#phantieart

[heliphantie]

My family's amazing, and I'm in my family!

Preview of next picture in the Year of Madrigals!

Though initially I’d planned to finish it to March 6, I’ve decided to complete it with no hurry. Previous one was finished in a rush, and I wasn’t quite satisfied with a result, so now I want to take my time for the better outcome, while still having it by the end of month.

[heliphantie]

In honor of Mirabel Madrigal's birthday (March 6) and the Fifth Anniversary of Encanto movie, here is the selection of my Mirabel-centered fanarts through the years. (1-2 - 2023; 3 - 2024; 4-6 - 2025.)

[heliphantie]

I haven't drawn this gang in a long time, so here they are: the teenage Madriplets!

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Small fanart for Antonio’s birthday.

It is a sort of a remake of older picture (one you can see as a header for this page in regular Tumblr interface).

Sketch before the clean-up - under 'read more'.

[heliphantie]

“It was the winter of war, in 1939. One’s work stood still; it felt completely pointless to try to create pictures.

Perhaps it was understandable that I suddenly felt an urge to write down something that was to begin with “Once upon a time.”

What followed had to be a fairytale – that was inevitable – but I excused myself with avoiding princes, princesses and small children and chose instead my angry signature character from the cartoons, and called him the Moomintroll.

The half-written story was forgotten until 1945. Then a friend pointed out that it could become a children’s book; just finish it and illustrate it; maybe they will want it.

Anyhow, here was my very first happy ending!” - Tove Jansson

~~~

It must have been late in the afternoon one day at the end of August when Moomintroll and his mother arrived at the deepest part of the great forest. It was completely quiet, and so dim between the trees that it was as though twilight had already fallen.

They were out searching for a snug, warm place where they could build a house to crawl into when winter came. Moomins cannot stand the cold at all, so the house would have to be ready by October at the latest.

80 years ago, in 1945, during the last months of World War II, was published the first book about the family of Moomins by Tove Jansson – “The Moomins and the Great Flood” (Swedish: “Småtrollen och den stora översvämningen”, literally “The Little Trolls and the Great Flood”).

Small tribute to the book, drawn in style informed by early look of characters.

[heliphantie]

Alma Madrigal – in my opinion, one of the most underrated (and undervalued) Disney heroines, and it’s her who is a main character of the story, to me.

In less than year of her life, this young woman has met the love of her life, married him, had children, and lost him to violent death (while seeking refuge and being exhausted from childbirth of three), and after that, for 50 years she lived with a trauma of witnessing her husband killed before her eyes, while raising triplets, governing entire growing village, and dealing with unpredictable mysterious magic. (And, while she, probably, was helped by whole community in the course of it, she, despite being very young and remaining such for years, never remarried again, staying fairly independent.)

The magic that was given in a cost of loved one’s life, and one that serves as a mean to assure that nobody, Alma herself of her children, never have to revive experience of seeing one of them giving away their all to save other. And one way to honor and maintain that miracle is to teach each new generation to respect its origin, use its gifts only for good and not to mistreat it, so no sacrifices will be needed to keep family together. And, by tragic irony, it turned that her children and grandchildren are willing to do exact thing they were supposed to be prevented from, for the sake of keeping miracle alive, rather than taking care of communication and open support of each other to be strong together. And even then, for years all of them never tried to abuse their, potentially dangerous for the most part, magical gifts, remained kind-hearted and loving to each other, even if not all of them mastered ability of expressing their love in constructive ways. This is, I think, a testimony of Alma being a fairly good mother and mentor figure in highly irregular situation she was put in without any clue how to handle.

In early versions of story draft, she was written as even more legendary figure, apparently having built Casita in one day all by herself while heavily pregnant(!), and such, but, magic aside, her story being more grounded works better for giving her character empathetic angle and highlighting how, struggling through imperfections and uncalled experience, she managed to stay strong and reliable and earned deserved peace of mind in the end.

[heliphantie]

Celebratory fanart for 15th anniversary of “Tangled” and 4th year since the release of “Encanto”, two movies sharing one director, Byron Howard.

Someone once said Bruno would make good fairy godparent figure, which sounds just fair (he embodies archetype anyway, and in early versions of it in folk tales, role of magical mentor is sometimes occupied by an uncle or aunt of hero). Then, get a magical godchild assigned, old man!

“Tangled” may be my favorite (second of TP&TF) Disney fairytale of modern era, it does pay respect to its classic form, but also has its own distinctive visual language and original themes as well. I like in particular that it introduces first princess with defined artistic inclinations, her longing for open world expressed through her paintings, recreation of the universe inside the walls she’s trapped within.

And there’s a personal touch behind the concept: not just animator Clen Keane designed the character in likeness of his daughter and successor Claire, she herself developed ideas for workings of Rapunzel’s creative mind through the diary-like notes, and many of works belonging to the character in supplementary materials (and in the animated series) are made by her as well. It’s a love for the craft reflected in a creation itself in the form of wonderful meta element.

Bruno’s character is an interesting mirror to Rapunzel’s, as his story contains similar elements in more ambiguous, less fairytale-clear aspect. Like her, he’s been confined in a tower with a purpose of service with his obtained magical gift, like her, he possesses creative mind, and like her, he’s more than his gift and eventually letting go of it as it doesn’t define his essence. The difference is, unlike Punzie, Bruno, in pursue of following his heart’s call, leaves the tower just to subject himself to even stronger confinement, and in the end has to face and resolve his family issues without running from it, because in real life, your demanding parent is less likely to turn to be an evil witch who’s got you stolen from your actual perfect royal family.

And as a side note: color of Punzie’s dress is a reference to the green dress seen in concept arts!

[heliphantie]

See the finest girl in France Make an entrance to entrance Dance la Esmeralda Dance!

What do I do to commemorate 30th anniversary of Disney’s “The Hunchback of Notre Dame”? Why, draw the characters from different movie as THoND characters, of course!

Consider it a continuation of Madrigals-cosplaying-Disney series, started here with Pepa and Félix. This one idea, while not a “couple cosplay”, was on my mind for some time as well, finally realized.

What I like, among other things, about Bruno’s character, is his many-layered personality, including what appears to be a slightly tricksterous and performative side as well, so it’s all appropriate for him to pose as Prince des Sots once in a while. And Isa, as Esmeralda from the movie (and partially from the source novel, though different in some regard), is an enchanting performer with sorrows hidden within the gracious façade, and is something of “big sister” archetype towards Quasi. Also, while not obvious in movie version, Clopin serves as sort of protective figure for the girl, while not exactly fatherly one, but fitting the “uncle” archetype. (Movie Clopin is like an amalgamation of three different characters from the novel, I’m not exactly sure he’s supposed to be Romani, but I somewhat assume he is?) And while the further fate of Quasi in Disney movie stays unclear, I assume, here he becomes welcomed and adopted (back) by Romani of Paris after events of movie, so I can see Clopin becoming that kind of guardian figure for him, and won’t you think Bruno would embrace Quasi as a “godson” and a kindred soul to himself, just as I think he would with Punzie?

Hm, I did it all mostly about Encanto characters, as always. For THoND, it’s definitely one of my favorite 90s Disney movie, still following the spirit of previous “Renaissance” movies (mainly “Beauty & The Beast”), but leaning more towards experimenting with themes and visuals, and is an organic blend of two things, combining gorgeous animation with memorable music and colorful characters. (I especially like to point how, despite “Disney Princess” being a persistent stereotype to that day, late 90s – early 00s had a wide range of diverse female characters with nuanced rich personalities, Esme being one of them.)

I should honor actual characters of the movie some time in future as well.