So every year for several years now, a lot of artists do all the Inktober daily art prompts, and there are now a whole slough of various prompts. There are even a fairly large number of #sciart prompts. I thought I would do the "AI weirdness" neural net generated prompts by Janelle Shane called #Botober2021. I think the only way to manage daily brand new art is to keep it low key, so I'm keeping it simple, posting to Twitter (@minouette) and my Instagram stores (@the.minouette) only. Mainly there's pen and ink sketches. I am going to try and fit in a couple of linocuts. There's an upcoming prompt which made recall a mythological creature I have previously considered. I rather like all the various holidays (many pagan and ancient) which coincide roughly with Christmas time and how some of them are more spooky than festive, as we, in the northern hemisphere, approach the solstice and the longest nights. The prompt is "way too much cat" and what came to mind was the Icelandic Yule Cat, Jólakötturinn.
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| Linocut print Yule Cat, by Ele Willoughby, 2021 |
The first written accounts of Jólakötturinn, enforcer of good behaviour leading up to Christmas, date to the 19th century but the stories of the monster cat likely date to the Dark Ages. In Iceland, good children who did their chores received new clothes, but the lazier ones risked meeting the giant Yule Cat, who towered over houses. If there were no new clothes amongst their gifts the Yule Cat would eat them! The Yule Cat was intended to also inspire generosity and encourage giving clothing to the less fortunate.
I have added a couple of sets of hand printed Yule Cat cards to my shop. I think I might get some digitally printed so I can make more cards.
You can find Bjork singing a carol about Jólakötturinn here, and if you haven't already done so, do yourself a favour, and check out Luke Pearson's Hilda graphic novels or the animated Netflix series - where you'll also find the Yule Cat and other trolls and Yule lads from Icelandic folklore.
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