I feel like I really got my juju back!! Last week ko na pala sa work ko next Saturday. Nag-resign na ako because I want to live the freelance life. Also, my mental health is suffering with my current job. The environment is so fast paced and there’s always changes. Like I swear lagi nalang may bagong updates + the endless meetings and video calls which is really draining. Like siss, umay na ako sa mga pag mumukha niyo. Chos. It’s hard to catch up with life itself especially with all that is happening because of the pandemic and all that tapos sabayan pa ng ganong environment and pacing sa work.  Don’t get me wrong. I enjoyed being in the leadership team and having been given the opportunity to lead people. I’m not really a natural born leader and whenever an opportunity to step up arises, I always back out or not pursue it. But I took the leap and gave it a shot when there was an opening. I’ve learned so much in the process and it has also contributed to my growth, but I just felt like somehow along the way I lost myself. Like sino na ba ako, sino si Rie. Nawala yung creative self ko and parang without art, I was nothing. I used to write like a lot, play instruments and just create art randomly yung pang practice lang or whatever basta I’ll just make an artwork and create something. Parang I lost a lot of time for myself too, kasi pagod na ako or I just don’t have that creativity in me anymore.  So now, I feel like I’m slowly reconnecting with myself. I actually bought a kalimba and ukulele. Sira na kasi yung guitar ko, tapos yung keyboard ko before pinamigay narin namin (which I regret huhu) pero ayun I’m learning how to play those new instruments and it’s been fun. Also, see, I am writing again!! Gagi, sobrang na-miss ko talaga ‘to. Like before I would just write here and express how I’m feeling or stories about what’s happening in my life. And finally, I get to create art once again!!! Huhuhuhu. Nag resign ako, but I’m also starting to take freelance projects na. Konti-konti lang muna. I get to design again which is really fun. Idk but I’m just really passionate about what I do. 

#prsnl #self #life

[alittlefrenchtree]

So.

I know I haven’t talked that much (at all) about… everything. And as much as I also know it’s probably not that interesting for a large majority, I also understand, in situations like these, it’s easier and more comfortable to know where the blogs you follow stand so you can adjust in consequence and take care of your own tumblr/fandom experience by choosing to keep on following me or to unfollow me in good conscience. Plus, writing it down will probably help me sort things out, (and maybe help other to sort things out) so all is good.

When things started to go south last week, I firstly chose to step back to see how things will unfold but it quickly appeared that it won’t be enough for me. This whole mess might keep on plot twisting for a while and since the instant I’ve started thinking it could very much explode (one way or another), whether it was right now or weeks or months from now, I know I had to run away because there are too many things I care about that could be caught up in the explosion and I wasn’t going to run the risk of letting anything or anyone blow up these things. I knew I had to do something to mentally save all of what I wanted to save so I did.

So I consciously and slowly emotionally detached myself from Armie, put him in mental box, locked him inside and put the mental box into a mental attic so I could focus on mentally save what I needed to save, namely:

-First and foremost, myself. I am and will always be my first priority and being at 100% of my mental health is an even biggest priority so I’ve started there. Rushed into irl and virtual safe places that has nothing to do with the fandom and stayed there. Summoned everything I needed to go back as close as possible to 100%.

-My tumblr blog. During the few days I stepped back I missed having it, so I make sure I could come back as peacefully as possible. Both me and my tumblr blog are good now, but I still have things to work on, as:

-Oliver.

-CMBYN as a book and a movie.

-My relation to Timothée. As much as I know he’s his own person, it doesn’t change the fact that, having learned from him first with cmbyn, my relation to him will always be linked to Armie so I have that to find a way to work around everything with him.

-My relation to art, including movies, music, reading, etc. Since I saw cmbyn for the first time, my approach to art has been very much linked to it, so I’m working on this as well, since it’s something essential to my well being.

-My creativity. Kind of the same, since it’s been almost 3 years that a large part of my creativity as been in relation to cmbyn, I have to find a way to reconnect with that in a different way, since I can’t be my normal self if I’m not currently trying to create something. Fortunately, I have my original fiction and universe to go back to (created in 2013 and in hiatus since 2018), so I have good hope I’ll be able to reconnect with my writing soon enough.

So here is where I’m at the moment. The box is still closed for now and, whether will happen in the next few weeks/months, I intend to keep it closed for a while. For many reasons that are both related and unrelated to me, I think it’s better this way for me and for now. I’ll decide what to do once I’ll be ready to open that box.

#about me

[solistair]

Happy New Year! ♥

It’s the time of year to make this post again, there might be some sad but there’s plenty of good as well, promise!

In short I want to wish you all the most wonderful transition into a new year, and that you will all have the strengthened mindset to make 2021 a better year despite the hardships that you may or may not go through. With all of my heart, Happy New Year, my loves, and the biggest of hugs and well wishes to you and your loved ones! ♥

This year has been kind of hell, other than the obvious entré of Miss Rona. My friend and I got fucked over by an old friend, lost our flat, I lost all my savings saving my credit, and then I moved in with my partner. I am beyond thankful for the support and love this man has given me, and though the lockdowns and have forced us to be in the same room 24/7 without work or school to go to, I think we’ve made a great job in keeping our sanity. ♥ In a stressful period of not knowing where to live he stepped up and helped me, and for this I will be forever grateful. As I worked through double workload of university assignments, work shifts, then job loss, then the most anti-climactic graduation in the world, he has been by my side. But as the year ends, so does my relationship after just over two years. Second time breaking up around holidays... I don’t recommend it, no fun! Jokes aside though...

I’m once again in a position of looking for a new home, although now as an unemployed person supported only by the government. Being stressed is an understatement, feeling heartbroken is too simple, though being lost feels right on point. I might be going back home to Sweden for a while, while things are slowly stablising, continuing my job search while there. I’ve met my sister and nephews only once in the past year and half, same with my mother. Dad I was lucky to see three times because he came to London for work. I miss my family. My heart really goes out to you who have been forced to distance yourself because of the circumstances.

Because of my current situation I started a patreon for my creations, offering Early Access to my CC. I was so worried about this because when I left the community over a year ago, patreon had a horrendous reputation here! I’m glad there’s a bit of a shift lately. A massive thank you goes out to my patreons, both current and old, for helping me receive a little something for what I love doing. It’s so exciting to see you want to support me and to gain access to my content earlier! It helps me greatly, in so many ways. Creating gives me so much joy and truly is an escape, creatively and mentally.

Through the hardships and annoyances, this year granted me an amazing gift - you all. I decided to come back to the TS4 community as a refreshed creator, reconnecting with a lost hobby, and I was truly welcomed back so warmly. Many, to whom I was previously close, have either become inactive or left the community altogether which made me feel a bit alone. In my want to find new friends I joined Planet Mari, a discord server led by one of the kindest persons I’ve met on here. Through this discord I’ve met likeminded people, oddballs, clowns, creators, storytellers, and artists - all whom I hold SO very dearly today! You all have made my life so much brighter with all the laughs, memes, music, edits, art, stories, helping, joking, etc... it’s nuts how much I love this server. And to all of the community who interact with me and/or my content, you really brighten up my days so much!

It’s a tough time, but I try to hold on tightly to the small joys while chasing a bigger one. Life’s a journey for sure and not always an exciting one! But hey, 2020 brought an enormous amount of change and trials and I for one am stepping into 2021 with a weak smile and small steps, something I am very proud of. You don’t need grand resolutions, a clear focus, high goals, or have everything figured out. Taking it one step at a time is an amazing thing alone after what year we’ve all had.

I wish you all the best, and here’s to another year I hope to fill with fun conversations, loving relations, warm memories, new creations, and exciting adventures - big and small! 

Happy new year, my loves! ♥

#ts4 #personal #but still it's counted as #non sims #as well so tagging that too #happy new year #happy new year 2021 #i write one of these all years so i'm continuing that #little tradition #both positive and negative #but a nice way to look back

[captainlaurence]

Just have to say a 'quick' thing. I don't often post personal anecdotes on here, however, a huge shout out @mounted-archer . Ive known Jai since middle school and from the start we hit it off with our love for everything fantasy. I grew up in a household where being weird and embracing creativity was fully looked down upon. Art was only ever encouraged when it was "proper", i.e. Ballet (keep your chin up, redo your hair there are too many fly aways, suck in your gut) or painting, so as long as it adhered toward realism, nothing fanciful. (Paint more portraits and western scenes, make sure it looks like a picture, you'll be more respected.) I even tried my hand at dressage/jumping after some prodding from my mom and a family friend because it "looked" better.

Jai 100% embraced her passion and confidently tackled new projects that expressed who she was to the core. I didn't quite have it in me yet to be that kind of brave and we fell out of touch as I persued avenues that would look more favorable to my uptight, conservative family. These past two years, after years of just kinda existing in each others peripherals, we've reconnected and damn it, she and these other archery nerds have managed to coax me out of my shell. Sometimes I feel completely inadequate when I string my bow and can't quite figure out how smoothly transition what I've learned on the ground and translate it to the saddle, dressing up in garb has me feeling a little jumpy (because yeah, I'm still afraid of being judged), trying to balance my studies with just, chillin and trying my hand at character building for DnD and picking up my art supplies for the first time in about 6 years is still daunting. Today's photo shoot/lesson was probably the most comfortable I'd felt in the saddle in a while, despite my balance not quite being what it used to be. I managed to knick each target at a canter despite this only being my third time shooting on horse back. I'm slowly feeling like my old self again.

Jai, you're truely a gold star friend and I love you. A lot.

You have my bow.

#mounted archery #nerds on horses

[lovelydragoness]

Demiurge

I’ve come to terms with how I pursue drawing. 

For the longest and most agonizing time, I’ve been shackling myself. I felt the life force of my creative ambition evaporate from the burden. These chains... these chains held expectations of subjugating my passionate endeavors. This isn’t where I belong; becoming something docile to the will of others is not my place. I hunger for freedom to explore the depths of beauty and truth. I’m a wildling--that is my heart.

A major reason I was confined into a creative block was seeking to limit myself into an entrepreneurial platform. I’ve been asked by others if I have considered this opportunity many, many times. Often times, I couldn’t express why it didn’t feel like this is my place. I have experimented with it and the results were disappointing. It’s my wish to detach from impurities that would plague my free-spirit; ephemeral trends, the folly of an egocentric status, or the possible avarice of affluence would do a disservice to my well-being. I understand others would take up this position as their rite and discover their place for their artistic passions. Mine... mine could not be fitted into this framework.

I care not for the shell of excitement that is only worth passive praise in art--I’m after something more that escapes my thoughts at this time... Could I describe it, not define it? By heart, I am an intense being and only few can understand my need to express my sentiments in private. My hobby of sketching is a therapy to release the fervor I feel inside. This is a part of me that I denied into misguidance that no longer serves me for the lesson has been instilled.

Slowly, my creativity in art is no longer chafing and I’m beginning to reconnect to my conduits to continue where I left off.

#Self-reflection #Might edit later because I'm getting sleepy #creativity #creative block #art #artistic pursuit #drawing is therapy

[imaginariumpod]

For the defense of slowing down: a study of slowness in cinema.

Leisure - Poem by William Henry Davies

What is this life if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare.

No time to stand beneath the boughs

And stare as long as sheep or cows. 

No time to see, when woods we pass,

Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.

No time to see, in broad daylight,

Streams full of stars, like skies at night.

 No time to turn at Beauty's glance,

And watch her feet, how they can dance.

No time to wait till her mouth can

Enrich that smile her eyes began.

A poor life this is if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare.

For the defense of slowing down: a study of slowness in cinema. 

This article is one that I have been meaning to write for a while and that is very important to me in a lot of ways, but also I feel like with the amount of people staying at home and who have had to slow down their pace of life one way or another in the past months, it just feels oddly relevant. A lot of people have been forced to ease the pace of their lives, and have had the time, maybe for the first time in years, to spend on things they couldn’t before. People who have been trying to take care of themselves in any way they can, by maybe learning how to cook or bake bread, maybe finally having the time to just take a nap and not feel any guilt because they aren’t productive. 

This might be more personal than usual because I feel like I really do need to put this subject in perspective to myself first, and then in perspective to the general context and climate that is shaping our world. We live in a culture where productivity is valued more than anything, where you are expected to go above and beyond, and to run yourself to the ground in the pursuit of success, of money, of efficiency. If you don't have a side project or four, it might feel like you are a bit of a failure because don’t you know you have to take advantage of every opportunities out there to make a name for yourself ? This hustle culture that is becoming predominant everywhere, but especially in western culture, is definitely a byproduct of capitalism in a way it never have been seen before. You only have to take a look in the self-help section of a bookshop or a library to feel exhausted : The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business, or Ready for Anything: 52 Productivity Principles for Getting Things Done. 

While I think being a hardworking person and trying to be productive in order to achieve your goals, there’s definitely a point where it’s too much for one person to handle, and when this constant stress of needing to be successful all the time and to always go above and beyond what is needed becomes a societal expectation placed on all of us, that’s when it becomes dangerous. There’s a certain climate that is saying that we need to be constantly productive to be valuable to the system, or else, what is the point of you existing. 

And my friends. the only point is you being alive. And being content. and that’s what matters in the end. 

The point isn’t to further a corporation’s agenda, the point isn't to exhaust yourself trying to play the game of a system that is designed to fail you. The point is that, maybe, someday, you wake up a bit earlier than usual, and you drink your tea in a world that is still quiet and peaceful. The point is, maybe that you feel safe, that you feel content, that you feel loved, and you have the time to just breathe. 

And to just be. 

Take a breath. 

So most of my friends know this, but I feel like I need to share this to give my proper perspective on this subject. Before finishing my Bachelor’s degree in Art History, I had previously done two years in architectural design. It seemed like a good idea at the time, it was a creative endeavor that seemed fulfilling and yet also a smart move practically speaking. I wanted to be able to find a job after finishing university, and maybe continuing on to grad school to eventually become an architect. That was the initial plan when I was 20 and started university. Fresh-eyed, full of hope and determination. 

Those two years were a nightmare. 

To sum up really quickly, I was so stressed and anxious, I ended up having constant panic attacks and breakdowns for a whole month, every single day of that month, which made me take the difficult decision to give up on that degree. I had an actual burnout before my 22nd birthday and had to take a full year off to recover from this. 

I think it’s then, that I truly was hit by how dangerous fatigue and exhaustion could end up being, both mentally and physically. How, when pushed by the constant pressure to perform and to catch up to a standard that keeps rising, and to a speed that keeps getting faster and faster, one is bound to crack at some point. The stress and anxiety that this puts on people can easily get to be too much to handle. That year off, being forced to slow down, to reconnect with myself and with who I am and with what I wanted from life  really was one of the most beneficial things to me and I just wanted to give a bit of my story to make you understand where I am personally coming from, when it comes to slowing down, and to slowing the pace of life. Unfortunately, most of us have a story that resembles this in some way shape or form. I know I was incredibly lucky to be able to take that year off, and it's a privilege many of us might not be able to have.

So this is why  I think i can say, that for a lot of us, we are just tired. We are so tired.  I know I am exhausted. Life can just be so tiring, there’s this really fine line between being productive and having an active life and being run to the ground. It’s a fine line that a lot of us thread, and it can get overwhelming very easily.  Indeed, «life has become fast-paced, as people try to live up to these expectations. Yet, while many people might be materially affluent, their quality of life and work-life balance are often unsatisfactory, and potentially lead to stress and burnout (Schor, 1998).»  I feel that especially for the current modern life experience, a lot of us can relate to that, in ways it may not have been felt before in previous generations. Time has always been precious, but it just feels like there’s never enough hours in the day to be able to finish all the things you want to do. 

The luxury of time. Time to do nothing. 

It might seem that we have more time,  but  «that free time is used to cram more activities into the day and to travel further to work». Which means that we are all trying to  manage to do everything at once, whether it’s working, and trying to continue learning, and needing to keep yourself in shape, and to keep your space clean, and also needing to keep a social life, and sleeping well, and etc and etc. It feels like you always have to do this and that and the list of expectations and goals to meet is never ending and constantly adding up. Indeed, «it is not just free time that people desire, but more time for meaningful things».  You are just one person, and there’s only so much one can do before it gets to be too overwhelming. And in those moments, I think it’s important to just. Take a deep breath and Slow down. 

We need rest. we need fulfillment. I think there’s a lot of disenchantment toward modern life, by the dream that have been sold to us since we were young. Just work harder and you’ll make it. Work more hours, do more things, put yourself out there, run yourself ragged to the ground and then you will finally get what you deserve (money ! fame ! success ! love ! Family ! Friends!  ) and yet all we have is exhaustion and stress and anxiety and pain. I think this whole context has made it so that there’s a resurgence lately of an appreciation for  slower media, whether we are talking about movies, books or something else. 

I think it can be really interesting to mention the newest Animal Crossing game (Animal Crossing : New Horizons) that has been played by a lot of people since its release, which has been considered like  «the video game equivalent of a relaxing getaway — and we could all use that kind of respite right now.» Those kind of slower paced games where you have to build your own life and take care of a city, village or, in this case,  island (slow-life simulation games) let players exerce control in their island in a way they feel they might not be able to in their own live. This is a very wholesome game that players can get really engrossed into, and that can provide them with much needed relief and escapism from the troubles of real life, when things get really hard. Those type of games also need you to take things slowly, one step at a time, which I think is very interesting when we think about low-stress sources of entertainment.

 «In this, the game forces you to take it one day at a time. You can bypass this by "time traveling," or setting your Switch system clock ahead of time to advance quicker than the game intends for you to, but this isn't how it's meant to be played. You're supposed to feel a sense of slow, but meaningful progression throughout the course of your island adventure, and artificial time changes take away from that»

I could also mention the growing popularity of the cottagecore aesthetic on various social platforms such as tumblr, Instagram and twitter. While being predominantly a visual and aesthetic trend, cottagecore does reflect a  growing desire by younger people in their teens and early 20s to have simpler and slower life. Dreams of just living in a tiny house, with maybe a vegetable patch, and all of the time in the world to just bask in the sun.  As «[a]n obvious backlash to the hustle culture embodied by Fiverr ads, cottagecore attempts to assuage burnout with a languid enjoyment of life’s mundane tasks.» This aesthetic trend then seems an answer to the growing consumerism and rapid pace of life.

This seems like an unattainable fantasy to most of us, which is why I think a lot of people have been gravitating toward those aesthetics and ways of thinking and living. «It’s a romanticised idea that we could leave behind all the stress and craziness in our lives to go live off-the-grid, where emails can’t reach us and our only task is baking bread or making jam. » I know this isn’t something that everyone longs for, but to me, this sounds like a dream and something that seems like a distant hope. I do wish I could take some time off in a small cottage or mediterranean house, maybe not forever, but maybe spend a few months with the freedom of having the time to myself and using that time the way I desire. Just so one can breathe, reconnect with oneself and have enough energy to keep moving on. «Cottagecore is the perfect escape, it’s soothing and calming but it’s also relatively attainable. Maybe we can’t all go live in a cabin in the woods, wearing nothing but flowy dresses while tending to our garden of wildflowers. But we can learn to cross stitch, we can bake bread, we can buy some watercolours, we can have a picnic in our backyard.»

I am always so anxious about so many things and the only thing I want at any given moment is to have a small house and no responsibilities greater than doing the groceries and watering the plants in my garden. I think that life has gotten very hard and difficult to handle, what with the climate crisis, the political unstableness, the economical unstableness, the rise of the alt-right, and now the whole global pandemic going on, it’s easy to understand why people would feel drawn toward comforting things : « Rebecca Jennings ties a push for coziness in branding (and trends like cottagecore) to the feeling that "things are bad, and people are anxious about whatever ongoing horrors are metabolizing in geopolitics, the environment, and capitalism." »

 I want to be safe financially and fulfilled. I want to have the time and space to do the things I really want to achieve instead of giving my time away to a system that does not care about me.

I want to have the calm of heart that I have lost years ago and that I yearn to regain. 

nostalgia & aesthetic 

There's an aesthetic of nostalgia that is really present in a lot of slow living content and slow media. I don't think ANY of us want to go back in time where things weren’t better for any of us unless you maybe are a white straight cis man, and even then.... In my opinion, slow living and wanting to slow down is not a rejection of technology or modernity in itself, but inherently a rejection of capitalism. You do not have to be productive to be valuable, and to be deserving of happiness, of peace, of love and of dignity. You deserve all of that no matter how useful or not you are to the capitalist system. It’s not about going back to oppressive social norms, but moving forward from them. 

I also feel like slow living brings a self care as deeper than the shallow superficial and capitalist self care that's being sold to us.  I’m not going to deny that it feels nice to do an extensive skincare routine before sleeping, but there’s a lot to be said about a nightly ritual that makes you feel more grounded in yourself and taking care of yourself and the body you inhabit versus the gigantic capitalistic machine that is the Beauty Industry™.  The same way the simple acts of taking of yourself and taking the time to slow down can be a revolutionary act of self-love, they can also be taken advantage of and capitalized on by the huge capitalist industries that use wellness, self-care and self-love as marketing tactics. In our era, it feels simply impossible now to get away from the “treat yourself” campaign. Industries have tapped into the real desire of people to live a more meaningful and happier life by making it mostly into a trend, and not an intentional change to someone’s lifestyle to make it better. 

I am of the opinion that slowing down shouldn’t be a trend, but a very deliberate act taken in order to take care of ourselves, of our mental health and our physical health. I think it’s a very essential need that we have to not feel burnt-out and to not feel trapped and stifled by our own lives, and having the space and energy to pursue our dreams and desires.

 (Not to say the culprit is capitalism … but the culprit is capitalism) (also not to advocate for revolution on a public platform but revolution)

What I mean by slow media, and slowness in media is that content that tends to be more of the slice of life genre. They are peaceful, quiet. Maybe nothing much happens at all, but it rings very true and very real. Those moments of calm are soothing when maybe the rest of my life really is not. The way someone relates to art and media is very personal and can vary a lot, but the escapism that this sort of stories provides and I feel that with the faster pace of life that has become the norm, it might become something that we seek more often than not. 

To me, this sort of media feels like relief. 

slow cinema 

Cinema has long been a medium that is very efficient at communicating epic and grandiose stories. Movies that are jam packed with action and drama and heightened emotions and tension. And while those movies can be very good and entertaining, I think there’s also a place in the world of cinema for movies that are slower. In fact, there’s a distinct genre of movies where the focus is not on a very fast paced plot or extravagant action scenes and dramatic events, but where the importance is placed on the mundane. Where the slow moments of everyday life and the quiet emotions that we all feel take precedence. It’s possible to name filmmakers such as Yasujiro Ozu or Agnes Varda.

 We could also talk about movies such as the Before Trilogy by Richard Linklater (Before Sunrise (1995), Before Sunset (2004), Before Midnight (2013)), where each movie spans a very short period of time and consists entirely of conversations between two people. Those movies are slow, ordinary and yet extraordinary in the sense that it’s two people who have found each other and are speaking and connecting. There’s nothing much that’s happening in those films, and yet it’s impactful. 

The movies made by those directors who tend to favor slower cinema often showcases a simpler plotline, but a more complex emotional arc. They are full of slow and quiet scenes, which makes those movies soothing, calming and nostalgic. 

What is slow cinema though ? in the academic sense, slow cinema is often defined as «a modern cinematic production trend that emphasizes slowness and duration of time» Even though there’s a lot of more contemporary cinematic examples of slow cinema in more experimental movies such as directors Abbas Kiarostami or Tsai Ming Liang whose movies are very much in line with what is slow cinema. When it comes to slow movies, «Flanagan writes that the stylistic features of ‘slow films’ are “the employment of (often extremely) long takes, de-centred and understated modes of storytelling, and a pronounced emphasis on quietude and the everyday,”»  The techniques used in slow-paced movies will often communicate a romanticization of everyday life, of routine, of moments that are quiet and peaceful. 

There’s a lot of emphasis put on the passage of time, whether it’s a slow drag of time, with nothing much to do, the quiet moments that punctuates our daily lives or the years passing by and the plotlines in those movies spanning years, generations and even lifetimes. I think this is one of the reason why this kind of cinema can be really relevant in our times, where we feel that time is a precious commodity that isn’t ours anymore, and where time is filled with the pressure of being constantly productive, slow cinema poses itself as the antithesis of that. 

«Slow Cinema situates itself solidly within art cinema both in aesthetic and methodology: it is defined by authorship that hinges on the representation of reality. It carries with it a disposition towards the consumption of time that forces the audience to labour through and critically engage with the film itself.»

It’s possible to see that this type of cinema is something that’s very sought after lately, as proven by this letterboxd list The Absolute Beauty in Everyday’s Mundanity, which has been liked by a total of 6,092 people at the moment of writing this article (including me). Containing 209 movies that fit into what the list maker considers as being slow movies that showcase the beauty of everyday life, this list demonstrates that there’s a very definite space for movies that have a more deliberate pace and who, instead of trying to heighten the stakes and action constantly, do take the opportunity to just. Slow down. 

An enchanted month. 

Elizabeth Von Arnim (1866-1941) was a english author active during the early 20th century. She wrote both fictional and non-fictional books, and the ones I have read from her are very in this vein of slow living, taking the time to just sit in a garden,  and let time heal you. It's from her book  Enchanted April (1922), which  is one of my favorite books and that I wholeheartedly recommend, that the consequent 1992 movie, released by the BBC, was adapted from. 

                            Von Arnim made a point to give a prevalent place in her books to the spaces where one could feel at ease and free from the constraints dictated by social norms and what people might expect from you :  «In the garden, Elizabeth von Arnim could think, reflect, and distance herself from the oppressions and duties of the highly rigid and strict German culture that she had adopted through her marriage to Count Henning von Arnim. In observing the varying seasons of nature in conjunction with an active pleasure in literature, she perceived the garden as a metaphor of her life in terms of the development of her soul, and in this context, she believed herself to be in "the process of becoming".» I think it’s possible to draw a parallel between the demands of life that are growing increasingly harder to handle. While Von Arnim puts is mostly in relation to the social norms that were in place during the 1920s, it’s possible to see that the desire for slowing down during the 2020s stem mostly from a tiredness of the ultra-capitalistic world we live in. 

The story of Enchanted April starts during a dreary month of march. Grey. Tiring. We have all went through months like these where the responsibilities and list of things to do, and slow drag of the days gets to be unbearable. Mrs Lotty Wilkins sees an a journal advert to rent a castle in Italy for a month, and under the grey drizzling London skies. And she yearns for that moment of respite. Far from her obligations, from her nagging husband and being able to take time for herself for the first time in years. 

Eventually, four immensely different women will end up in this  castle in San Salvatore, Italy, for a whole month. Each of those women have a distinctive purpose in this book, but they all seem to be looking for something similar: an escape from their frantic and boring daily life, a relief from routine, from the lack of connection and intimacy that they feel. In the midst of those charmed italian gardens, you feel like they can finally take a breath, loosen up and rest.

«She moved about with quick, purposeful steps, her long thin body held up straight, her small face, so much puckered at home with effort and fear, smoothed out»

And just reading that, or watching the movie, gives me a similar respite. The sun lits all the shots, the wind blows gently in the tree leaves, and the clothes that are worn are looser, more comfortable. This movie is charming, humorous and delightful. But most of all, it’s slow paced and soothing. You have drawn out scenes where nothing much happens but the moments are peaceful and reassuring. I rewatch it every april, because while I cannot take a month off to spend it in an isolated italian castle, oh god I Yearn So Much For It.

Even though, this story is set during the 1920s, thus being a contemporary story written by Von Arnim, I cannot help but feel that this story is one that is still deeply relevant today, in the 2020s. The thoughts of the characters seems very familiar and relatable : «For Lady Caroline Dester, the process of change is longer, more involved, and more isolated. She approaches San Salvatore with a “dream of thirty restful, silent days, lying unmolested in the sun, getting her feathers smooth again, not being spoken to, not waited on, not grabbed at and monopolized, but just recovering from the fatigue, the deep and melancholy fatigue, of the too much”»

In Enchanted April, this month in Italy is a moment of quiet rest for these four women, bt also a time dedicated to oneself and to introspection.  «Initially, each woman desires to be alone for long stretches of time: Mrs Fisher in her room, Lady Caroline in a chair in the top garden, and Mrs Wilkins and Mrs Arbuthnot in the gardens and hills. Each is free to reflect on her life and begin to have a clearer understanding of herself in relation to others. »   

A late afternoon: 

Yasujiro Ozu (1903-1963)  is one of the prominent filmmakers in Japan during the first half of the XXth century. His movies had a very distinct style and technique to them that made his work really unique to himself. A lot of filmmakers tried to replicate or imitate the stylisation of his work, but there was something in Ozu’s work that was very particular to the period of cinema he lived in. He was active from the later half 1920s until his untimely passing on his birthday in 1963. This means he lived through the Second World War as well as through a time of great change and evolution in the world. 

It’s possible to write a hundred pages on Yasujiro Ozu alone because there’s a lot to say about him and his movies, whether it’s about the narrative and the story he chose to portray or the techniques and stylisation that characterize what is an Ozu movie.  I thought it was relevant to mention him when talking about slower movies and slower paced media,  because of the impact that he had on film, especially when it comes to using the medium to tell stories of lost and quiet moments. 

With the increased modernity and a rapidly changing world, Ozu’s films, such as Tokyo Story ( 1953), Late Spring (1949) and Floating Weeds (1959) tried to capture the very modern life he and his contemporary were experiencing and the way they dealt with these changes. Even though Ozu’s movies were particularly specific to a certain period and country, it’s indeed impossible to disassociate Ozu’s movies from the fact that they were made in Japan, and that Ozu went through the pre-war, war and post-war era and continuously made movies during these times. 

Which means that his films do reflect a certain time in Japanese history which makes them incredibly specific and contemporary to the society he lived in. «However, I believe that the film is less about articulating the value of modernity against the challenge of tradition than observing the subtle state whereby the former unknowingly pervades the latter. In this sense, rather than the overt manifestation of free movement outside of the home, the trivial motion inside the confined domesticity are a more essential element in Ozu’s films. In other words, in Ozu, modernity exists within the everyday, a stable flow that undulates but hardly overflows.» Nonetheless, the issues and subjects tackled in those movies, such as intergenerational conflict, the difficulty that people have to catch up with a world with values that are rapidly changing, and modernity. Those problems are a universal experience, but were communicated in a unique lense through Yasujiro Ozu’s movies. 

The focus of most of Ozu’s films is centered around the familial unit, and the conflicts and moments that arise between them as life moves forward. The everyday moments in a world that gets harder to navigate each day. The story of a daughter who is pressured to married, and the dilemma and conflicts between the societal expectations that people have of her, her own wants and needs and also the desire to be able to strike a balance between those two elements. I think that this, while not being necessarily being a universal experience, can still be an incredibly relatable one. 

Once she gets married, she needs to move forward with her life and leaves her widowed father to live alone, which really showcases the simple and universal realities of real life. The plotlines of Ozu’s movies focus on simple and universal conflicts and problems, the stories he tells through those movies are nonetheless things that are universal and. the way he presents them are beautiful, quiet and, most importantly, real. «More broadly, Ozu’s omission of important events also speaks to his interest in the mundane, his desire to uncover the emotional nuances within small talk, daily routines, and other “boring” details of everyday life.» 

There are quiet moments of silence, of rain falling while someone is folding clothes or eating. Laughter and companionships. Tears and pain and love and hurt and all of the very important emotions that compose the human experience.   «the great filmmaker used to evoke a sense of melancholy and poetry in everyday existence.» which is something that truly is a balm to the soul in my own humble opinion. There’s a lot of vulnerability in this slowness, a very real sadness and emotionality that is very raw and yet mundane in its encompassing universality of the human experience.

The stylistic choices that Ozu decides to take all tend toward this one goal of showcasing the quiet movement of life, while hinting at the tumultuous feelings that people might feel, and the world around them. His movies were simple and slow but very meaningful as well. «Ozu’s films often violate the stylistic conventions of mainstream filmmaking. For example, one “rule” in classical Hollywood cinema is that every shot should clearly and obviously advance the narrative. Yet Ozu’s films frequently feature what commentators call “pillow shots” – namely, shots of landscapes, objects, or interiors that have no apparent connection to the protagonists and what they’re doing plotwise.»

His movies focus on the relationships between people and the world they inhabit, and the growing modernity, and also capitalism, of it. «As you’ll quickly come to see, Ozu is hardly a fan of modernity. In films like The Only Son, Late Spring, Late Autumn, and An Autumn Afternoon, he suggests, among other things, that economic modernization has engendered inequality, feelings of alienation, empty consumerism, and the Americanization of Japanese life.» Those feelings of alienation that we currently feel toward our own lives, our own time and our own time are very relevant for us in 2020. While I do think that those movies represent a certain time and a certain context, and you cannot talk about Yasujiro Ozu without really contextualizing both him and his work, I think it can be really relevant to today. Ozu made movies for himself and for the society he lived in  but that doesn't mean that those movies can’t still be important today.

Ozu did impact international cinema, as can be seen for exemple with the movies of Wes Anderson, as seen in this visual essay that compares their body of work.  both narratively and stylistically. I won’t go into more details about Anderson here, because he is  one of my favorite directors and i hope to write an entire article on him soon, but i thought it was relevant to mention this. Most importantly, Yasujiro Ozu left an imprint on  japanese cinema that can still be seen to this day in contemporary movies. I could mention filmmakers such as Naoko Ogigami, with movies such as Rent-a-cat (2012), Close-Knit (2017) and Kamome Diner (2006), all movies that have a decidedly slower pace and kinder vibe to them. Hayao Miyazaki and the movies Studio Ghibli produced also are an example of that slower cinema, but we’ll touch upon this a bit further down the line. 

(rent-a-cat [2012] d. Naoko Ogigami)

a little world of our own 

With this in mind, it’s easy to see that there’s a sub-genre of japanese cinema that really make a concerted effort at incorporating the concepts of slowness in their stories, whether it's the slower pace of the story or actual slow living principles. Those movies often address the fantasy of leaving everything behind (your work, your problems, your issues, your sadness) to go live in a small town or quitting your job to follow your dreams, or simply to feel like your time is yours again. This list on letterboxd which showcases many movies of that genre in japanese cinema (currently 157 movies on date of writing this article) 

A good example of this type of stories would be the duology of  the Little Forest movies, as well as the subsequent korean adaptation in 2018. These movies were both adapted originally from a manga by Daisuke Igarashi.  Little Forest : Summer/Autumn (2014) and Little Forest : Winter/Spring (2015) follow the story of a young woman who leaves her busy city life to go back to her hometown and decides to live in a slower way, taking care of her vegetables and living according to the seasons.  The two movies are infinitely slow, focusing on the main character cooking, resting, eating, and eventually resolving the conflict that she has with her mother. The life she lives in these secluded parts seems uneventful but happy and calm which seems all that she desires. She doesn’t need to contribute to the capitalist system of society to be deserving of being able to live in peace, and this makes her feel less alienated from the world she lives in. 

Spirited away

I also don’t think it’s really possible to mention slower moments of everyday life in cinema without talking about the movies that probably were the first introduction to this for many of us. The movies of Studio Ghibli, with Hayao Miyazaki at the helm of it, are little masterpieces of animation. The movies are intended for a younger audience but can be appreciated by everyone. Studio Ghibli movies are another example of filmmaking that manages to capture this slower pace in media. Between all of the adventures and events that are happening in those movies, there are moments of slowness. Of calm. Of quietness.

As Robert Ebert told to Miyazaki, during an interview with him « I told Miyazaki I love the "gratuitous motion" in his films; instead of every movement being dictated by the story, sometimes people will just sit for a moment, or they will sigh, or look in a running stream, or do something extra, not to advance the story but only to give the sense of time and place and who they are.» Miyazaki proceeded to explain what this concept was for him  «"We have a word for that in Japanese," he said. "It's called ma. Emptiness. It's there intentionally."» Those slow moments between the action are very deliberate, to slow down the story and to slow down the pace. Contrary to the generally accepted school of thought in modern Hollywood cinema, which is that every single scene needs to move the story forward, Miyazaki lets his story and movies breathe. This way of building the story gives it an added sense of calm and soothingness, but also it gives it another sense of realism. Instead of following a strict narrative outline, this fluidity makes the story feel more real and relatable.

Despite being an animated movie set in a very obviously fantastical universe, Studio Ghibli movies tend to be very realistic in the way they portray the characters, their complexity, and also what are the real underlying conflicts. For example, in Kiki’s Delivery Service (1989) «The primary conflict isn’t about magic—it’s internal and invisible and wholly human: Kiki’s brief period of lost motivation and artist’s block. She gets it back when she wants to help Tombo, whom she loves. Simple as that. She doesn’t have to wage an epic battle to prove her worth»  The stakes might seem lower in this movie, very mundane and ordinary but I think this is what makes it so special. 

The quiet moments and details that might seem innocuous and useless at first and slower the pace of the movie in itself, are ultimately what gives it this feeling of genuineness. It lets the characters and the plot have the space to evolve and to grow. 

« Although these scenes may seem slow or unimportant, they give space to develop the characters and to heighten dreams or feelings the characters are having such as feelings of isolation, wonder, or anxiety. It is in these moments of stillness that the audience can contemplate with the characters and feel what the characters are feeling. These moments remind the audience the importance of stillness in such a fast paced world and highlights the beauty of a slower paced life»

Studio Ghibli movies insert those slower moments in between more faster paced and action packed scenes but also in the midst of world-changing events such as wars, as shown in Howl’s Moving Castle (2004). This demonstrate how people still live on during those crises, even with the danger looming over their heads. Which is something that I think can be very relevant in today’s time where the past twenty years have been increasingly more unstable and the … few months of 2020 were a Shit Show in itself, if you want my opinion. So this kind of media gives me hope that we can live through this, that moments of happiness and peace are still to be found.

A charmed life

Slower cinema is something that has existed for as long as cinema existed, but I do think that it’s a very current feeling to want to be able to slow down the pace of our lives, and be able to enjoy time in a more meaningful way. Personally, I know life has gotten ridiculously hectic for me in the past two years, and while there’s a lot I always want to be doing and I’m very happy about how my life is coming together, this doesn’t mean that sometimes, it doesn’t feel Very Overwhelming and alienating to constantly feel the need to be productive. What we can bring to the capitalist system isn’t what determine the worth and value of who we are as people. «"As speed is seemingly equated with efficiency and professionalism, however, slowness can become a way of signaling an alternative set of values or a refusal to privilege the workplace over other domains of life.”» I hope to be able to live my life on my own term and to be able to spend time on things that are important to me and feel like my time is my own.

Slow media is everywhere lately, whether it’s in cinema, books, games, but also in a more broader sense with the slow life movements, the minimalist trends, but also a general awareness of sustainability, the amount of mass production and mass consumerism in our modern world. 

In order to sustain that fast pace of constant production of things, you inevitably have to sacrifice on either the quality of the product, the work conditions  or on the materials in order to be able to keep up with the extremely high rhythm sustained by capitalism. It can also be compared to the fast work pace imposed on people who work on the sets of movies or video games for example. I think we all heard of the debacle with the Sonic (2020) movie as well as Cats (2019) and the pressure that was put upon the vfx artists to re-do the movie and complete it extremely fast, which brought poor working conditions on them.

Slowing down is, in my opinion, of the utmost importance for us to be able to live better, but also to be able to do better things. To have better working conditions, to be able to have a better craftsmanship, people having more time to do things and do them better instead of scrambling to constantly catch up to a production rhythm that is just simply way too fast. This ties in with the environmental aspect of slowing down, because if you take more time to make things that are of a better quality and that will last for a long time, there won’t be such a  need for a constant production of those things but unfortunately that’s capitalism Babey. 

a quiet respite

Ultimately, the act of slowing down and taking a stand against the fast pace imposed on us by the constraints of capitalism is a very personal one, but I think it's worth considering. And when it’s not possible to actually slow down, I hope those movies and these slower medias can give you a respite even if life isn’t giving you much of one. I do think that having the opportunity to meaningfully slow down the pace of your life, and taking the time to think, breathe, and reconnect with the more mundane parts of your life can be beneficial, especially when there’s a constant pressure to perform and to excel in this fast-paced modern life.

I just hope we can try to take care of ourselves deeply, connect with ourselves but also with each other. We need time to feel, breathe and actually live and not just beat to the drum of a corporation and of this sadistic capitalist system who will never care for you.  Corporations do not want you to slow down and they want to get your money by any means necessary, which we have obviously witnessed a lot during this Global Pandemic. Which is why I think there's a real pushback against this fast pace of life and the mass consumerism, by slowing down, 

On this note, i hope you appreciated the article, i hope you are taking care of yourself during those hard times and i hope the media you are consuming is something that makes you feel better, and i hope you don't put too much pressure on yourself. 

please just breathe. hopefully it will be okay.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Slow Life & Slow Cinema : 

Matthew Flanagan. 'Slow Cinema': Temporality and Style in Contemporary Art and Experimental Film. University of Exeter as a thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in English in October 2012.

ZEESTRATEN, J.  Strolling to the beat of another drum: Living the ‘Slow Life’, Master’s Thesis, Lincoln University, 2008.  <https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/e0c6/f533e7d8f9254eddbadc0fe6dbb7d4a5ea8c.pdf > 

SCREENING BOREDOM THE HISTORY AND AESTHETICS OF SLOW CINEMA Orhan Emre Çağlayan. A Thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Film Studies University of Kent February 2014

ELSON, Logan. Slow Cinema Modality: Applying Bordwell to Tsai Ming-Liang,  Trent University, JUST, Vol. V, No. 1, 2017

LAVIN, Mathias. Prolonger Ozu, avec Kiarostami, Akerman, Hong Sang-Soo.

FLANAGAN, Matthew. Towards an Aesthetic of Slow in Contemporary Cinema, 16:9, 2020 <http://www.16-9.dk/2008-11/side11_inenglish.htm>

RASSOS, Effie. Everyday Narratives Reconsidering Filmic Temporality and Spectatorial Affect through the Quotidian, A Thesis Submitted in Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy School of Media, Film and Theatre University of New South Wales August 2005

LETTERBOXD. The Absolute Beauty in Everyday’s Mundanity. Hungkat, 2020. <https://letterboxd.com/kun/list/the-absolute-beauty-in-everydays-mundanity/>

LETTERBOXD. A Slice of Japanese Life. Seraphimjc, 2020.  <https://letterboxd.com/seraphimjc/list/a-slice-of-japanese-life>/

Enchanted April:

BOLLARD, Jennifer Jane. The Felicitous Space of Elizabeth von Arnim,  Master’s Thesis, University of Canterbury Christchurch,  New Zealand,  1995 ,  <https://ir.canterbury.ac.nz/bitstream/handle/10092/11887/Bollard_thesis.pdf;sequence=>

VON ARNIM, Elizabeth. Enchanted April,  Waking Lion Press, 2008 (first published 1922)

YOUNG, Katie Elizabeth. More than "Wisteria and Sunshine": The Garden as a Space of Female Introspection and Identity in Elizabeth von Arnim' s The Enchanted April and Vera, Master’s Thesis. Brigham Young University, 2011. < https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4032&context=etd>

Yasujiro Ozu:

The Cinema Cartography,  Yasujirō Ozu - The Depth of Simplicity, Youtube video, 2015 <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2G7oeyOsfSg>

JOO, Woojeong, The flavour of tofu : Ozu, history and the representation of the everyday. PhD thesis, University of Warwick, 2011.

BETH, Suzanne. Destruction, puissance et limites du cinéma dans les films d'Ozu Yasujirô, Doctorate Thesis, Université de Montréal, 2015.  <https://papyrus.bib.umontreal.ca/xmlui/bitstream/handle/1866/13600/Beth_Suzanne_2015_these.pdf?sequence=2&isAllowed=y>

EMERSON, Andrew.  The Beginner’s Guide: Yasujiro Ozu, Director, The Film Inquiry, 2019

<https://www.filminquiry.com/beginners-guide-yasujiro-ozu/>

Criterion. The Signature Style of Yasujiro Ozu. On film. 2015 <https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/3836-the-signature-style-of-yasujiro-ozu>

  Thompson, pp. 19-20, 327-331; David Bordwell, Ozu and the Poetics of Cinema (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988), pp. 73-74.

CATLEY, Anna. Wes Anderson & Yasujiro Ozu: A Visual Essay, Youtube, 2015.  <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rbXRpiVO1po >

Little Forest:

SREEKANDAN, Nikhil , Little Forest: Film Review , The Inkline, 2018. <https://the-inkline.com/2018/06/17/little-forest-film-review/>

https://snackfever.com/blogs/magazine/a-refreshing-cool-breeze-found-in-the-little-forest

Studio Ghibli:

EBERT, Robert. Hayao Miyazaki interview. 2002. <https://www.rogerebert.com/interviews/hayao-miyazaki-interview>

The Magic and Artistry of Studio Ghibli’s Films, The Artifice, 2017 <https://the-artifice.com/magic-artistry-studio-ghibli-films/>

JAREMKO-GREENWOLD, Anya. The Low-Stakes Pleasure of Kiki’s Delivery’s Service. on Birth, Movies, Death, 2017. <birthmoviesdeath.com/2017/07/18/the-low-stakes-pleasure-of-kikis-delivery-service>

STEY, George Andrew.. Elements of Realism in Japanese Animation, Master’s Thesis, University of Ohio, 2009. <https://etd.ohiolink.edu/!etd.send_file?accession=osu1250700496&disposition=inline>

Cottagecore:

SKELLEY, Jemima. Cottagecore Is the Soothing Online Aesthetic We All Need Right Now, The Latch, 2020. <https://thelatch.com.au/cottagecore-aesthetic/>

HAASCH, Palmer. People online are flocking to 'cottagecore,' an online aesthetic that idealizes agricultural life, to calm their hyper-stimulated nerves, The Insider, 2020. <https://www.insider.com/cottagecore-isolation-aesthetic-tumblr-explained-social-distancing-2020-4>

SLONE, Isabel. Escape Into Cottagecore, Calming Ethos for Our Febrile Moment, New York Times, 2020. < https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/10/style/cottagecore.html>

animal crossing: 

VINCENT, Britanny. Find fulfillment in Animal Crossing New Horizons' slice-of-life gameplay, CNN underscored., 2020https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/30/cnn-underscored/animal-crossing-new-horizons-review/index.html

WEBSTER, Andrew. ANIMAL CROSSING: NEW HORIZONS IS A CHILL, CHARMING LIFE SIM THAT PUTS YOU IN CONTROL, The Verge, 2020.  <https://www.theverge.com/2020/3/16/21179238/animal-crossing-new-horizons-review-nintendo-switch-features>

#slow living #cottagecore #slowness in cinema #cinema #film