Episode 193: Ask Me About My Fanart
In Episode 193, “As Me About My Fanart,” Flourish and Elizabeth talk to longtime fanartist Fox Estacado about the business and the pleasure of fanart. Topics discussed include changes she’s observed in the practice over time, the way platforms like Etsy handle legal issues, meeting fellow fans in artists’ alleys at cons, and her mixed feelings about monetization versus the fandom gift economy.
Show Notes
[00:00:00] As always, our intro music is “Awel” by stefsax, used under a CC BY 3.0 license.
[00:00:40] First things first: the million places you can find Fox! Etsy, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, Facebook, and YouTube, SO MANY CHOICES.
And you can see those famous shirts pictured in the cover above, but Fox has also made us a wonderful horizontal crop with some of her additional work:
[00:01:05] That’s the Three Patch Podcast! You can hear her on a ton of episodes, but if you are desperate to hear more of Elizabeth’s voice, she’s been a guest on two: “Three Shot Latte – The Official TPP Coffeeshop AU” and, yes, “Lustful Cock Monster,” shoutout to Benedict C. for the title!! 😘
[00:03:10] Tropefest: Soulmate AU! Our EIGHT Tropefest episodes—and nearly two dozen other special episodes—are available to Patrons at $3 a month and up.
[00:03:41] Our interstitial music throughout is “How I used to see the stars” by Lee Rosevere, also used under a CC BY 3.0 license.
[00:05:20]
[00:06:47]
[00:08:30] NEVER FORGET!!
[00:11:56] Yes, they’re all still there: http://www.keyofx.org/videos.html
[00:31:15] The T-shirt in question.
[00:44:09] TUMBLR WHY.
[00:47:09] Martin Freeman, feel free to thank Fox directly.
[00:50:47] Fox made this great behind-the-scenes video about working at cons as an artist!
[01:03:20] The Nap Ministry post Flourish is referencing.
Transcript
[Intro music]
Flourish Klink: Hi, Elizabeth.
Elizabeth Minkel: Hi, Flourish.
FK: And welcome to Fansplaining, the podcast by, for, and about fandom.
ELM: This episode #193, “Ask Me About My Fanart.”
FK: [laughs] Which is going to be an interview with Fox Estacado, and the title is because Fox Estacado is the creator of those shirts you might have seen that say “Ask Me About My Ship,” and then if someone does, you pull them up, and on the bottom, like, on the inside is printed a picture of your ship kissing.
ELM: They are very cute shirts renowned throughout fandom. Fox has been a fanartist for a long time in a bunch of different fandoms. I first met her via Sherlock, and she’s heavily involved in the Three Patch Podcast.
FK: Yeah, and before that, like, yeah. Harry Potter and X-Files, which is where I encountered her, yeah, and I guess Xena before that—anyway, I’m really excited to talk with her.
ELM: [laughs] So one of the reasons we wanted to have Fox on is because, you know, we’ve gotten a fair number of comments over the last few years from folks being like, [beleaguered] “Can you do a fanart—fan—please talk about fanart. Why aren’t you talking about fanart?” Kind of a—I’m putting this weary tone onto these messages. Maybe they were just more, like, [cheerfully] “I’d like to hear fanart, please.” But I definitely think it’s something that we idly speculate about briefly and in passing far too often, [FK laughs] because we are both, you know, it’s just not—it’s something that we obviously see and like and, you know, have paid for at cons or over the internet and reblogged but, like, it’s not something that I think either of us ever have had any firsthand experience with, unlike a lot of other fan behaviors.
FK: Yup.
ELM: Between the two of us, I feel like we cover a lot, so…
FK: Absolutely, absolutely.
ELM: Personally.
FK: So we’re extremely excited to have somebody who’s been, like, doing this for as long as Fox has, especially, like, and really seen the whole spread of stuff.
ELM: Yeah. OK, great. So we are going to call her up, but first, astute listeners may have noticed in our last episode—[laughs] I’m sure people were so sad that we didn’t talk about Patreon, [FK laughs] but we completely forgot. I just—I don’t know. I just felt a little silly when I was editing it and realized that we had just ended the conversation. So we wanted to mention it upfront, because for our $3 and up patrons, the special episode tier, we have a new special episode out.
FK: Woo-hoo!
ELM: It is another installment in our Tropefest series, which we hadn’t done in a while. We were really coming in hot during the first year of the pandemic, and I think it fizzled a little bit, and this—
FK: Yeah, well, you know, we were—[laughs] we didn’t have as much to do outside of our apartment—
ELM: That is so true.
FK: —so we might have recorded some more. [laughs]
ELM: That is so true. But this one is about one of Flourish’s all-time greatest number one top tropes: the soulmate AU.
FK: All right, I’m gonna just let you have that one. I’m not gonna fight with you about it. [ELM laughs] I do like soulmate AUs, and we, I think, had a really great conversation about it. Of course, there’s also other things that you can get if you support us on Patreon, such as a really cute enamel pin, occasional Tiny Zines, various levels of access to our special episodes. If you just want one to see if you’ll like it, you can try it. So Patreon.com/Fansplaining is how you can support us there.
ELM: All right, great! So should we call Fox?
FK: Let’s do it!
[Interstitial music]
FK: All right, it’s time to welcome Fox to the podcast! Welcome, Fox!
FE: Hi! Thank you for having me.
ELM: Thank you for coming on. We are delighted to talk to you, specifically, and a fanartist in general. [all laugh] It’s been, like, a long time coming. Though, I will say again, you are not speaking on behalf of all fanartists. I wanna make sure that you feel reassured, here. [FK & FE laugh]
FE: Yes, these are all just my opinions, [ELM laughs] and my opinions also change over time, so… [all laugh]
ELM: All right, great.
FK: I love this disclaimer. It’s, like, if I were a listener, I would think that you were about to drop, like, a volcanically hot take of some sort. [all laugh] I’m not sure of the plan, but—
FE: I don’t think anything I’m gonna say is a particularly hot take, but… [all laugh]
ELM: OK, all right. Let’s start in the traditional spot we have with guests, is I would love to hear your, like, fannish origin story. But I’m also curious about your, like, art origin story and kind of how those—what’s your fanartist origin story?
FE: Well, I was—I actually—we didn’t have a word for this back then? I didn’t realize I was doing fanart since I was a very young child, actually. My fandom at that time was Xena: Warrior Princess.
FK: [laughs] Yeah!
ELM: Yeaaah.
FE: That was middle school, for me. And I drew Xena all the time. [FE & FK laugh] I made—and I didn’t know it was fanart, but I drew Xena in my class notebooks, as school art projects. Whenever there was a class presentation, I somehow made it about Xena. [FE & ELM laugh] I had read those Xena spinoff books, and whenever we had to do a book report, guess what—
FK: Yeah!
FE: —I’m doing a Xena book report. [laughs]
ELM: Incredible. [laughter]
FE: And I had this one class where we were supposed to talk about literary tropes or something, [FK laughs] and I literally took out, like, I was like, “OK, Xena is literature. [ELM laughs] There’s media. Xena’s media—” So I was ahead of my time. I was doing, like, you know, multimedia [FE laughs] critique, and so I literally had the class watch segments from Xena episodes, [FK laughs] and I discussed—
ELM: Stop.
FE: [laughing] —the literature—
FK: That is next-level.
ELM: Were your teachers like, “Wow, OK,” or they were like, “Oh, this is creative and you’re really engaged,” like?
FE: Yeah, I don’t know what my teachers all thought of me. I was the one who, for PE, you had to bring in, like, a song. You had to bring in, like, exercise music, and people brought in, you know, pop and whatever. I brought in the Bulgarian Women’s Choir [ELM laughs] soundtrack from Xena, [FK laughs] a battle song. [all laugh]
FK: This is—I mean, the level of commitment. [laughs]
ELM: Also, can I just say, I haven’t seen Xena, but you say Bulgarian Women’s Choir, I’m taken right back to the ’90s. [FE & FK laugh] I feel like that kind of music was super hot. I’m sure it still is. I just feel like that’s the moment when I also listened to that kind of thing.
FK: But this is appropriate for PE, because don’t you want to be like Xena, and Xena can do everything in PE.
FE: Right! Exactly!
ELM: Like a warrior.
FE: So the PE teacher literally, like, played my CD and shut it off after about, like, a minute. [FK & ELM laugh] I was the only one jump-roping. [all laugh]
FK: [laughing] Jump-roping!
FE: Everyone else was like, “...This is different.”
FK: Jump-roping. While you were, like, jump-roping.
ELM: Oh my God.
FE: Yeah. And so, like, my entire AP Studio Art portfolio was Xena. Like, there were Xena—I mean, there were non-Xena things in it, but [laughs]—and, like, a whole panel of judges had to judge my art portfolio, [FK laughs] and there was Xena in there, so I didn’t—
ELM: OK, so this is, like, all through—that’s, like, middle school to high school, you were just on the Xena train.
FE: Oh, yeah. Oh yeah, I was on the Xena train—
ELM: Wow.
FE: —through [FK laughs] middle school to high school.
ELM: Incredible.
FE: I was at the very first Xena convention that happened in Pasadena, California. [laughs]
ELM: Oh, man.
FK: Oh, wow.
FE: Karl Urban was there. [all laugh] Lucy Lawless was there.
ELM: Wow.
FE: Oh my God. Everyone was there! Kevin Smith was there, you know, rest in peace, but [FK & ELM laugh] Karl Urban was there. I was just online talking about this, because people now who are Karl Urban fans didn’t realize that Karl Urban played both Cupid, and [FK laughs] he played Julius Caesar, too! [laughter] Like, Xena always [all laugh]—they recycled the actors. Apparently, they had too few actors or something, [laughs] so they recycled actors, and everyone played at least two roles.
ELM: Oh my God.
FE: And so he—anyway. I can go on and on about Xena. [all laugh] I’ve held Xena fests at my house.
FK: We could listen to you talk about it. [laughs]
ELM: Yeah, we could just change the topic right now, if you want. That’s all I want to hear about.
FE: I had a Xena newsletter. Of course I did art for that, too. [laughter] I had eight subscribers for my Xena newsletter that I actually mailed out [ELM gasps] in the mail.
FK: Eight! Eight!
ELM: Oh my God!
FE: I actually put that on my college application, that I was the editor in chief of a newsletter. [laughs]
ELM: That’s incredible!
FK: I love this. I love this—
FE: Now, they didn’t have to know that it was a Xena newsletter that I called “Xenite.”
FK: I love this.
ELM: Oh my—[all laugh] Do you have any of this—
FE: I mean, that’s what we were called. Xenites. [laughs]
ELM: Do you have any of this digitized? Like, have you put it online anywhere?
FE: No, I should probably find all of those and digitize them.
FK: I would love that. [laughs]
ELM: Yeah. Please, we will share it. [FE laughs] If you have any to put online, we would love to share that.
FE: I’ll have to find it. I made everything about Xena. Like, I did. Like, we had to do some kind of math-related comic book thing, and I drew an entire, like, comic book strip with Xena in it with math. [all laugh] Doing algebra, I think, with Gabrielle, or something. I don’t know. [laughs]
ELM: I’m just imagining, OK, so your math teacher goes into the teachers’ lounge and is like, “Oh my God, I got this one kid [FE & FK laugh] obsessed with Xena.” And then, like, I don’t know, the 8th grade English teacher is like, “Oh my God, I had that kid two years ago. She’s too much.”
FE: Yeah. I can just imagine.
ELM: That’s my fanfiction about your high school teachers. And then the PE teacher comes in and is like, “You would not believe this music she brought.” [all laugh]
FE: Yeah, so that was some of my first fanworks. And then from there, I got obsessed with The X-Files, so that was, like, late high school, college…yeah, Flourish. [laughs]
FK: Yeah, that is where I first encountered you, although we didn’t know each other at that point.
FE: Yeah?
FK: When I actually met you online, I was like, “Yeah. Fox. That person who’s been making art. I knew them from The X-Files. Well, I didn’t know them, but, like, I knew their art.” [laughs]
FE: Yeah. Well, I mean, were you on Haven?
FK: Yeah.
FE: You were on Haven! OK, OK, so back then, I actually didn’t do fanart for The X-Files.
FK: Wait—
FE: I did vidding. I was a vidding person. I was doing fanvids. That was what I was kind of known for in The X-Files fandom.
FK: Whoa, so I had a false memory of you. I mean, like, I knew that I knew you from the X-Files, but I had a false memory of what you did.
FE: Well, I probably did some art…like, I did some cover art for some fanfics.
FK: That’s probably where I knew it from—
FE: Yeah.
FK: —because I was much more into cover art—
FE: Oh, OK OK.
FK: Like, I was much more into fanfics than I was into—so I think that must have been it, but, like, that blows my mind that you were primarily vidding. Now I wanna go watch all your vids. [all laugh]
FE: Oh, I have—well, see, that kind of goes into, like, what platforms people are using, but at the time, this was all pre-YouTube.
FK: Yup.
ELM: Right.
FE: It was pre-YouTube, so we didn’t have a platform to share our vids with. We literally provided download links.
FK: Yeah.
ELM: Hmm.
FK: I never watched very many vids at that point. I mean, I saw some, but I never watched very many, because it felt like you had to, like—you had to be in the spot—
FE: Yeah, yeah.
FK: —and I was never in the spot, somehow. [laughs]
FE: Well, actually, I still have all of those, [FK gasps] so I not only, like, vidded my own work, but I was just, like, “We need to make it easier for people to download this stuff.” So I downloaded and kept thousands of fanvids.
ELM: Wow!
FE: And I posted them on my website, KeyofX.org. And you can actually still download all of them.
FK: You’re kidding.
FE: Yeah, but I don’t make the links public. They’re all kind of unlisted, just because I got a little bit of—[laughs] I got a little bit of hate from people who were like, “I didn’t give you permission to share this.” And I’m like, “OK, I’m sorry, I’ll take it down.” [FE & ELM laugh] But that was how people shared it back then. Like, you had to share the download link, so it’s really hard.
FK: Please, please bring this into my life. I will do nothing [FE laughs] but watch X-Files fanvids for, like, the next 48 hours.
FE: Oh my gosh.
ELM: This is dangerous. Flourish has homework to do, Flourish has obligations for this podcast…
FK: [laughs] I do!
FE: Yeah, I’ll have to find, like, a directory of all these links, because it’s not—also my website is super outdated. Everyone who’s watching and who’s like, “Oh, I should go check out KeyofX.org,” oh my God. [FK laughs] It’s probably a security nightmare, because I haven’t updated the PHP in forever. [all laugh]
FK: The fact that we’re talking PHP also suggests perhaps some things about your website.
FE: Oh my God. Yeah, no, I used to make websites using frames. Oh my God.
FK: Yeah! [ELM laughs]
FE: So, yeah, nobody should actually—I mean, well, that was, the other work I was doing during the X-Files fandom was I was recommending fic, and we kind of treated fic the same way. We had Gossamer, we had, you know, those sites. But especially when GeoCities went down, there weren’t that many repositories. And we used to share fic the same way. We would share each other’s .txt files.
FK: Yeah! [laughs]
FE: So I wanted to put together a website where I could put all my favorite fics in one place, and then people can read those, and so I created my archive on KeyofX.org, and I started to do that for a couple of other fandoms, too. So that’s all still up, and people still—I still get, like, hundreds of people who go to the site every day, actually, to read fic, because some of those fics are not archived at Archive of Our Own.
FK: Yeah. Do you still have the problem where you see, like, some-number-K, and you immediately think in terms of the size of a text file, [FE & ELM laugh] not in terms of the number of words? Because this happens to me all the time.
ELM: All the time—Flourish, you’ve had many years to adjust.
FK: It’s, you know, the things that happen when you are in, like, early high school and middle school—
ELM: No.
FK: —they really work their way into your brain. [ELM laughs] It’s just like how you know your music tastes get set at that period? So now if you, like, listen to a song from then, you immediately have to get low, or whatever? [FE & ELM laugh]
FE: Well, I have a—one of my things for that is, I still cannot get over that we have many, many megabytes, many, many gigabytes of space on our computers. [FK & ELM laugh] So I’m one of those people who don’t save files on purpose, [FK laughs] because I’m afraid of losing space—
ELM: Oh my gosh.
FE: —and running out of memory, so sometimes that’s how I dumbly, like, lose art, because I didn’t save.
ELM: Oh my God!
FE: I literally didn’t save the file, because I was like, “Oh, that file’s too big. I’m gonna run out of space. I have to, like, save it towards the end.”
ELM: That’s wild.
FE: [laughs] So I end up, like, not having the original Photoshop file. I’ll have, like, all the JPEGs, but not the original Photoshop file because, in my head, I’m like, “Oh, that’s not worth saving, because I won’t need that later, [FE & FK laugh] because that file’s too big.”
ELM: This is—have you ever worked in publishing professionally?
FE: Oh yeah, yeah.
ELM: I feel like the, you know, ⌘-S, or whatever, is the most engrained muscle memory thing in my entire life of anything, not just of computers. [FK laughs] Right? That’s all that matters. I guess that’s not what it is on Photoshop, but you know what I mean. [FE & ELM laugh]
FE: Yeah, yeah. So I still have that ingrained in me, just like, “Oh no, I can’t save these files right now because I’m gonna run out of space.” [laughs]
ELM: That’s so funny. [laughs]
FE: But yeah, I think when I actually started doing fanart—so there was a period of time where I actually didn’t really do that much fanart. I was kind of doing more cover art for some of my favorite fic authors who I was working with in the X-Files, and then came the Harry Potter fandom. And then I went to my first con, and that’s when I realized, “Oh, people want my art.” [all laugh] I didn’t realize that before. I was just kind of making art and sharing it. Oh, we used to use DeviantArt, so I was posting a lot of work on DeviantArt.
FK: Oh yeah. [laughs]
FE: And I went to my first con, which is Harry Potter Education Fanon.
FK: Yeah, HPEF. [laughs] Yup.
FE: HPEF, yes. Portus. Portus 2008—
FK: Ah, yeah.
FE: —was my very first Harry Potter con. My first—
FK: Did we actually meet there? Because I was there, too. Did we actually, like, physically encounter each other?
FE: We may have! It’s just, like, that con was so formative to me, [FK laughs] because that’s where I met so many people that I still talk to today.
FK: Wow.
FE: Because I went there—I literally had no—aside from the Xena convention, I had never gone to another convention. And that one didn’t count, either, because it was a Creation Entertainment convention.
FK: Yeah, yeah.
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FE: So that one doesn’t count. [FE & FK laugh] It’s not—it was a different kind of convention than what—the conventions I ended up going to and what conventions kind of look like today for me.
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FE: But that first Portus was my entry point into the LiveJournal world, because then, every—because I didn’t know a single person. Before going to HPEF Portus 2008, I didn’t know anyone in fandom. Like, I had read fanfic, and I’d been reading fan—I mean, and looking at fanart, and kind of participating kind of in a passive way, but before that convention, I didn’t meet anyone, I didn’t really talk to anyone, and I just suddenly decided, “I want to go to this convention. That sounds really fun.” And I went with two friends, and it introduced me to people. [FK & ELM laugh] Like, cosplayers, and—
FK: Yes! [laughs]
FE: —introduced me to the fic authors. I was just like, “Oh my God, I’ve read this person’s work, holy cow!” [ELM laughs] And I remember, like, even before the convention, because I was trying to figure out ways in which I could participate, and I was just like, “Oh, they’re gonna have an art show. Oh, maybe I should make some Harry Potter art for this art show.” And so before the con I, you know, painted some pieces, and I brought them to the art show, and they sold for a lot. [FK & ELM laugh] For charity. I was just like, “Wait, people want to pay $500 for this print?”
ELM: Wow.
FE: And because that was my very, very first time in that kind of atmosphere, where people were paying—shelling out huge bucks. Like, that very first—I mean, I have—I think I kept records of all of this, but I was just like, I think my very first art show at that Portus 2008 generated over $1,000 for charity. And I was just like…it blew my mind. And suddenly everyone was coming up to me and was just like, “Where can I buy this? Where can I look at more of this work?” [FK laughs] And I’m like, “Um…OK?” And that’s how I got started, like, selling fanart. Before, I didn’t really sell it. I made art when I felt like it, and that’s kind of still my approach today, but I never thought about selling it until people started asking me [laughs] for it.
So, yeah, that’s kind of my history with fanart. And I started going to cons after that, started at just one con a year, then that increased to two cons a year, then it increased to three cons a year. Right before pandemic, I was going to about 12 to—I think I did a high of, like, I think I did 14 cons one year.
FK: Wow.
ELM: Hmm.
FE: And what I mean by doing cons—
FK: That’s a lot of cons. [ELM laughs]
FE: Yeah. What I mean by doing cons is I go to the artists’ alley or the marketplace of the con, and I actually exhibit at those cons, or the craft show or whatever it is. So that’s what I mean by “doing cons.”
ELM: Can I ask you, when you—back in 2008, when you first started selling fanart, I guess I have a couple of questions. One is, did you see—were other people doing that, too? Or were you kind of an early…not early adopter. What’s the word I’m looking for? And my second question is, were you doing commissions, or were you making stuff that then people would choose to buy? Or both?
FE: Yeah, I’m sure—no, people have been selling fanart for ages. I just wasn’t part of that scene, because I know people have been going to, for example, San Diego Comic-Con. There was always an artists’ alley there, I heard.
ELM: Sure.
FE: I’ve never actually done San Diego Comic-Con, but there’s other artists’ alleys that have been around for a really long time. I know Gallifrey One, that just happened, they’ve been running their art show there for twenty-something years, so I’m sure people have been selling fanart for ages. I know people, as part of Three Patch, they were in—I mean, back then, before the internet, there were zines, and people were buying zines, and you know, exchanging zines. So—or zines, sorry, I might be pronouncing it wrong. [all laugh]
ELM: It was a charming mispronunciation. [laughs]
FK: I was definitely gonna let it be, because I was so delighted by it. [laughs]
FE: I never got into zines, so that was before my time. So I think people were selling fanart for a while. But for me, when that happened, it was 2008. And I think at that particular con, did we even have a craft show at that con? I don’t think so. But I didn’t participate in that.
FK: No, the way that the HPEF cons were run, there was sort of a combined, like, everything in the sort of merch room. It was like, everybody was put together, and then there was the art show for charity.
FE: Mmm hmmm.
FK: And you could get a table at the merch room’s, you know—no matter what, it was all sorts of different things. But it wasn’t, like, a separate artists’ alley or craft show or whatever.
FE: OK. Yeah, I actually, for HPEF, I ended up doing that one-time craft show. There would be, like, a one-time thing—
FK: Yeah.
FE: —where artists could sell stuff, and that I started doing a little bit later, like, a couple years later.
FK: Yeah yeah. Yeah.
FE: Because I was just like, at that time, I was still really into going to all the panels and I wanted to do other things at the convention. I didn’t want to, you know, just sit in one place the entire weekend.
FK: Totally.
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FE: That’s why I didn’t want to do the merch room, and I couldn’t afford to do the merch room—
FK: Yeah.
FE: —before, either, because that’s a pretty high cost. And it still is, so… [laughs]
ELM: It’s interesting, though, thinking about, like, San Diego Comic-Con artists’ alley or that kind of—to me, there’s different, I mean, there’s a lot of different things involved in what fanart might be. But, like, the kind of fanart that I’ve always known from you has felt very much in step with the kind of fandom that I’m in, whereas I walk around [FK laughs] artists’ alley at San Diego Comic-Con and I was like, “This is a different—this is a somewhat different world.” I know I always make fun of New York Comic-Con because it’s full of gazongas, so I don’t think it’s always just—that’s a, you know, big boobs.
FK: “Full [laughs]—full of gazongas.”
ELM: [laughs] It’s not always like that, but it often feels like an extension of the comics world, as opposed to…like, you know, when I first encountered your fanart, I felt, you know, it was from within the fandom I was in, which involved shipping and, you know—
FE: Yeah.
ELM: —fanfiction and stuff like that, you know what I mean?
FE: Yeah, and I think that’s a reflection of my own personal interests. I don’t make fanart for the sake of making fanart. Like, my fanart is very, very focused on what I’m personally interested in, which I have and—I mean, from the beginning, I think in Harry Potter, specifically, from the beginning, I was a slash shipper. So I wanted to make art that was focused on that, and I also wanted to make art that not a lot of other people were making. I wanted to make art that I found fun in my own group, and my own group were all slash shippers, so that’s kind of how—that’s always been my approach, and my approach has always been making the art, it should be number one. Like, love of the fandom, I should just be driven by that first, first and foremost. You know, I don’t make art in fandoms that I’m not in, because I think you can tell. I think that does translate.
ELM: That’s really interesting. This is something that we speculate a lot, but we are not fanartists, so we [FK laughs] don’t actually know. Because it feels like these days, maybe in the last decade or so, I feel like I see a lot of fanartists who are just artists—you know, they’re artists for hire, right? And they’re like, you know, especially with commission posts, it’s like, you know, “I won’t draw these themes,” or maybe “I won’t draw this character,” or whatever. But for the most part, like, I could probably go up to them and say, you know, “Draw me Magneto,” and they’ll do it, right? And I don’t know. Do you feel like—I mean, you don’t have to drag other fanartists, but that’s interesting to hear that you feel like if it’s not coming from a super fannish, individually fannish place, you can tell.
FE: Yeah, I think that’s just my personal preference. Now that I’ve been—now that I regularly go—pre-pandemic, regularly went to about a dozen conventions a year, I’ve seen everything. Like, I see most of the offerings at these artists’ alleys. And for me, my drive for fanart is about connection. I love the source material so much that I want to meet other people that also love the source material and see these characters the way I see them, and I want to find that connection through the art.
So for me, my art was always about my headcanon. It’s actually kind of—it’s almost like fanfic writing, where you have a story you want to tell. I’m also trying to do that with my art. And I’m trying to find community through that. I’m trying to find connection through that. So I actually want to talk to people about it, and when people come and look at my art, and they’re like, “Oh, OK, I can, you know—” and we start to have a conversation about it, and then, you know, if they want to, I’ll tell them about what I’m thinking. What’s going on in this character’s head? What is this character—like, why did I make the choices, the stylistic choices I made? What is the story behind this piece? I have all of that. That’s all part of the story that I wove with this piece of art. That’s kind of how I approach my fanart. I really treat it like a story, and I want to tell that story.
So that’s why I kind of feel—I mean, to talk about the different, the other artists, I kind of come from a place of privilege, and I think I need to address that. I have a full-time job. So the art that I do on the side, it is purely fun for me.
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FE: It’s not really driven by a need to make money. Of course, I do make a little bit of money from the fanart, but that’s not really my drive for making the fanart, whereas I think for a lot of other artists, they are actually trying—like, some people actually do try to do, to make a full-time living doing fanart. They go from convention to convention to convention and do art as a living, and their art happens to be fanart.
And I think that’s legitimate. But when you are doing art for work, doing art for commissions, or, doing—you know, like, what you were talking about, Elizabeth. Like, artists for hire, that’s essentially what they’re doing. They’re making a living from their art. And I’m a little different. [laughs] I make art when I feel like it. And I have the freedom that way, but it’s also from a place of privilege, because I’m able to do that, because I don’t need to make my living from making art. And I pick and choose a lot.
ELM: OK, well, so, that kind of answers the other part of my original, multi-prong question, which is whether you were just drawing—you know, even back in 2008, but so that’s—has that continued—that’s 15 years ago, right? You know?
FE: Yeah.
ELM: How has your work as a fanartist changed, including distribution and selling elements? How has that landscape changed over those 15 years?
FE: Yeah, as I kind of mentioned earlier, pre-all these platforms that we have today, I was mostly putting my art on DeviantArt and on LiveJournal. And I used to actually write entire whole, long narratives about each piece, [laughs] because of that story element that, like, I wanted to connect with people over the art I was making. And I wanted to share my own headcanons and my own interpretations of these characters through the art I was making, and I wanted to connect with like-minded people that way, so I would write long, huge things. That’s kind of gone out of fashion. [all laugh] Like, people don’t want to read long, huge things. They want to look at pretty art and, you know, actually, if people connect with you, the art connects, right? You don’t necessarily need a long narrative to explain the art and everything.
So I used to be on LiveJournal and DeviantArt, and then now people have moved on to, you know, obviously LiveJournal’s not quite the same anymore, so I’ve moved on from LiveJournal. I’m mostly on Twitter now. People are using Instagram. And as for sales platforms, we used to sell on LiveJournal. That used to be how people sold things. This was all pre-Etsy. And then when Etsy first started, I remember there was kind of actually a low uptake first, among fanartists.
FK: Mmm hmmm.
FE: Of course, everyone was different. So there were fanartists who were taking it up, but I felt like I couldn’t take up Etsy for a really long time, because Etsy, at the very beginning, was very, very focused on handmade things. And as someone who printed my work professionally through professional printers, I didn’t print my own work out, I technically wasn’t allowed to sell on Etsy.
ELM: Hmm.
FK: Hmm.
FE: So now they allow that. Now they allow manufacturing, even, so now there’s more fanartists who are able to legitimately put their work on Etsy, because those rules have changed.
FK: Mmm hmmm.
FE: We’re now allowed to use manufacturers. We’re now allowed—I mean, it’s still our own work, like, our own design, but they might be fulfilled, like, the production part of it might be fulfilled—
FK: Yeah.
FE: —by another third party.
FK: That’s really interesting. I mean, I guess I knew that about Etsy on some level, but, you know, I mean, people have been making quote-unquote “born-digital” art forever, and people have been making prints of their art forever, and it seems—I guess I’m just, even though I knew that about Etsy, it had not connected in my head that that was that barrier. My mind’s just a little bit like, “Oh. Oh!” [laughs]
FE: I was always very careful with these platforms, because I think we also came from a period of time, and even now, you’re worried about these platforms taking away your copyright.
FK: Yeah.
ELM: Hmm.
FE: And I know that’s a little—that’s a little, you know—that’s a little funny, too, because we are obviously, you know, using copyrighted characters and copyrighted material to make fanart. So fanart was always on this, like, gray area.
FK: Yeah.
FE: And that’s also another reason why I really wanted my work to be really, really original. Like, not so much drawing characters or making art that could look like it came from, you know, the original source material, because I always wanted to be very careful navigating that divide between what I was making, as an artist, and not wanting to be too close to the original source material, in which I could be infringing upon their intellectual property.
ELM: Have you ever had any issues with that, or…?
FE: Oh yeah. Yeah.
ELM: Yeah?
FE: There’s been issues. Yeah, I’ll tell you a few really funny examples. [laughs] I created this art where it was, like, Sherlock with the David Bowie lightning bolt image, but on Sherlock.
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FE: And it was kind of our tribute to David Bowie, because we wanted—we, as in, the Three Patch Podcast—[laughs] we wanted to have a fundraising product, and it was kind of our tribute to—David Bowie had just died, had just passed away—and there was always also that rumor that Benedict Cumberbatch would play David Bowie [FK laughs]—
ELM: Hmm. Mmm hmmm.
FE: —so we were kind of riffing off of a little bit of that. But it was a super, super popular design. Oh! “We will always be heroes, forever and ever.” So that was the line, the lyric, that was from the song—
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FE: —which I put kind of in his hair. And it was just a very cool graphic design, and I had seen lots and lots of people use the David Bowie lightning bolt in various different other ways, and of course it’s not David Bowie’s face, it’s Sherlock’s face, so—
ELM: Right.
FE: And I even consulted a lawyer on this. I consulted an attorney.
FK: Wow, you were careful!
FE: The IP attorney said, “Oh, this is fine. This is, you know, you’re making original art. This is so distanced from the original source material, you are clearly making a fair use—you’re clearly doing this in fair use.” So we produced the shirt, we posted it everywhere online, it was a shirt, it was keychains, it was, you know, a few different products. And we had actually sold out of everything. It was no longer in stock. And it was, like, a year or two later—
FK: Whoa.
ELM: Oh my God.
FE: —where the David Bowie estate came after the Three Patch Podcast Facebook account and said, “This is infringing, take it down.” [ELM gasps] And we said, “Oh, OK.” We took it down. [FK laughs] And then they reported our whole account to Facebook.
FK: No!
ELM: Wow.
FE: And we lost the entire page.
FK: No.
ELM: What!
FE: We had over 1,000 followers at that point, on our Facebook page, and because of that report, the whole page got taken down permanently.
FK: Whoa.
FE: And we tried to appeal to Facebook, and we got all the form responses, and so we eventually gave up, and we just had to restart our Facebook page.
ELM: That’s wild.
FE: But that was—and the thing is, it wasn’t even for sale anymore.
ELM: Yeah.
FK: Yeah.
FE: We had sold out. It was, like, a limited release sort of thing, and we had sold out.
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FK: Just punitive.
FE: Yeah. Super, super punitive, and, you know, we had no recourse. Like, I even had an IP attorney look at this for me first. And the thing is, that’s kind of the culture now. Like, we’re such small business owners, we have no way of going and appealing these sorts of decisions. Like, when—so basically, we just let them, like, whenever I get a cease and desist, and I’ve gotten many of them before—[laughs]
ELM: Hmm.
FE: I just take it down. I just take it all down. I’m like, “OK, all right, taking it down.”
ELM: Yeah.
FE: I’m not gonna risk it. Like, I know, like, one of the things that I did that recently got a cease and desist was I designed the—this was back when I still did Harry Potter artwork. I don’t do Harry Potter artwork anymore. But I had the Deathly Hallows design, but I made it out of sticks and flowers. So you can’t copyright the Deathly Hallows symbol, actually. One, it was originally a pagan symbol, and two, the U.S. Copyright Office does not allow you to copyright geometric symbols.
FK: Mmm hmmm.
ELM: Hmm.
FE: So actually, if you all noticed, the actual Deathly Hallows design that’s completely geometric, that’s just the triangle and the circle and the line, that is not copyrighted. You’re allowed to use that image.
FK: Hmm.
FE: Because it is geometric and it was previously used as a pagan symbol.
FK: Hmm!
FE: The Universal Studios, Warner Bros. version of the Deathly Hallows actually looks different. It’s the triangle, the circle, and there’s, like, a wand in the center.
ELM: Hmm.
FE: It’s, like, a thick thing in the center. So look at that next time when you’re looking at the official merchandise.
FK: Whoaaaaaa. [ELM laughs]
FE: So they copyrighted that symbol, because it had to be different, because—
FK: Whoa.
FE: —the U.S. Copyright Office does not allow you to copyright geometric symbols. Anyway. On Etsy, I was selling my own version of the Deathly Hallows, which does not have any of those elements. It literally has sticks—like, images of sticks—and a big huge flower in the middle, in place of the circle. And it had two sticks—like, two broken sticks, above and, you know—so it was sticks and a flower. [FK laughs] And they said that was an infringement on their copyright.
ELM: Look, sticks, wands, that’s basically the same. I don’t know what you’re talking about. They’re totally right. [laughs]
FK: That’s wild.
FE: So I took it down. I was like, “Ok, I’m not gonna fight with, you know, Warner Bros.” [laughs]
ELM: No.
FE: I took it down, but I’m salty, because that—
FK: I would be!
FE: Yeah!
FK: That’s overstepping! That’s bananas.
FE: Yeah, it is. And the thing is they know. They know—
FK: Yeah.
FE: —that we don’t have a recourse.
FK: Yup.
FE: Like, I’m not gonna hire an attorney to go after this. I’m a small business owner. I’m not, you know, I’m not gonna go after Warner Bros. for this.
FK: Yeah.
FE: And I could, and I would probably win, but that would be, what? Months, if not years of going back, trying to get a settlement or trying to work it out in court? Most people won’t.
ELM: Sure.
FK: This is particularly depressing, because it’s such, you know, “second verse, same as the first,” and it’s, I’m sure—in fact, I know from my work within these spaces that it is still the same situation where you have, like, a team of lawyers who are incentivized to go after everything that they possibly can.
FE: Mmm hmmm.
FK: And the people who are actually involved in making the stuff would look at—probably are even looking at it and going, “How cool is this? How amazing! We love it!” You know? Like, and feeling great about it, and it’s a real “left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing” situation, and also, different incentivizations for different people and that works in their favor in a really gross way, right? It’s bad.
FE: Yeah. So online, I’m part of many artists’ alley communities, where we actually share all this information, so that we know what fandoms not to do art in, [FK laughs] because you’re never gonna sell it.
ELM: Hmm.
FK: Wow.
FE: Because it’s a huge—OK, if you’re just doing prints, whatever. Prints are pieces of paper, and they cost less to make.
ELM: Yeah.
FE: However, if you produced your art and spent thousands of dollars making enamel pins or making acrylic keychains or whatever, you spent money, and you can’t sell it anymore?
FK: Yeah.
FE: That’s a huge loss.
ELM: Yeah.
FE: So that’s something that artists, that fanartists—we’re always in that gray zone of, like, we think the work we’re doing, at least for me, personally, my work is always, like, I need to make it very, very different from the original source material, because one, I don’t want—this is probably a hot take, I don’t think it’s very creative to make work [FK & ELM laugh] that’s—[laughs]
FK: Yes! Volcano! [laughs]
FE: —that’s exactly like, you know, the original source material. I don’t think that’s creative. I don’t think that’s added value. But, on the other hand, I could be sued, you know? I could lose everything. I don’t want to put my business in danger of being taken down permanently, because that’s something that could happen. If you have too many infringements, Etsy could just ban you.
ELM: Hmm.
FE: So basically every single time—and they also tell you, you can’t put it back on.
ELM: Hmm.
FE: If you take down, if you get something taken down, don’t put it back on. And some people will actually run that risk, because they’re like, “Crap. I spent thousands of dollars on this.”
FK: Mmm hmmm.
FE: “I have to sell it, because my livelihood is on the line.” So that’s a risk some people take.
ELM: So it sounds like, I mean, the Bowie example is interesting, because that was—that was just an image, right? You know?
FE: Yeah. That was just an image.
ELM: It wasn’t like, “Stop selling shirts.”
FE: I know. And you know what, it came at the—so [laughs] I, you know, from the feelers I put out there, I think the David Bowie estate could care less.
ELM: Hmm.
FE: However, it was actually—it coincided with our—so the event that kind of coincided with that whole takedown, it coincided with his one-year or two-year anniversary, they came out with a posthumous album, or something.
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FK: Hmm.
FE: It coincided with that.
ELM: Hmm. [laughs]
FK: Yeah, that’s how that always works.
FE: Yeah.
FK: Because they don’t care about it until there’s something coming out—
FE: Yeah.
FK: —and then they say—
ELM: Yeah.
FK: “Hey, legal team, will you clear out the internet,” basically.
ELM: Yeah.
FE: Yeah, yeah.
ELM: Man.
FE: And right now, there are huge witch hunts over fanart. That’s why it’s so important for artists to have kind of a community outside, to try to figure out OK, what’s dangerous to make art of right now.
FK: Mmm hmmm.
FE: So we have a list. We have, like, many fanart communities will share a list of, like, “OK, I got taken down for this fandom. I got taken down for this.”
ELM: Hmm.
FE: “I got taken down for this character,” et cetera. So it’s well known that you don’t do Disney art. Ever.
FK: Mmm hmmm.
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FE: There are also certain Japanese fandoms that you don’t do art of, either.
FK: Mmm hmmm.
ELM: Interesting.
FE: I’m not big into anime, so that doesn’t really apply to me. But I did some Yuri on Ice work and unfortunately, I can’t sell any of that online.
FK: Hmm.
ELM: Hmm.
FE: Because they will go after everyone. And it’s blanket. They literally have, like—they are searching the keywords on Etsy—
FK: Mmm hmmm.
FE: They’re searching everywhere. They’re, you know, they will find you. [laughs] Even if you’ve made no sales, they will find you, and they will do, like, mass cease and desists.
ELM: Huh.
FE: And now these companies, like, they’re not even giving you really the—I mean, you can appeal it, but they’re gonna take down everything first.
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FE: It’s—you know. Before, it was, they asked you to take it down, and you’d take it down. Now they just go ahead and take it down. And then if you want to appeal it, you could.
ELM: I’m curious also, what about the role of the platforms here? I mean, it’s interesting to hear about—we rarely talk about Etsy as a platform on the internet, but the idea that you would risk angering them just to keep, you know, because you don’t want to take a huge loss. But I’m also thinking about, you know, Tumblr’s adult content ban, which was the first of many platforms’ adult content policies, you know what I mean? Which obviously affects fanart, too.
FE: Well, Etsy will let you sell anything. [FK & ELM laugh] I’ve actually reported—because the thing is, they just need your assurance that this is not an IP violation, that this is handmade, and that this is, you know, not commercially mass-produced.
FK: Mmm hmmm.
FE: Those are their rules. Their rules are, is, all of this has to be somehow made by you.
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FE: You can be the designer of the product but need a third party to help manufacture it. That’s OK now with Etsy.
FK: Mmm hmmm.
FE: But they need your assurance that they do this. Right now, Etsy has gotten so big, they don’t screen anything, anymore.
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FE: They all count toward—I mean, it’s all kind of policed by individuals.
FK: Mmm hmmm.
FE: So Etsy won’t stop you from putting something online. However, they will stop you if someone reports you.
FK: Mmm hmmm.
ELM: Sure.
FE: So I’m sure you’ve probably noticed, there are many, many things that are not handmade on Etsy. I mean, I see mass-produced things, and that angers me so much, because people go in and they think it’s handmade, and it’s not, because—
ELM: Yeah.
FE: —I’ve seen the exact same product on Amazon, and it’s, like, more expensive on Etsy, for some reason, and they’re using the exact same promo pictures and everything, and I know it came from China, so [laughs] you know?
ELM: [laughs] Right.
FE: It’s just like, it makes me angry. So when I was looking for furniture myself, I was seeing, like, “Oh my God, that’s the exact same cabinet I’ve been looking at, and that is not handmade, I know that for sure.” [FK & ELM laugh] So I would report every single one of those. I’ve become that bitter person. [ELM laughs] But Etsy just lets you post, but they will take things down if you report it.
ELM: Right, right.
FE: And that’s how they’ve been responding with other things, too. So if Disney—if a Disney spokesperson says, “OK, you need to take down these listings, because these are copyright infringements,” they’re not gonna question it.
ELM: Yeah.
FK: Mmm hmmm.
FE: They’re gonna put the onus on the artist.
ELM: You’ve never had any issues with visual art just being posted on social media platforms?
FE: No.
ELM: But you don’t—you’re not making erotic art for the most part, right?
FE: I mean, I’ve done some erotic art for Three Patch. I’ve done some erotic art on my own. I don’t really post the erotic art, because I’m still kind of—[laughs] I’m still from that era of [FK laughs] people who are very, like, scared of posting erotic art, especially under a pen name that can, you know—that has a long history, so…
ELM: Sure, sure.
FE: Yeah, but no, I’ve never had any problems just posting art.
ELM: Yeah, interesting.
FE: Yeah, it’s only when you monetize it. That’s where you run into problems.
ELM: Right, right. Yeah. I mean, I think that I actually—it’s really unclear to me— Flourish isn’t using Tumblr anymore, I am still very much there. I’m seeing female-presenting nipples every day, [FK laughs] so I don’t actually know what the rules are, right?
FE: I think they relaxed it.
ELM: Yeah, it’s unclear. And even when it—they were—I still have a post in content moderation that is a cat on a sled, [FE laughs] and they will not remove it from the, like, the naughty box, right? [FK laughs] But then I see, like, dicks and boobs all the time on this site, so I’m like, “I don’t know what we’re doing here.” But what about IRL? Are there ever legal issues with stuff at cons?
FE: Cons will generally have a rule against bootleg material and traced materials. I’ve personally never had someone come up to me and say, “You should stop selling that right now.” I’ve never had that problem, because again, my work is unique enough and removed enough from the original source material. But I have heard of other people who’ve gotten shut down.
FK: Hmm.
FE: Especially if their work is too similar to the original material.
ELM: Hmm.
FK: Hmm.
FE: And this happens a lot at anime conventions because, you know, anime is anime, and if your anime is too close [FK & ELM laugh] to the original anime, then [laughs] it could be mistaken for official merchandise. And there are undercover people from these different anime companies that come and walk around artists’ alley and take notes.
ELM: Oh wow.
FK: Whoa.
FE: Yeah. I have had some people come up—like, this is very, very rare, but some industry people sometimes come up to me and say, “Wow, that’s, uh…you know, interesting. I should probably show this to, you know, whoever, like, so-and-so.”
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FE: And I never know if that’s from a good place or a bad place. [FK & ELM laugh] Well, sometimes they’re very clear on it being a good place. That’s, like, 99.9999%. When I see industry people, like, I’ve had many, many Supernatural actors and Supernatural producers come up [ELM laughs] and see my Destiel shirt. My “Ask Me About My Ship” shirts. And I show them [all laugh] how it flips up to show Destiel kissing, and they’re very, very amused by that, and they want to show everyone on the show that, and they’ve seen it now. They’ve all seen it now. But that was never really my audience. I don’t really want, necessarily, approval from the Powers That Be. [ELM laughs]
FK: Mmm hmmm.
FE: So I’m like—oh, one time, I had my giant body pillow cases. I have a—
FK: Oh yes! [ELM laughs]
FE: —Sherlock and John body pillow case where they’re half naked. I made them look really, really good, [all laugh] and one time someone came up to me at L.A. Comic Con, and he was like, “Oh, can I take a picture of the John Watson side?” And I said, “Yeah, sure, thank you for asking.” And he took a picture, and was like, “OK, I’m gonna show it to Martin.” [laughter] And I’m like, “Wait. Martin who?” And he was like, “Martin Freeman, of course.” And I’m like, “Noooo! Don’t show him!” [laughs] Because actually, even though the franchises, they don’t own the actors’ faces, so they can’t say, “You are infringing upon this character, because the face belongs to me.” No. They can’t say that. The actors own their own faces. Yeah. [laughs]
FK: I was gonna say, [laughs] but Martin Freeman, if he decided that the body pillow was not how he wished to be represented, [FE & ELM laugh] you know—
FE: He could! He could come after me.
FK: I have seen that body pillow, and if I were Martin Freeman, I would be thanking God [FE & ELM laugh] that you chose to give me that particular body, so, like—I mean, I’m sure he’s a very handsome man and everything, but that body doesn’t belong to anybody who has not just done a lot of pushups to look good on camera, so yeah.
FE: And so, like, that was what—you know, that was what that guy said. He was just like, “Oh, he’ll find this super flattering, super, you know, funny.” And I was just like, “He better, because I don’t want you to share it with him.” But then after some back-and-forth, he—I, you know, I’m not gonna tell someone not to share it, but then always there’s a little bit of anxiety in the back of my mind.
FK: You also don’t want to be that person who, like, is shoving their fanart in an actor’s face, right? Like, that’s—
FE: Oh, no. I am never that person. I am never that person.
ELM: Yeah.
FK: You know, I can imagine, if somebody did that—if I were in your shoes, I would be like, “Oh no, I am skating dangerously close to being The Person.” [FK & ELM laugh]
FE: I mean, I have gifted some actors their own shirts with their own faces on them.
FK: Sure.
FE: I’ve done that with Rupert Graves, I’ve done that with Loo Brealey, I’ve done that with the guy who played Kowalski from the Harry Potter movies. [FK & ELM laugh] So I’ve done that a few times, and they always seemed like they, you know—
FK: Sure.
FE: —they took it really, really well. Loo Brealey insisted on paying me for her shirt.
FK: Aww.
ELM: Aww.
FE: And she came up to me. She wanted to buy one. Yeah, it’s been very nice.
FK: But that’s also different, like, that—
ELM: Yeah.
FK: Yeah, but that’s also, like, not—like, the body pillow is probably the closest thing to erotic art that I’ve seen you really put out there—[ELM laughs]
FE: Yeah.
FK: —and, like, I feel like the body pillow would be that bridge where I would start feeling weird. [laughs]
FE: Yeah, no, I would not—like, my first interaction with Martin Freeman will not be like, “I’m the one who made the body pillow!” [all laugh] Because he did not—the person who sent him the picture, he was supposed to tell me what Martin Freeman thought, and he never came back to talk to me, so I don’t know what he actually thought.
ELM: Aw man!
FE: But there is a rumor, actually, that Robert Downey Jr. owns the print that I made of him as Sherlock Holmes. [all laugh] There’s a rumor that he actually owns it, because there’s a rumor that he has a whole room in his house for fanart of himself.
FK: Yeah, yeah.
ELM: Wow.
FE: So…and—
ELM: Wow.
FK: I believe that rumor implicitly. [FE laughs] That seems like—
ELM: That’s very funny.
FK: —the kind of thing that, like, having observed Robert Downey Jr. at Comic-Con just basking? [FE laughs]
ELM: Yeah.
FK: It seems like the kind of thing.
ELM: Yeah, but he could also pay people, like, he could commission stuff, like, art. He could commission, like, a gold statue of himself, if he wanted, you know?
FK: But I feel like if you were an actor, the thing that would be really pleasurable about it is that you didn’t have to commission it, right?
FE: Yeah.
ELM: Yeah, the most flattering fanart, too.
FK: Yeah, like, that’s the most flattering.
ELM: Yeah, yeah.
FE: Yeah, and I’m always happy that I made them all look really, really good. [all laugh]
FK: I love how this, like, is impacting some of—well, maybe it’s not, but it sounds like it’s impacting some of your artistic choices. You’re like, “You know what? I could envision drawing this person in a way that didn’t make them look that good, because there are those moments, but I’m gonna do ’em a solid.” [FE & ELM laugh]
FE: Well, I just, ah, I just like making beautiful people beautiful. [FK & ELM laugh] That’s one of the things that I really like to do, so those are—that’s part of my headcanon, that they’re just beautiful. [FK & ELM laugh] I just like to make them beautiful.
ELM: That’s really funny. Well, I have a question about cons, though, too, related to this. It sounds like, I mean, you’re describing, like, the actors and stuff like that. But, you know, we met once at—what was the name of that? What con was that? Oh, Leviosa, right?
FE: Leviosa, yeah.
ELM: Yeah, talking about, like, small, you know, the small fan-run cons. And I’m wondering, like, do you do a mix of them, or is that more your scene, or…?
FE: Yeah, I do a mix of them. Actually, I choose my cons not really for—[laughs] I choose the cons I want to go to.
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FE: And mostly, for proximity to people that I want to visit. Because for me, cons are an excuse to travel—
ELM: Sure.
FE: —and an excuse to see friends in those cities. So I don’t do every single con. There are plenty of very, very profitable cons that I could be doing that I just choose not to, because I, one, have no interest in visiting that city, [FK & ELM laugh] and two, none of my friends are there, so I don’t want to go.
FK: Uh-huh.
FE: And it’s, you know, I choose cons for vibes, so—[FE & FK laugh]
ELM: Yeah, yeah.
FE: And actually, that’s something I wanted to talk about. I want to talk about how my fandom experience has actually kind of shifted to actually having a fannish experience in the artists’ alley.
FK: Hmm.
ELM: Hmm.
FE: So I get my enjoyment from cons in that artists’ alley. It’s actually a little weird, but I like interacting and meeting people in artists’ alley, where we can connect over the art, because that’s my main medium. I’m not a fanwriter. I consume lots and lots of fanfic, but I’m not a fanwriter, so the most natural place for me to connect with others over my art is actually in the artists’ alley. It happens to be a place where people buy stuff, but that’s also where I hang my art.
FK: Mmm hmmm.
FE: And then people can come find me, and we can have a great conversation about, you know, our headcanons.
ELM: Hmm.
FE: Our mutual love for this fandom that I’m driven to create something, because I have so much love for the fandom, and I want to meet other people who have the similar shared interests. So it’s my way of meeting people and talking about things. It probably won’t even—I mean, we end up sharing, like, “Oh, have you read this fanfic? OK, OK, no I haven’t. [ELM laughs] OK, let’s share links.” And so that’s such a fun experience. It’s so fun, and for me, that’s actually why I go to cons now. I used to go to cons for a lot of panels and a lot of the presentations, but then I felt more drawn to doing my own thing in the artists’ alley or in the marketplace and connect with people there. And that’s such a different fannish experience, and I actually enjoy—I mean, I’ll do the bigger cons, and I’ve had—well, OK. Different cons have different vibes. L.A. Comic Con is actually a very, very fannish con space.
ELM: Hmm.
FE: I’ve also had great experiences at Flame Con in New York, WonderCon has been great, too. But I feel like I won’t love the vibe as much at San Diego Comic-Con, which is one of the reasons why I haven’t gone there, and I haven’t gone to New York Comic Con, either—
FK: Mmm hmmm.
FE: —because I feel like that might be more mainstream, it’s more covered by the news, you know, people go in with a certain expectation—
FK: Yeah.
FE: —of finding more of the merchandise, and I want to talk to the fannish people. I want to talk to the slash shippers. I want to talk about people who ship Stucky right now. I want to talk to people who are so, super, super still into Sherlock. [FK & ELM laugh] Those are the people I want to talk to, and so I’m trying to find vibes for that. So I still do the fan-run cons. I still want to support the fan-run cons, because those are unfortunately kind of going away.
FK: Yeah.
ELM: Hmm.
FE: One of my favorite, favorite cons that I used to go to and I miss so, so much is I used to go to Yaoi-Con. [laughs]
FK: Oh yeah.
FE: And—
FK: I’ve never been, but I have heard.
FE: And it’s legendary. [ELM laughs] Legendary stuff happened in Yaoi-Con. That was just such a fun convention to go to, and I miss that con so much, but it’s because—I guess they were purchased by a company—OK, nobody should quote me on any of this, [FK laughs] but I heard [ELM laughs] that they got purchased by a company, and the company just doesn’t care about the cons.
ELM: Hmm.
FK: Hmm.
FE: So they are just like, “It’s not profitable and, you know, we’re not gonna do the con.” And I’m like, that’s such a waste, because people want to go to this con—
FK: Yeah.
FE: —and we want to have the, you know, the Bishounen Auction, [ELM laughs] where lots and lots of stuff go down. We want to have the Bishounen spanking sessions, [FK & ELM laugh] we want to have spank bingo. Oh my God, that was such a fun con. [laughter] I’m not even into anime, but it’s not all about the anime, it was, like, multifandom. And it was just a celebration of beautiful men, [ELM laughs] and it was so queer. It was wonderful. Yeah.
ELM: It’s very interesting to hear you talking about the, like, people coming up to you to talk to you about your art in-person is the place where you get to talk about headcanons and interpretations and stuff, because, like, when I think about where I get to do that most, personally, aside from, like, the DMs, which is mostly where I do it, it’s in the comments of my fic, right?
FE: Hmm.
FK: Yeah.
ELM: And then people will leave me, like, six paragraphs analyzing, “Oh, I see you understood this about them,” and I’m like, “Yeah, that’s one of my favorite things!” Right? Whereas, like, I reblog fanart every single day, you know?
FE: Mmm hmmm.
ELM: I’m—don’t worry, I’m a reblogger. Everyone is like—Flourish, if you don’t know, on Tumblr there’s a lot of angry posts about how you have to reblog, and I do it.
FK: This much I know, [FE & ELM laugh] even though I am, like, a person who rolls into Tumblr once a week and sort of looks around and goes, “Mmm. OK,” and rolls out.
ELM: You don’t see any of those female-presenting nipples and you’re like, “Never mind.”
FK: No, no no no. But this much, it’s like a—it can be heard from—it can be heard from many sites away.
ELM: Right, it’s been a thing for a long time. [FK laughs] Yeah. You know, but I wouldn’t go into the replies on Tumblr and be like, “Oh, I really see from your art that you underst—” You know what I mean? And so I’m wondering if that’s your—from your perspective as an artist, that’s partly, you know, you don’t have that space. That’s not how art is online, where you get to really talk about it at length, you know what I mean?
FE: Yeah! I’m so glad you brought that up, because that’s what’s missing.
FK: Hmm.
FE: That’s what’s missing for me.
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FE: I want to have discussions with people, but it doesn’t happen anywhere online. [laughs]
ELM: That’s so—do you feel like part of it—I mean, I want to talk a little bit, you know, we’re running short on time, I want to talk about, a little bit, the difference between fic and fanart, in terms of monetization. But it’s also—to me, I mean, whatever. I follow a lot of fanartists. They do great stuff. They’re not all just like, “Give me money! Pay for this! Pay for this!” But I do feel like that is a lot of what—you know, like, fanartists’ accounts often feel very professionalized to me, even if they’re not, like, begging for money. But it feels like, “Here’s my work. Here’s my art. Please reblog. If you like it, please buy this. Here’s a print.” You know? And it doesn’t feel like a space—as much of a space to be like, “Oh my God!” the way even, like, gifset makers feel a little more casual to me these days. I don’t know.
FK: That’s—yeah.
ELM: You don’t agree, Flourish?
FK: That’s—well, no no, I think that what’s interesting to me is, and Fox, maybe you’ll have something to say about this, but I feel like that is something that has been changing over time, because I feel like the fanart that I experienced on LiveJournal and in some of those spaces was definitely—you know, I mean, people drawing sketches, like, in response to things that other people had said. Like, really casual, really intertwined with discussion, and it feels like that is—it’s not gone, but it’s rarer now, than it used to be.
FE: Mmm hmmm. [sighs] Yeah, I really miss that. Yeah, it has changed, I think. I, again, mentioned that I’m part of a lot of artists’ alley communities, and I do side-eye a little bit whenever someone new comes on, and they’re expecting to make money from fanart.
ELM: Hmm.
FE: They’re like, “Well, I like to draw, I like fanart, and I see a lot of other people making a lot of money. Can I do this, too? I hate my job right now. I want to get out, and I want to do this.” And then they ask people, “So, what are the most profitable fandoms?”
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FE: And I’m just, like, that’s not fandom for me. You know?
FK: Mmm hmmm.
FE: Like, for me, there’s…[sighs] The monetization thing is really complicated. In the very beginning, fanfic authors were the ones that got cease and desists over the fanworks.
FK: Yep.
FE: Those of you who are older probably remember this, [ELM laughs] where every single fic had to come with a disclaimer that said, “I did not make a single cent off of this.” Because that’s the only way in which you could make fanfic. Like, you can’t monetize it. I mean, I know this happened for the X-Files—
FK: Yup.
FE: —fic authors, where you got taken down if you were writing fanfic, and the only way in which you could be left alone was if you didn’t make a single cent. So that’s part of the fanfic history. I believe that artists should be paid for their art. I’m a big proponent of that. In fact, I go around educating other artists like, “You can’t sell your print for that low, [FK & ELM laugh] because it actually affects everyone, not just you.”
ELM: Hmm. Mmm hmmm.
FE: Because, one, if you sell your print that low, you’re not paying yourself. But also, it changes how consumers look at fanart.
FK: Yeah.
FE: Because they think that, “Oh, then prints should be $10—”
ELM: Sure, sure.
FE: “—because that person’s selling it for $10.” And then in order to compete with that person, everyone else down the line is selling their print for $10, and then that means everyone is not going to make an appropriate wage for their labor. And it does affect everyone in the community. You know, I think prints actually used to be a little bit more expensive than they are now, because there’s so many more artists who are just flooding the scene, and they have super, super low-cost prints.
Now, there are differences in business. Like, some people just want to sell quantity, and some people, you know, want to sell their prints for more, because they feel like it’s worth more. That’s all individual choice. Different people have different business strategies. But, [sighs] I think there’s also a lot of education that needs to happen with these artists, especially brand-new artists who are like, “I don’t know what I’m doing, you know, prints aren’t selling.” And I’m like, “Your time and your effort is worth something. Your labor is worth something. Your skill is worth something.” But not just that, the cost of business, you have to pay yourself for that. Like, your table isn’t free. It wasn’t free for you to get here. You needed to pay for transportation, but also in order to do your art, you needed equipment. You know, you needed your computer, and you needed electricity, so all of that needs to be factored into your business model.
And so that’s unfortunately not something that a lot of artists are thinking about. And maybe a lot of artists also are thinking that this is a hobby, and then there’s also artists who are like, “I need to live off of this income.” So there’s a lot of—you know, it’s very complicated, because a lot of artists are also making items that they themselves are not producing. And I myself do that. I have, you know, a lot of my work is manufactured in China—
FK: Sure.
FE: But it’s all my original art that I’m getting manufactured, and it’s because I like making different items, and that actually, the whole world depends on the manufacturing of China, [laughs] because that’s where everything is made.
FK: Yeah.
FE: There is no such thing as an enamel pin that’s made by people who are making a living wage—
FK: Yes.
ELM: Yeah.
FE: —because we literally cannot make enamel pins in the United States because it will pay so low in order to make this enamel pin affordable. And so when I see artists who are selling their enamel pins for $8, I’m like, “You’re not charging enough, because you’re not paying yourself. I know how much your enamel pin probably cost, and, you know, it’s actually hurting every single artist down the line.”
And yet, and yet. [FK & ELM laugh] This is so complicated, because for me, and for a lot of people, but I can’t speak for everyone, is fandom is a work of labor and love. And we can’t possibly be compensated for everything we do in fandom. I’m not paid for the podcast. I’m not paid for any of the graphics I’ve made for the podcast. I’m not paid for all the websites I’ve made to rec fanfic. I’m not paid for—you know, all the fandom work and love we put in.
And it shouldn’t be, because fandom, as a space, is accessible to everyone, and I love that. I love the community that fandom is. That anyone, anywhere in the world, can come and be fannish about something that we love and enjoy fanworks, you know? That’s the—it’s such an anticapitalist space that I think is just so unique and so powerful about fandom.
So…[sighs] this is where I said, I’m not going to give you [all laugh] a rational answer, because there is no answer for this. On the one hand, I want people to be paid. But on the other hand, we shouldn’t expect payment for fandom. This is—we’re all putting in labor that we cannot possibly be paid for.
FK: Yeah, this is making me think a lot about something that Tricia Hersey, the Nap Bishop, I guess, I think she posted it. It might have just been on Instagram stories, and it was something like, “Are you making your hobby a grind, and you think that that’s, you know—”
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FK: “—and you think that that’s something to brag about? Because actually, the thing to brag about might be having a hobby [ELM laughs] that you do only for fun until it stops being pleasurable for you.”
FE: Yeah.
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FK: And I don’t mean to say that in order to say, like, “Oh, you know, it’s bad to make money off this,” or whatever. Obviously, this podcast is supported by Patreon. It enables us to do it. There’s reasons to get involved in that to some degree, but I think it’s really true that there’s a beauty in that. You know, sometimes things can just be for fun.
FE: Mmm hmmm.
FK: You know, if you are lucky enough to be able to spend any of your time for fun.
FE: Yeah, I think that’s really key, that I know I come from a place of privilege and that my side hustle, my art, my fanart, is really—like, I don’t need to depend on it. During pandemic, my sales went down a lot, because I haven’t gone back to cons, and maybe I won’t ever. I don’t know yet. [laughs] But, you know, I can do art that’s completely for me.
ELM: Mmm hmmm.
FE: And that’s my joy. That’s my bliss. The moment it’s not fun anymore, I will stop doing it. And I have the privilege to be able to do that. A lot of people who find themselves doing fanart for, as a full-time job, and I know people who do that, I hope they are having fun. But [sighs] I just can’t see myself doing that.
ELM: OK, I think we both could talk to you for another, like, nine hours, but [laughs] we may be out of time. This has been so fascinating. Would you, like, would you come back on again?
FE: Absolutely!
FK: Yeah!
FE: I love the two of you.
FK: Yeah!
ELM: Yeah! Likewise! [laughs]
FE: I’ve known both of you for so many years. Flourish, I probably—we probably met at Portus.
FK: Yeah, I was like, I was really trying to excavate where we had met, and I was like, I actually don’t know, and so I am feeling awkward about this, [ELM laughs] because you’ve just always been part of my fannish life that I can remember. At least as a vague presence.
FE: Yeah, and I think that speaks to so much of my experience. So many people in my life are these vague—like, they’ve been part of my fannish experience for such a long time, and that’s the power of fandom, and—
FK: It’s true.
FE: OK, anyway, [FK & ELM laugh] I don’t have anything else to add. [laughs]
FK: All right, well, it has been a total pleasure to have you on.
FE: Thank you so much, this was so fun! Thank you for having me. [FK & ELM laugh] It’s such an honor, actually. [laughs]
FK: Aww!
ELM: Aww. [laughs]
FK: [laughing] Bye!
[Interstitial music]
FK: Oh man, it is true that we could have talked with Fox for, like, nine more hours.
ELM: Yeah.
FK: I know we say this all the time, but it was really—we were—I was looking at your face as we were getting toward the end of that interview, and it was the face of a person with a lot more questions. [laughs]
ELM: Yeah, look. I always have more questions. But, yeah, in particular, yes. I did have many more. It is fine. We’ll have Fox back on, I hope. I hope. I was really struck, I didn’t know that fanartists were sharing information that way, and it’s interesting, because I feel like that’s not—you know, because fanfiction is not monetized, that’s not something that—there’s no, like, professional support network, you know, with people kind of getting each other’s backs, which I find very interesting. That’s a key difference, I think, between those two mediums.
FK: It totally makes sense to me that that would grow, you know, and exist. But I do kind of wonder how much people in the entertainment industry know about it overall, because if I wasn’t thinking about that—admittedly, I was never somebody who was having to police that kind of a space, thank God, but if I wasn’t thinking about that in terms of cons, then I don’t know whether other people are likely to be thinking about it. I’m really—I wanna go grill people in the entertainment industry about how much they know about this now. [laughs] But I don’t—
ELM: You think that they would use—
FK: —want to blow up anybody’s spot.
ELM: Yeah, you think that they would take it to use it to their advantage somehow, or…? You know, because I think one thing that you pointed out, which is really true, is that there’s different priorities within the entertainment industry around fanart, in particular, right? You know, like, on the creative side, you see, not just in the work that you and your former colleagues did on the marketing side of, you know, boosting fanart and making that a part of your social media presence, but the creative side, I know, often really likes it, when it, you know, is not like—
FK: Yeah.
ELM: —erotic, like, weird erotica. [FK laughs] You know, not just normal erotic—
FK: Sometimes they like it—sometimes they like it even when it’s weird erotic things, to be honest.
ELM: That’s true, that’s true. You’re right.
FK: I have observed that happening, which I know that people don’t want to know about the creators of things knowing about this stuff, and trust me, you’re right. That’s right. It’s a line that shouldn’t be crossed, but sometimes the line gets crossed, and they love it. Not always. But sometimes. [laughs]
ELM: Like, if we’re talking, like, writers or whatever—
FK: Yeah.
ELM: —they’re definitely likely to have weird kinks, just as much as the average fandom person, so…
FK: Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, I don’t know. I don’t mean that necessarily being, you know, trying to use it against people. I don’t think that that is terribly likely, but even just—
ELM: You just—even the knowledge that that is—
FK: Yeah.
ELM: —that is, like, a factor.
FK: I mean, I think—I don’t think anybody would be surprised to hear that there’s a grapevine, right? But a grapevine versus the level of organization that Fox was talking about are very different things.
ELM: Yeah, yeah. I mean, just to clarify, I meant, like, competing priorities of, like, the legal—you were talking about the legal side, versus the—
FK: Yeah, totally, totally, totally.
ELM: Yeah, yeah.
FK: Yeah.
ELM: So that’s very interesting, and the question of, like, actually those things working against each other because, I think the presence of a really robust fanart space, for fandom-building, or—you know what I mean? The kind of work that you were doing, that is probably a really good sign. But to the legal side, that could be very threatening, you know?
FK: Yeah, and there’s also a difference—and this is something that, like, I had run into—there is a big difference between people who are making fanart like Fox was describing, to make money, and they’re making stuff because it’s popular, and they can sell it. It’s still good to see them, you know, exist in a space. It proves to you that this thing is popular in that way, right? But there is a difference between that and having, like, a lot of people making fanart online for free or putting up little tiny things on Etsy that are not to the scale—I mean, you know, Fox is not talking about a giant scale, but aren’t even to that small scale.
ELM: Right, right.
FK: So it’s a complicated question, and I’m—I don’t know. I’m kind of excited to think about it, now that it’s no longer my job. [both laugh] You know what I mean? When you’re like—
ELM: Yeah.
FK: “Hey!”
ELM: Yeah.
FK: “This has a—” You know, suddenly it has fresh piquancy. [both laugh] Anyway.
ELM: All right, well, thank you, Fox, for that. To freshen up Flourish’s life, here, [FK laughs] and thank you generally. I would love to hear from other folks, their perspectives. I would love to hear from other fanartists anything that resonated. So, as a reminder, you can write to us at fansplaining at gmail.com. You can leave us a question or a message on our website, fansplaining.com, or in our ask box on Tumblr. That’s fansplaining.tumblr.com. Or you can leave us a voicemail: 1-401-526-FANS. Also, we should note, if you really want to record your voice and don’t want to do it via phone, we’ll take voicemails—you know, we’ll take recorded files directly to fansplaining at gmail.com, but, like—
FK: I would say, like, keep it under three minutes.
ELM: Under three minutes, yeah—
FK: Yeah.
ELM: —which is the cutoff for the—that’s the right cutoff. If it’s much longer than that, there’s a limit to how much we can include, really.
FK: Exactly.
ELM: And that’s pretty hard to edit down, usually.
FK: Yeah.
ELM: So those are the places you can contact us—or on Patreon. We always have people leaving us comments. That’s Patreon.com/Fansplaining.
FK: All right.
ELM: You can talk about soulmate AUs, and how much you love them, just like Flourish, or how you don’t care for them, just like me.
FK: All right. Elizabeth, I think that we are coming to the end of this conversation.
ELM: [laughs] You—
FK: Love you very much!
ELM: You—you haven’t relistened to this episode. I have. You really came to embrace your love by the end!
FK: I’ll talk to you later, Elizabeth.
ELM: OK, bye, Flourish! [FK laughs]
[Outro music]