ART WAR 5 | 2D Submissions | Art World War | La Maja - The Spanish Artillery Soldier | rakskuder

Representing Spain with a war champion that is still going through a brainstorming process

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Hi! I’m Rak Skuder and this is my first time taking part in Art War. Very excited about it 😊.

So, I’ve decided to represent a champion from my own country, Spain. Been doing my own research to get some inspirations. As you may know, Spain has a long history with great heroes and legends. Oh Europe, the old continent!

So, I was doing my brainstorming and I kinda went way too back in time until Lusitania, which was, the union of Spain and Portugal, and decided to skip to another recent time. And as I was reading and refreshing my mind with the country’s history, I reached some lines that blew my mind, in a good way. Firstly, let me explain the context:

The Spanish War of Independence (a military conflict fought by Spain against the invading and occupying forces of France for control of the Iberian Peninsula during the Napoleonic Wars), began in Spain with the Dos de Mayo Uprising, on 2nd May, 1808. The episode remains as the bloodiest event in Spain's modern history.

Those lines that touched me were the ones that named not only men, but also women and children, who faced war defending their own beliefs, culture, religion and homes. And all of it, takes me straight to Francisco de Goya to recreate that event through his art.

So, I felt at some point that I found the inspiration I was looking for, as I can relate with those convictions that the Spanish people showed. I believe this is a good chance to pay tribute to those almost unknown heroes and heroines.
Then, as I kept on my reading, also I found her: the Spanish Joan of Arc, Agustina de Aragón. She has been the subject of much folklore, mythology, and artwork, including sketches by Francisco Goya and the poetry of Lord Byron.

The legend around her tells that, the 2nd of July 1808, the city of Zaragoza resisted the siege of the French troops. At one of the city gates, known as El Portillo, a young woman of no more than twenty years old caught a linstock, and above the fallen soldiers, she lit the fuse of a cannon. The shot forced the French to retreat. Agustina de Aragón, with this brave gesture, became a myth.

Agustina de Aragón (2012), by Augusto Ferrer-Dalmau

Did I need more inspiration references after all of this? Indeed. I researched more about the people in the Spanish Society of the 18th century and trends. I don’t want to extend it too much but my brainstorming made a U turn, from war to the way of living in Spain.

There was a Spanish female urban tribe in the 18th century called “Las Majas”, and the trend is known as “Majismo”.
Las Majas were part of a social protest that arose around 1740s. Their main goal was going against the French tendencies that were introduced from France in the reign of Philip V.
Their presence made a great transformation in the female behavior. But also, and above all, in the human relationships between the men and women of that time.

You may have seen the singer Rosalía performing and imitating this paint as a "maja" in her videoclip "Di mi nombre" (Say my name).

It is true that during the 18th century women continued to act as mothers and wives, while their role in public life had nothing to do with the large male presence. However, these women, made noticeable changes in their outward appearance and also in female social functions and their behavior. They broke with some stereotypes that had marked the lives of women since the Middle Ages.

They were women who belong to middle classes and who began to have a presence in public life as vendors or merchants. Defined as bold, friendly, outspoken, foul-mouthed, outspoken, and mischievous, Las Majas were women who opposed to imposed principles. Their morals were not exactly Catholic. Rather than that, it was more in line with the collective of their community. They were women who could not control their instincts and were opposed to the images of home angel and virtuous woman. Needless to say, in those times society was trying to sell that image as the morally correct.
Just as today's urban tribes use music and culture to spread their ideals, las Majas expressed these behaviors in public spaces and in different theatrical and musical performances.

It all together makes me think that, if I would have lived in those times, it all would have matched with myself! With who I am today, because some things may have changed in a period of 200ish years, but, somehow I feel something still remains. I find it quite curious that I’m able to relate myself with this, with some kind of a freedom feeling in this society that we live in.

And now, after all my references it’s time to have fun designing my champion 😊. The idea is to mix the clothing and outfits of soldiers in the independence war and the majismo trend within the same character. Leaving here some that I have collected too.

En ello estoy!! Pero me gusta cuidar mucho los posts jeje. Prontito subo cosas!!!

Haha sorry!! They were just saying that it's a good historical background and research, and I replied that I'm working on it! I'm glad to reply to people in any language as long as I can speak it, but of course I will be posting everything in english . Thanks for your comment! Will show you all that I've been doing these days soon!!

Happy new year everyone and here we go! I can start showing some designs.

Thinking about my character La Maja and according to all my research, she has to look powerful, breaking stereotypes related to the “correct morality” for women, and also, being a Spanish independence war’s soldier. I normally hate designs that represent girls as tiny, thin and weak human beings. My image of a perfect woman goes more in the direction of strength and beauty rounded shapes/muscles. When I find the occasion, I tend to exaggerate those shapes a lot. This was one of those moments to let my hand do the anatomy thing.

I started with some gesture drawing, trying some dynamic poses, in order to choose one and develop some designs.

So, what I have focused on this stage has been the mixing outfit. Majismo and soldier´s uniform, with sort of a sexy looking in the end. Tried to use almost all of my references to take the right choices. It hasn’t been that easy to be fair. In fact, I ended up doing clean up linearts that I’m not even gonna use at all in my final designs , but somehow I needed to know what were the shapes I was looking for. I have wasted a bit more of time than expected at first just cleaning lines. Will keep on with volumes, color and light next time, hopefully.

Well, there are many things I would comment about all the accessories that I added. At some point, I stepped back a bit from my screen and analyzed what changes the design needed. I’m going to try another texture for the trousers, as the one I did is from the soldier’s uniform and my idea is pushing it to the majismo trend. Don’t know if it will work yet. And of course, I've got other accessories in mind that I'll add to the design as well.

But the main problem was the Spanish mantilla. I did the shape of a basic one (although in reality there’re many and some are very different!) but it just didn’t fit the way I wanted. So I had to give it another go pushing my imagination forward. Tried a soldier’s hat and half of a cannon wheel.

The cannon wheel mantilla is what convinced me the most, but I would like to know your opinions and feedback!

And this is pretty much it for the time being. Have to do facial expressions with color and light to give her the right personality. Just one thing else, she’s not coming alone on this adventure, but can’t reveal more for now hehe.

PS: La Maja has already an official OST. Been constantly listening to the album El mal querer by Rosalía. Funny the fact that it's inspiring me with this design

I thought that too about the cannon wheel! And planning to make it look gorgeous, a bit more of a crown without loosing the feel of a wheel but so far I'm choosing it for the final design.

Hi! Finally starting with color and light! I have used my first close up design for it, and took the final decision of choosing the cannon wheel as the official Spanish mantilla for her. Apart from designing, I needed to write down a narrative behind my character in order to keep on creating, and it has become a some kind of war tale.

I have been seeing the submissions and I can tell my approach to the meaning of “war” is different for me. Some designs are awesome, but I’m surprise with the fact that we have normalized that these characters enjoy battles and wars within the narratives. Some characters even smile while fighting, and out of here, I can find a million references with the same fact. For me, war is tragedy. It is something that would freak me out, and gathering the courage to face war is what I believe is the real epic. But it is only my point of view and being realistic after all. Within the context of La Maja’s story, and happening in the bloodiest episode of the modern era of Spain, she has no choice and has the duty of becoming a soldier, forced by her thoughts of loosing everything she owns in present, and the possible future that would not occur. Because war is death, and again, it's a tragedy. I want her to represent that meaning. That has driven me to draw her sad, crying even, because it’s her duty to enroll in war to achieve freedom for her people and future children.

I had to upload the png file, so right click to open it in another window if you want to see it in detail. The jpeg file seems to show the colours more in a grey hue, and those aren't the real ones

On the other hand, I would have never thought that the Spanish flag and its colours would match soooo well with the artillery theme! They are perfect to represent cannons and fire. Also, I think red represents very well a powerful bloody drama, plus, it kinda makes the character more passionate about it. And red for make-up is also sexy. Yellow works well too as highlights, contrasting with reds.

Will work more with the concepts 😊. By the way, this time I listened a lot to the album Los Ángeles by Rosalía. Highly recommended haha. All that text that I wrote above about war is also inspired by Rosalía’s lyrics, as the entire album is like a sad story of death, or seeing how life is ending. Although this time I listened to The road to el Dorado’s OST by Elton John, casually about two spaniards in the 16th century haha.

Hi! It feels like an eternity since my last post. This design has taken a lot of my time to have it done, but I can say finally that I have my front view fully designed! I’ve been struggling way too much with details, adding way more than what I had planned in the beginning with the lineart. Sadly, I have been able to spend only two/three hours per day recently, after I finished my Christmas break and came back to work.

The goal was to mix the Spanish soldier outfit with the majismo trend, and the process became madness with so many patterns! Don’t even ask how many layers I used. I could not respond accurately. Even so, I enjoyed the making a lot, although I admit that I’ve suffered a bit with some of the details. There is a song from the 2000s, by a young spanish singer that says “antes muerta que sencilla”, which means, rather dead than simple. Many of us have grown in Spain with that phrase, and I had it in my mind with every single stroke of those trousers and veils!! Like, she is going to war, but hey, don't forget to dress up with your best clothes because you worth it girl

Well, I’ve done a shot breakdown with the progression. I couldn’t divide it in more shots given that my file was way too messy as I mentioned before!
First, I did the textures and solid colours, and then, I started with volume, light, adjusting final colours and made sure everything was set in its right place.

I have added some accessories that I have found doing a bit more of research from that time in Spain. One of them is a necklace with medals and symbols that were quite traditional. On the other hand, I found this amazing good luck charm that children used to wear on their hip. As soon as I saw it, I knew La Maja needed to wear it too.

So, this is the final result.

And this is a test, again, with a background and the colours around representing Spain.

Hope you like it! Remember to do right click on the images to see them bigger in another window

Next step: back view (I’ll take it easy this time), planning thumbnails…and…another surprise I hope I can show a rough concept of it this weekend!

Well, I couldn't do as much as I wanted this weekend as I thought I could, and next weeks seems to be busy for me. But I'll do my best with the updates, sharing at least some little progress. I think I should explain a bit more of my last post, going through some decisions that I had to take according to the period of time and trends. They might not seem a lot once it's done, but I can tell they gave me some headaches to be accurate.

I have designed a profile view. Having some other views will help me better with facial expressions in the near future, and thinking already in the final illustration