Contemplating Satan

February 16, 2021 in Milton project

Hi y’all,

Welcome to this week’s blog post! Today, I want to share my thoughts on (eventually) illustrating one of Paradise Lost’s most interesting characters: Satan.

What fascinates me about Milton’s version of Satan is how likable (and, at times, relatable) Milton makes him out to be. Before his fall from Heaven, Satan (then Lucifer, meaning “light bringer”) is the most beautiful, radiant, and eloquent angel. These same traits play a big role in his fall. He’s able to persuade other angels to join his rebellion because his eloquence makes him persuasive. His radiance and beauty lead to a very weird, incestuous affair with Sin, who springs out of his head as a fully formed goddess (for my fellow classical nerds, yes, that’s an Athena-Zeus reference).

In the end, though, it’s Satan’s pride that leads to his downfall. When he first arrives to Eden to tempt Adam and Eve, Satan has a prolonged moment of doubt. It’s my favorite monologue in the poem (beginning of the fourth book, for anyone who’s interested in reading the full thing). He confesses to the reader that “pride and ambition threw [him] down” and wishes that he had been “some inferior angel”, so that he could have “stood happy”. The problem, however, cuts deeper: “Which way I fly is hell; myself am hell; / And in the lowest deep a lower deep / Still threatening to devour me opens wide, / To which the hell I suffer seems a heaven.”

Satan’s inner torment distorts his outward appearance. As he goes through waves of rage, doubt, and despair, they “[mar] his borrowed visage”. After the fall of Adam and Eve (spoiler alert), God even turns Satan and his fellow angels-turned-demons into snakes.

I want my depiction of Satan to capture both his luminosity before the fall and his gradual distortion through pride, rage, and sadness. This is what I’ve come up with so far:

I’m still tinkering with it, but I like the direction so far. After the last oil study (which you can find below), I wanted to get more experimental with the brushwork, color, and texture — basically, to get more energy in the piece, spice it up a bit. As I painted, I thought more and more about Satan’s dual nature, and, eventually, the two ideas merged into one.

Prepping for the Satanic torso involved a lot of pen and ink studies, most of which I put up in last week’s post. For comparison’s sake, I’ve included them below, along with one more I worked through before starting the oil study.

And, as always, I started with a human anatomy study, which you can find below:

That’s it for this week! I’ll be back next week with an update on the WIP oil study, some more pen and inks, and whatever other art news I have to share. Thanks for tuning in and have a great week!

More angels; send us your Iliad poems!

February 09, 2021 in Milton project, Consequence

Hi y’all,

Welcome back to the blog! This week, I’ve got an update on the Milton illustration project and a high-key pitch for you to submit your best Iliad-related poems to Consequence, where I work as the assistant poetry editor.

For those of you who haven’t read last week’s post, I’ve recently started work on a long-time goal: illustrating the angels from John Milton’s Paradise Lost. If you’re not familiar with the poem, it’s essentially a retelling of Genesis/the fall of Adam and Eve (but much more exciting and stuffed with drama). At one point, Milton describes the angels’ anatomy as “vital in every part”, capable of taking on whatever shape they please, and similar to the “fluid air" (check out last week’s post for the full passage).

Over the past week, I’ve gotten through two more pen and ink studies of the angel anatomy, this time of the back view of their torso. As usual, I started with a regular, human anatomy study:

then distorted it:

I’ve also worked up a procreate study of the back view of the angel torso, like I did for the front view. I decided to get a little more adventurous with the lighting and mark-making here. While it was more difficult than the last Procreate study, I think I also learned more along the way.

I also managed to get through the first study using oils. As I was working on it, I kept thinking about how the medium naturally translates Milton’s idea of the angels’ bodies being like the “fluid air.” In future oil studies, though, I think I want to get more out-there with the color choices and the background. Live and learn!

That’s it for this week on the Milton project. Outside of that, I’m very excited to announce that we have an open reading period through the end of March at Consequence. For anyone who isn’t familiar with the journal, we’re dedicated to art and writing on the culture and consequences of war. This coming issue, we’re launching a special project — “What is War Poetry?” — in which we’ll be asking fundamental questions about the historical development and importance of war poetry. For the first installment, we’ll be tackling those questions through the lens of the Iliad, the ancient Greek epic composed by Homer about the Trojan War/the beef between Achilles and Agamemnon. Send us your best poems that touch on the Iliad here! And stay tuned for future special issues. Next up: the Bhagavad Gita.

That’s it for this week. Thanks for tuning in and keep creating!

Welcome! (with angels)

February 02, 2021 in Milton project

Hi y’all,

Welcome to the blog! In an effort to be more transparent about my process, I’ll be posting here once a week or so. Stay tuned to keep up with current artistic projects — painting, poetry, and bears, oh my.

To get started, I want to share some studies for a project I’m excited about, although it’s still in early stages: a series of illustrations for Milton’s angels from Paradise Lost. For anyone who doesn’t know, Paradise Lost is a book-length poem that John Milton wrote in the 17th century. It retells the story of the fall of Adam and Eve. The poem starts with Satan’s fall from Heaven and ends (spoiler alert) with the expulsion of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden.

It’s truly a great poem — a lot of work, to be sure, but one of my all-time favorites. Milton earns his place in my top five with this poem for the sentences and rhythm alone. If that’s not enough for you, it’s got torture (literally), heartbreak (figuratively), and adventure (both).

I first tried to read it a few years ago in Delhi, but ended up giving the book away to a friend. I tried again with a reading group the next year in New York, but we trailed off. Finally, two years ago, during my MFA, I managed to get through it. Third time’s the charm.

I was also studying artistic anatomy, drawing, and painting at The Art Students League of New York at the time. One passage in particular fascinated me:

”[…] for spirits that live throughout
Vital in every part, not as frail man
In entrails, heart or head, liver or reins,
Cannot but by annihilation die;
Nor in their liquid texture mortal wound
Receive, no more than can the fluid air:
All heart they live, all head, all eye, all ear,
All intellect, all sense, and as they please,
They limb themselves, and color, shape or size
Assume, as likes them best, condense or rare.”

The passage comes from book six. Raphael, one of the archangels, is telling Adam about the battle in Heaven between the pro-God forces and Satan + his soon-to-be-fallen angels. Essentially, it’s pointless — since they’re all celestial beings, none of the angels can seriously wound each other. Here, Raphael is explaining how their angelic anatomy allows them to quickly recover from their wounds. If you’re curious how the battle ends (spoiler alert, again), the Son drives Satan and his companions out of Heaven on a fiery chariot. They plummet through Chaos into Hell. It’s pretty great.

This passage has been tickling my art-nerd brain ever since I read it — what would muscles, fibers, and bones that form as freely as the “fluid air” look like? For every little part of a body to be independently and fully alive? And part of a single being?

Well, here’s my best guess:

For now, I’m working through these studies one section of the body at a time. The first is an angel torso, the second angel legs. Both are pen and ink (microns, to be exact). I’ve been starting with studies of regular human anatomy, then distorting them to fit Milton’s description. Here are the corresponding regular human studies:

I’ve also worked up an angel torso on Procreate. The idea was to think through how these studies might eventually work as paintings (color, brushwork, etc.).

I’ll be doing more studies in the coming weeks with pen and ink, Procreate, and, eventually, real-life oils. Stay tuned here and on Instagram to see more. Thanks so much for reading! Keep creating and have a great week.