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Welcome artists and crafty people

I just thought I'd start up a little spot for those of us who enjoy being creative, or indeed, those of us who are creative for a living.

I myself am a freelance artist, and I thought it would be nice to see how many more atheists there are in the art world.

I also wonder if your atheism affects your art in any way - as I have seen countless religious artists covering the internet with their religio-inspired works. Anyone out there who counteracts that with gorgeous paintings of long-dead dinosaurs for example?

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Anath on July 10, 2008 at 10:01am

I wouldn't say my atheism inspires my art, but my philosophy and extreme anti-Christian leanings most certainly do.

I'm very interested in monsters and creatures as well as natural history items and science.

Permalink Reply by Hannah on July 10, 2008 at 2:30pm

*lol* no, my atheism doesn't inspire my work - but I find I enjoy playing with religion in it. Creating new ones, messing with existing ones and so on.

I have seen some gorgeous darwin inspired work and drawing/paintings of dinosaurs and extinct creatures by atheits attempting to show the creationists what they're missing.

Permalink Reply by Pam on July 11, 2008 at 5:17am

I do a lot of collage and textual work and I like to play around with religious images and 'standard' images of women and try to either put a point across (even if just to myself lol) or change something in them that will give a message to anyone who sees it- not that anyone does :)

Permalink Reply by inspectormustard on July 11, 2008 at 5:28am

I probably should do more political art, since lately I haven't had much inspiration to make anything specific. Plenty of atheist (inspired by but not particularly aimed at atheism) music though, a bit of which I have uploaded to my page.

Permalink Reply by inspectormustard on July 11, 2008 at 5:57am

I'm big on surrealist minimalism, although I think that sounds like a contradiction in terms. My inspirations are André Masson, Hans Bellmer, Willem de Kooning, and Franz Kline's black work -the stuff that when you look at it briefly you see more than is actually there. I'm apt to try and find out what a given artist was experiencing when they created something I really like, even though I tend to make things that are completely different from the way I feel at that time. With artistic work I like to surprise people with missing details or detail where it doesn't belong; building their expectations up to the point when even though they see the edge coming it's too late to turn away and they drop right off of into it.

Permalink Reply by Vitomama on July 21, 2008 at 6:09pm

Love de Kooning! And I love your detail thing. I've discovered (from necessity) that some of my best work is done on finished works (that nobody wanted to buy) - I create new work on top of it and leave things from the old work that I've fallen in love with - you know what I mean - stuff you're not willing to sacrifice (even if you should). So, subtle imagery comes through, sometimes recognizable as an image, sometimes not.

Permalink Reply by Darla on July 11, 2008 at 12:51pm

Hi eveyone!
I usually paint expressive faces and concept stuff, so atheism isn't really a theme or anything, but I'm sure it colors what I see and how I perceive reality so it must affect it somehow : )

Permalink Reply by Glendon Mellow on July 15, 2008 at 10:52am

I tend to paint fanciful creatures based on our prehistoric past.

I think science informs my work, atheism to a degree. I'm still working on that. I find sometimes I am hesitant to be openly mocking myself - although I appreciate the Myers & Sekhars out there! So far my focus has been more about blending imagination with the wonders of the natural world, rather than satire of religions.

Thanks for starting this group, Hannah! Nice to see everyone...

Permalink Reply by LeaT on July 15, 2008 at 2:49pm

I am not an atheist nor am I an artist as such (my drawing is rather poor and shouldn't be shown to the world) but I write. I have already stated my official DA profile both here and in the DA thread I started.

While I would like to get a more sarcastic tone with my writing style, I guess I am too much of a romantist to do it. My writing ranges between a lot of themes, but pshychological horror is one of my favorite genres. When I write horror I tend to somehow become very similar to H. P. Lovecraft, such as shown with my short story "To Communicate With the Stars". In a way, it isn't that intended.

As for atheim in particular, there are some antichristian things I've written in the past, as well as people losing faith and about doubt. Well, I am too much of a romanticist (I really like that artsy era in general) to become utterly serious and not touch the supernatural. I have written some pagan stuff like The Wheel of Time, which is an aspiration making the Wicca myth into a poem. People often mistake it for the fantasy series Robert Jordan written though. Not so strange since that man incorporated a lot of paganism into his works.

Permalink Reply by AxisofJared on July 17, 2008 at 7:02pm

I do a little work here and there on a graphic novel that I came up with years ago. It covers several themes, but the central overall theme is the dystopia exacerbated by religion. There are the 'haves' and 'have-nots', the latter of which follow the faith more, well, faithfully - but pay more of a price because of it. Their world is primitive with no better than 15th century technology. The 'haves' live off the 'have-nots' (using religion) and enjoy futuristic technology and living conditions.

I don't really have a story yet, just sketches of different settings and of random characters. It's not earth, so I'm coming up with a whole different reality: different cities, villages, economy, a new religion. Basically, I'm still just at the phase of creating this world, like Tolkien or Herbert - but there's no way in hell I'm coming up with a new language!

I do want the story to have a very strong, yet subversive criticism of religious power and the willful ignorance that stems from faith. My holdup is coming up with the protagonist(s) that bring the corrupt system down and change things for the better. I'm practically allergic to cliche, so absolutely shudder at the thought of using a hero or heroine who is "the Chosen One" or something similarly banal.

Any thoughts would be appreciated!

Permalink Reply by Randall "Doc" Fleck on July 19, 2008 at 6:36pm

Oh my goodness... I'm so dumb.

I opened a discussion in "Forums" asking if there were any artists here... Hmmm... Well, of course there are. This is the place, isn't it, and I also found some photo-artists in another group. Kool.

Now then... Do we have a gallery of posted works? Hannah...? Anyone...?

Permalink Reply by LeaT on July 22, 2008 at 5:09am

Check my DeviantArt thread :)