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Anday — Orientalist Fire Nation - I
#atla #azula #firenation #shoujoai #atlafanart #princessazula #tylee #tyzula #avatarthelastairbender
Published: 2015-03-17 20:19:51 +0000 UTC; Views: 70514; Favourites: 694; Downloads: 0
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Orientalist Fire Nation 1/?
I don’t know why it took so long, but I just got on board this ship, WHERE THE HELL IS EVERYBODY??
I’m attempting to do a series of Fire Nation paintings inspired by Orientalist art (minus the creepy odalisk objectification aspects). My intent is to show court drama and the private lives of Fire Nation citizens, borrowing decorative elements from Orientalist paintings.
And I start with Princess Azula because I have too many feelings still want her to be redeemed and show a more human side. Following the tv show, we only ever see glimpses (and very, very minimally) of these through her interactions with Ty Lee.
I read a lot of post-recovery fics, so this is post-psychosis episode Azula reclining comfortably below Ty Lee’s eye level. Ah, it’s a moment of vulnerability
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Comments: 66
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Beautiful style, it looks like an oil painting and the depth and textures are amazing
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Very nice! I was waiting for something like this!! thank you! 
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A stunning reiteration of (and tribute to) the technical accomplishment displayed in 19th-century Academie des Beaux-Arts Orientalist work; I can't help but be reminded of Rimsky-Korsakov's symphonic suite "Scheherazade" as I view it. Succoring the emotional need to see Azula redeemed makes it priceless.
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Thank you for your words 
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This may be one the most singularly stunning works I've seen on this site. Love the style itself and love the idea that this is Azula and Ty Lee's eventual happy ending. I keep wanting to envision this as an in universe painting on display in a Republic City museum and captures the attention of a certain high class lady and water tribe born Avatar.
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Thank you so much! I love when an image makes people think/feel and discuss 
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This is wonderful! I LOVE Tyzula! The detail is so incredible!
Are you going to do more of them?
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Thank youuu! And YES! I am determined to redeem/humanize Azula one artwork at a time! *super serious face*
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Awesome! I hope to see more Tyzula along the way!
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I have a lot of Tyzula drama in mind
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You're welcome. And thank you, too
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They didn't have enough moments like this in Avatar (especially Korra). Scenes where you just SEE what their culture is like, when you FEEL the warmth of expensive rugs, the cold of an igloo in the Water Tribe, where you can read the history of an age-old field just by looking at it. Season 1 did and Season 2 had some, but after that (as much as I love this show so much, more than any other show ever I think) those slow, quiet moments faded away.
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I know! And I can unbiasedly say, I didn't love the technical world-building design of LoK that much hehe. Also probably because for AtLA we had just one opposition til the end (Fire Nation, Ozai, Azula, Zuko til the latter part), so we really got to know that world intimately across all 3 seasons. With LoK, it was a new plot and enemy in every book! But anyway, I always just assumed there were production or timeline constraints xD The concept art of costumes of background citizens were great though.
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wonderful art work ♥
i always wonder what country the fire nation would be in real life and orient sounds kind of logical but then they would have to have more dark skin, right ?
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Thank you!
The Fire Nation wiki says that its culture was intended by the creators to be largely inspired by Japan, and their soldiers to be like samurai. But I assume the concept artists took liberties in expanding the design cues to borrow from other Asian countries because while we have pagodas in the Fire Nation, samurai obviously did not wear pantaloons (but hey, the Ottomans and Mughals did).
Orientalism is an umbrella term created by the West (in this case Europeans who visited the Middle East) to define the "other" non-Western cultures through their eyes. The sexualized image of the "Orient" and harems as a place of mysticism and exotic allure is largely exaggerated by the representations of the French artists in the 19th century when they visited parts of the Ottoman Empire. I don't know historically at what point though, did the cultural West start expanding this "Orient" umbrella term to loosely refer to anything that is Asian --whether it's China, Japan, Thailand, Cambodia, other parts of Southeast Asia.
So to answer your question-- Nope, people of the Orient don't all have dark skin. Even if we go by the stricter historical definition of "Orient" as just encompassing the Middle East and Arab states. Not all people of Arab descent were dark of skin. The Ottomans were certainly fair-skinned, as well as the Circassian slaves that they employed. If you look up Orientalist artworks, there's a fair mix of dark and light skinned figures. Btw, I would like to add that "slaves" within Ottoman society did not have the same definition as "slaves" in Western society. Interestingly, Ottoman slaves were actually quite privileged; trusted servants who had the dignity of receiving the same education and upbringing as the royals that they served. And they had their basic rights, too, under the court of law.
In truth, in Ottoman terms, the harem is simply the royal family's apartments. It's where the sultan and his entire family reside. It's not an orgy lounge or a space for the king to pick up scantily-clad women of his choice, nope. But dirty old men (like the French painter Ingres) represented it as such in their paintings. Why? Because the Ottomans did not allow these Westerners inside their most private spaces. So a lot of the painters took liberties in interpreting what they weren't allowed to see and could only fantasize about.
This book talks a lot more about it -- www.amazon.com/Ottoman-Women-A…
Going back to Fire Nation design, since I'm about to tackle doing realistic designs of the culture soon, I've already settled on using medieval Japanese, Chinese and Ottoman design as references. But only because these were the design cues I could make out in the cartoons. Sorry for the lengthy lecture, but I hope this gives a better perspective on Orientalism
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yes, thanks 
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Oh wow, this is gorgeous!! Azula is such an amazing character. I'm surprised I never considered a redemption storyline before, but now you've put the idea in my head, there's nothing I want more
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I didn't know how badly I wanted it too until recently! Haha! Like srsly, I don't even read fanfiction but because I really wanted to see Azula find peace, I actually went (quality) fanfic-hunting just for it. XD
Thanks, btw!
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You're welcome! ^_^
Haha I don't blame you! I don't know why I never even considered it before tbh. I think my brain just assumed she died after she went crazy (no idea where I got that from), so it never gave me the chance to think of anything else.
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I also just brushed her off as a purely evil super villain when AtLA first came out. God I was so immature then. Haha.
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Heh, well, my excuse is when your younger, you're led to believe people are one or the other, so you don't really think that people can change. The first character I ever found myself thinking of as getting a redemption story was Hans from Frozen, so it's taken me a long time to get past the whole "you're either evil or good" thing |D
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I love this painting so much TuT it gives me all kinds of different feelings from it, I can't wait to see more
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I paint to purge my feelings!!! Haha! Thanks for your comment!
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HAHAHAHAHA. Oops. Sorry, I have more Tyzula feelings even though it's Korrasami that's on-trend. I don't know why haha.
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I love this.
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I love the detail you've put into the wallpaper and cushions! It must have taken so looong
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Shhhh the wallpaper is a texture from a photo I took when I went to Topkapi Palace in Istanbul. Hehe 
Thank you
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I love this!
This is how I picture Tyzula living on Ember Island, about 10 years after the war.
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