You might say I have “unicorn issues.” I like them; that should be fairly clear by the fact that this blog is called blackunicorn.org. I don’t tend to draw unicorns, though. I used to, back when I was in junior high, or early high school. And then I just stopped, I suppose because the College Board didn’t take kindly to my AP portfolio having a bunch of fantasy art in it. I didn’t pass, which was a devastating blow to my ego.
I didn’t really do anything remarkable in college- there isn’t a whole lot other than my graphic design work that was very good- my drawings were very stiff, or very obsessive about detail. I learned a lot, but I don’t have a whole lot of work I’m proud of to show for it.
Meanwhile, this movie came out my senior year. I don’t know if you’ve heard of it- Napoleon Dynamite. I hated this movie. I can’t remember another movie I so viscerally disliked as Napoleon Dynamite. I could never get on board with the whole “Let’s start wearing the uniform of the un-cool social group” trend. You know, how all of a sudden it became edgy and cool to wear t-shirts with sentimental pictures of horses? See, I was one of those kids who wore stuff like that in school, and I was ostracized for it. And now the cool kids have adopted that? That’s not fair. (also trucker hats piss me off, but that’s another rant entirely. Breifly, I think it’s subtle class warfare)
And unicorns, too. Cool kids suddenly love unicorns. But only ironic unicorns. Because if you earnestly like unicorns, you’re not in on the joke, as a matter of fact, you’re kind of the object of ridicule. Well, I like unicorns. I like this shirt collection I found on CafePress because it reminds me of all the good and sweet and magical things I liked about unicorns in the first place. And the cool kids can’t have it, because it’s not ironic enough. I think maybe if the star and moon didn’t have smiley faces it might skate the line between good-enough-for-the-cool-kids and Just Good, but it’s just too nice to be in on the joke.
I think there’s a place in the world for earnestly cute and sweet things. There needs to be some innocence left, untouched by that making-fun-of-nerds subtext that seems to be all over the place nowadays. I think I need to start drawing unicorns again.
Tags: art, cute, ironic, Napoleon Dynamite, POD Stuff, unicorns
Called in sick to the TV farm on Wednesday, and spent the entire day sleeping. At least I’m getting getting-sick out of the way before the Christmas maelstrom hits. But, dangit I have work to do! I’m getting some of it done insofar as I’ve been adding new and exciting stuff to my cafepress store at a rate greater than most of the rest of the year (which is to say I’ve done it three times in three days and updated all the old sections with the new products), but that’s still not quite where I’d like to be right now. And my comic is suffering.
This is my sketchblog, which is for doodles, comics, essays, and other stuff that an illustrator and comicker might blog about. I'm Veronica, and I run this joint. All the artwork is copyright Veronica C Guzzardi. Please don't use it without permission from me. Please contact me if you want to pay me to draw for you; that's my favorite.