#warriorprincessarthur

[eviko]

I  wanted to practice drawing more in the background. Anyway this is also an announcement that from tomorrow I will be without a steady internet connection/computer for a week so if you send messages don’t expect a reply straight away.

[eviko]

Anonymous asked: So your genderfluid merlin is awesome as hell! Have you ever considered him(?) and genderqueer/nonbinary arthur?

hmm I am kind of really attached to pairing him with WarriorPrincess!Arthur,  like its one of my fav pairings so i probably wont deviate from that, (if i specifically draw something with genderfluid!merlin)

Long discussion about drawing gender under cut.

As far as Warriorprincess!Arthur goes, part of me also wants to push back with “why isn’t she non-binary enough?” but i think that is me being a little protective. She poses a question for me about what is gender really, because in my mind She acts and behaves and dresses just like Canon Arthur, the only difference is her body is more feminine, and the fact she was born a princess not a prince. I see her being uncomfortable with feminine things, and not enjoying dresses and stuff, but at the same time I don’t think she sees that at odds with her womanhood. It’s everyone else’s problem, not hers and it’s a problem they soon forget once she faces them in battle. She is just a very masculine woman, and I think that kind of character is important, It’s also a character I can relate to quite a bit. 

In saying that,  the nature of gender identities is they are not always visible, and the only way to make them so in one picture art is to code in gender stereotypes, e.g. say well if they wear feminine clothes then they must identify as at least something other than their masculine bodies, and I think that can be problematic, because you are reinforcing that there are things that woman do and men do, and I am not comfortable with that at all. in some cases I know I do it, but I try to draw genderfluid!merlin in canon clothes as much as anything else. It is something I think any artist who wants to draw this has to struggle with and think about because artists do use symbols to communicate these kind of things..

People’s personal identities and how they feel about themselves are not always visible, especially with things like genderqueer, so I kind of encourage people to headcanon any of my drawings how they like in terms of gender Identity. It is one of the main reasons I continue using “he” for genderfluid merlin, because as far as I am concern all my merlin’s are or at least can be trans in some way.

Sorry about the huge wall of text, I have been thinking about this a while. But it is something I am consciously struggling with in my art.