Sketching mythical creatures

by Kaija on Thursday, April 18th, 2013

Posted in: Art, inspiration, making of RFR
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I’m excited for the upcoming weekend, because I will be inking a RFR page full of magical creatures and characters! I’ve been preparing by sketching them out and looking at old illustrations of creatures like dog-men and mermaids as well as reading up on all these wild and weird myths about them.

It’s all so fascinating to me. They seem to be such a real part of the world in those days. At the time of the witch hunts in Europe a huge amount of these stories were properly recorded in trials from witness testimonies, in much detail. You can just imagine how these elaborate stories were created: a retelling of an event spreading through some village, word of mouth moulding it, adding juicy details. With the tale comes finger pointing and accusations. Maybe the accused, in desperation, pushes the blame to someone else, not being able to shake the guilt they’ve been associated with. Finally, it all ending with a blown out, crazy myth for us to marvel at. Dog-men, monopods, witches, pacts with the devil, flying on brooms or sprouting wings. A fascinating source of human imagination.

– Kaija