Get inspired with this week’s Fantasy Art Friday, where fun fantasy artwork is combined with a writing prompt to get your creative juices flowing.
“Tranquility” is the title, and at first glance this place does look tranquil. The lush green of the landscape, the slowly flowing stream. Could be a nice place to idle on a warm afternoon. Perhaps wade through the cool water…find a few colorful rocks, or watch small fish swimming in the still waters close to the bank.
Yet as I look closer, into undergrowth surrounding the stream, I realize just how thick it is. Is the whole forest so dense, or has it only grown up that way along the water’s edge? What if you had to travel through an entire forest like that, wading through foliage, and stumbling over roots and rocks, never quite knowing what might be watching you through that tangle of green? What if your journey was urgent, requiring haste to reach your ultimate destination? Suddenly this scene seems oppressive, the stream tranquil because it offers the only break in an endless, smothering blanket of green. Perhaps it is not the ideal location for an idyllic afternoon stroll, but is more like the dark place in my book series called the Shadow Wood, full of terrors that torment the body as well as the mind. There…did you hear it? That whisper in your ear. What was it saying? Or was it just the wind after all?
“Tranquility” by Wouter Florusse
Allison D. Reid 
Your response conjures some old fears.
As I look at it, I’m tempted by the two responses you describe here, but then I intentionally ask “what else could it be”, that inner desire to keep spinning, keep wondering.
I think I’d go for a less definitively good/bad response.
What if this is a place where life dwells in a state of insulated slowness. It’s not that time passes any faster on the outside world, but this is a place that easily helps people let go of the concerns and timetables of man’s world. They do not intend to entrap or bewitch, they simply offer a different way through their example. To me this would be a place where the slow waves of the grass and the playful gurgle of the stream would tempt some, and offer salvation to others. It’s defense would be that no creature could look upon it and wish to mar it with the footprint of industry.
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Old fears? Hmmm…is there a story there? You always have such a unique perspective on these Fantasy Art images–I love your comments and the different scenarios you come up with.
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Thank you. I enjoy collaborating on these images. It’s a fun exercise. Thank you again for sharing.
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Reblogged this on Dragons Rule OK. and commented:
Always something more in these pictures.
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Reblogged this on Dragons Rule OK.
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