Godflowers, 2021
Janice Hu
3.875 in x 6.875 in

The theme of my work is to show how some of the Greek gods look as plants or fungi in my mind. I used what each god was in charge of or what they symbolize and depicted the image that came to my head into the cards. The program I used was Clip Studio Paint. I am not very good at painting so my style always changes, but I tried to stay loyal to one style so some images wouldn’t look too out of place. My favorite card I drew were the three in the top row: Athena, Dionysus, and Hermes. For those three I had a clearer image of what I wanted to depict, and I felt it was more unique too. For Hermes and Poseidon I used overlay layers to show sunlight or glow. For Athena I started off with the vase and the book, then did the background, but for the other cards I started off with the background first. Throughout this process, I realized laying down just some colors in the background can help you show the atmosphere of what you are trying to draw a lot better. For Dionysus, there is actually an underlying layer which I scrapped, except for the part in the wine cup because I thought it looked a lot more interesting when it seemed like there was something in the drink. I struggled a bit with the name tags, especially for Dionysus because I didn’t want to cover up the grapes, the vines, and the pretty clouds I spent quite some time on. However, I still think it looks okay. Overall, it was hard getting used to painting again since I am not a great painter, but some of the cards turned out beautifully to me.