Crowley's Greenhouse

💀 Studying skulls, beheading plants… great hobbies for two eldritch entities, if you ask me. ✂️

This is October's mini print artwork! If you'd like a print of this, make sure to be signed up to the Galaxy Voyager tier next month!

I KNOW, crazy things do happen! It's the 28th and I can already share the mini print piece! I don't know if anybody remembers but when I shared the painting for this month, I said I'd start on the one for October right away. And I did! This piece was a huge undertaking lmao I have a little rant for you below in case you enjoy reading about people's struggles 😂 I do also go into a little more detail about the overall choices I've made for this piece.
But I'm very proud of myself for having managed to break the cycle where I rush the bigger pieces towards the end of the month. Here's to hoping that I can be relaxed about the next piece as well!

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Here is an art rant for you! Or perhaps an insight to what goes on inside my head when I make these paintings lmao

You don’t have to read this. And if you do, please don’t take my outrage seriously djlsjsdk

Coming up with the setup for this was so hard! I almost cried!

Because I wanted to start early with the mini print painting this month, I knew I’d have some more time to work on it, which meant I could pick an idea that would need a little bit more work than usual. The perfect prompt for a painting like that was “Crowley’s greenhouse”. I’ve been wanting to draw him in a greenhouse for years but never started the process because foliage and plants in general need a lot, a LOT of time to be painted and as we’ve established, in the past I’ve often had to rush the big paintings I make every month.

So. I decided, yes, the next painting is gonna be set in a greenhouse, finally. Cool. Continue. The real issue came up when I had to decide what’s gonna happen inside the greenhouse. This print is for October and October is not only the autumn month, it’s also the spooky month and I really like it when my paintings fit the season. So alright, greenhouse + autumnal + spooky. Hm. Fantastic, ugh, greenhouses are SO known for including tons of fallen leaves that give off the typical autumn vibe and stuff like, pff, pumpkins, surE, and they’re also sooOooOo spooky(this is sarcasm, if you can’t tell, I had a whole breakdown over this).

I consulted my Discord folks, was entirely too hard to please in regards to accepting the ideas that were presented to me(Sorry again. And also thank you for putting up with me. It’s one of the best forms of love, I think, to help someone through an unnecessary art-related tantrum. I felt so loved and I love you all back jlkfdjdf I was also having the worst time.) I didn’t want something overly silly so stupid halloween costumes were right out. And also they don’t make a whole lot of sense in a greenhouse…? I also didn’t want something super sappy because that’s what I always do.

I’ve been having some trouble recently where I haven’t felt like people have been taking me seriously. May it be at work or with my business or when I'm being emotional and people decide to make a joke about it. I wanted to paint something that would make me feel, uh, serious? lmao Or at least it shouldn’t feel like a joke. I wanted to prove to myself that I can be good at the technical stuff if I have enough time, too.

In short, the issue was the mix of Greenhouse and Halloween. I couldn’t make it work.

So I had this problem and no solution so far. Then I went to check what paintings I’ve made for October over the years and we’ve had: vampires, Edinburgh lads, more vampires, Victorian lads……… Which? Always felt fitting. So I decided, why not bring back the Edinburgh designs? They’ve always felt a little bit like costumes to me(which is great because October is the Dress Up Weird month due to Halloween). Perhaps it’s because Crowley is extra silly in that minisode and also because Aziraphale tells the story like he’s got an audience. And they just look great. Ruffle them up a little and it’s sexy, even.

And then it kind of started to flow a bit more. The Edinburgh minisode is set in 1827 so the vibe is Regency or perhaps already a little Victorian? Which is great for greenhouses, at least the ones I’ve been thinking about for Crowley. Their costumes would help to make it more on-topic for the Halloween month but I wanted to lean into it a little more and decided to bring in some skulls. They’re not only great for spookiness, they also fit the theme of autumn where live cycles end so new ones can start fresh in the new year. It also ties in nicely with the minisode with the corpses and graveyard and whatnot. Aziraphale is studying his skulls, giving him a dark academia vibe with the right amount of candles, and he even draws them, which is something he’s good at in canon. I love when I can show their funky little traits in my art!

And then one thing lead to another: Aziraphale had to sit down for his studies so in order to bring Crowley into the composition I had to have him stand or walk and place him behind Aziraphale so I could still show the skulls properly. And whAT’s better for Crowley to do in a greenhouse than doing Actual Greenhouse Work??????? I’m so smart, someone pat my back. Crowley’s canon outfit is giving him funky halloween vibes already but to enhance it, I gave him big ass shears that he’s tormenting his plants with. I added some dirt “splatter” to his face as a parody of blood. For their faces I decided to make them seem a bit...out of their minds? Maybe a little manic? There is no particular in-universe explanation for it except for “they have been in there for a while because time is a concept and they do not care. Being so drawn into your skull studies and your plant slashing just makes you look Like That”. The technical explanation is that I do what I want and I wanted them to look like that, cheers.

So yeah! I know it's still a bit silly. I guess I cannot shake that off from one day to the next but I think I managed to tick all my boxes with this one in the end! We’ve got the greenhouse, we’ve got the autumn vibes AND I managed to make it a tiny bit spooky.

I hope you agree! If you don’t, please don’t tell me or I will cry.