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Description
This is a companion piece to my drawing of Uchchaishravas, the 7-headed demon horse. Part of the assignment in my drawing class was to put our mythological creature into its natural habitat. Since he didn't really have one, I decided to make a drawing inspired by his origin story.

According to this story, the ocean of milk, or Milky Way (Kshira Sagar), is one of the seven oceans that separates directional space from non-directional space. Devas (gods) and asuras (demons) joined forces to churn the ocean so that they could obtain the nectar of immortality. Mount Meru was the churning rod, and Vasuki the serpent was the churning rope. The god Vishnu, in the form of a turtle called Kurma, supported the mountain on his back. Gods and demons stood on either side, twisting the mountain to churn the ocean, and from this, the Milky Way was born and many creatures sprung forth - one of whom was Uchchaishravas the demon horse. This entire event was called the "Samundra manthan."

Since this is how the Milky Way (and we) were apparently created, I thought it would be cool if the mountain was a part of the gods' world and then became a part of ours. My idea was that the mountain would start as a massive crystal with a nebula inside it. As the ocean was churned, the crystal would get more and more compact. The crystal would compress and absorb the star dust inside it, and the two would form the mountain on earth. ...this made a lot more sense in my head.

Since the universe is being created, I wanted it to expand from around the crystal and the ocean of milk, and the gods' realm would be on the outside of it. I filled the gods' realm with weird multi-armed trees because....reasons. I just sort of thought it would fit in with Hindu mythology. And I just wanted to draw those.

I know that I didn't draw the snake, the gods or demons pulling it, or the turtle. The reason is that I started with the mountain, and by the time I was done with it, I realized that the other aspects wouldn't fit in with the rest of the drawing. I think just compositionally, it would look weird. Not really sure. If I had drawn this from a different angle, I think I could have included them and it would have looked better. I was going to include the turtle, but honestly, I just ran out of room. So I know that this isn't really faithful to the story, but I don't mean to be disrespectful to it. I just thought the image would look better this way.

I'm not sure how I feel about this. I would really appreciate some feedback on it, if that's okay.

Description
This is a companion piece to my drawing of Uchchaishravas, the 7-headed demon horse. Part of the assignment in my drawing class was to put our mythological creature into its natural habitat. Since he didn't really have one, I decided to make a drawing inspired by his origin story.

According to this story, the ocean of milk, or Milky Way (Kshira Sagar), is one of the seven oceans that separates directional space from non-directional space. Devas (gods) and asuras (demons) joined forces to churn the ocean so that they could obtain the nectar of immortality. Mount Meru was the churning rod, and Vasuki the serpent was the churning rope. The god Vishnu, in the form of a turtle called Kurma, supported the mountain on his back. Gods and demons stood on either side, twisting the mountain to churn the ocean, and from this, the Milky Way was born and many creatures sprung forth - one of whom was Uchchaishravas the demon horse. This entire event was called the "Samundra manthan."

Since this is how the Milky Way (and we) were apparently created, I thought it would be cool if the mountain was a part of the gods' world and then became a part of ours. My idea was that the mountain would start as a massive crystal with a nebula inside it. As the ocean was churned, the crystal would get more and more compact. The crystal would compress and absorb the star dust inside it, and the two would form the mountain on earth. ...this made a lot more sense in my head.

Since the universe is being created, I wanted it to expand from around the crystal and the ocean of milk, and the gods' realm would be on the outside of it. I filled the gods' realm with weird multi-armed trees because....reasons. I just sort of thought it would fit in with Hindu mythology. And I just wanted to draw those.

I know that I didn't draw the snake, the gods or demons pulling it, or the turtle. The reason is that I started with the mountain, and by the time I was done with it, I realized that the other aspects wouldn't fit in with the rest of the drawing. I think just compositionally, it would look weird. Not really sure. If I had drawn this from a different angle, I think I could have included them and it would have looked better. I was going to include the turtle, but honestly, I just ran out of room. So I know that this isn't really faithful to the story, but I don't mean to be disrespectful to it. I just thought the image would look better this way.

I'm not sure how I feel about this. I would really appreciate some feedback on it, if that's okay.