inkandgrease:
“Mountains of the Moon” in progress. Laying down the flats and some basic tints on this portrait of Chali Edimu, an ambassador from the Anumo Empire, a matriarchal kingdom in the rebuilding post-apocalyptic world. If I were a comic book artist, then this would be a mock cover to my first issue.
Chali and her world are mostly concept pieces that allow me to subvert dominant dialogues of beauty, feminine identity, and power in not only science fiction and fantasy but in wider artistic representations of women.
For me, Chali aligns deeply with the aesthetic of Afrofuturism. I also wanted to work against the presentation of the heroine in graphic science fiction as laughably underdressed in combat situations. In most of my depictions of Chali, she is formally dressed in flowing red regalia that denote her rank and power in her world as an important political personage.