issue 28 // volume 42 Explore the outdoors with Rhythms and Energy of Nature > Semi-abstract, mixed media works on display at Amelia Douglas Gallery Cheryl Minns Contributor Ne is alive and radiant in Madelyn Hamilton’s Rhythms and Energy of Nature, the latest exhibit in the Amelia Douglas Gallery. The semi-abstract, mixed media landscapes feature multi-layered textures and vibrant depictions of movement. They can make viewers feel like they just walked into the woods by invoking a sense of touch and of sound “IT am profoundly affected by the visual folds, shapes, and highly textured or abrasive marks of my vast natural surroundings,” Hamilton wrote in her artist statement for the show. “The tactile matrixes of my art are there for investigation and provocation of thought, and hopefully offer the viewer a renewed awareness of our surrounding world.” The paintings feature a variety of textures created by multiple layers of paint, which works particularly well in the paintings involving leaves. The bumpy and cracked lines add to the realness of the leaves, a ie some of which look like they just fell off a tree in autumn. The movement of wind through trees is captured in several of the paintings, including Upward Spiral, Red Wind, and Vibrancy in Motion. The latter painting captures the intense energy in the air with the leaves of a full, bright-green tree blowing in a white gust of wind. The movement of water Tee. boi a +i Sal is seen throughout Hamilton’s stream paintings, which show leaves travelling along the water’s surface. Like the wind in her other paintings, several white lines blend into the blue water to depict the water’s motion. One of the stream paintings, Carried by the Flow, is a long and skinny piece with about a dozen leaves floating along the water. Since the painting is hung vertically, it almost looks like the leaves are going down a waterfall. Hamilton attended the show’s opening reception on April 21 and spoke with guests about her artwork. She spoke to the Other Press about the process she went through in creating Frothy, Frolicking Flow. The painting captures leaves flowing along a frothy stream that was inspired Photo by Cheryl Minns arts // no. 7 by a creek near Hamilton’s home in West Kelowna. “I painted this, thought it was finished, and then I started it again. I’ve probably been working on this for over a year,” she explained. “I'll think it’s really done, but then it’s in my house or in my studio and I’m always looking at it. Then I figure out what’s wrong and go back into it. Discovery is always happening. It never stops. It’s ongoing.” Hamilton’s paintings in the show are available for purchase. The prices range from $325 for smaller paintings to $2,300 for larger paintings. To learn more about Hamilton’s works, check out her website at MadelynHamilton.com Rhythms and Energy of Nature is on display in the Amelia Douglas Gallery on the fourth floor of the Douglas College New Westminster campus until June 1. The next Amelia Douglas Gallery show, This Part Remains with Me by Louise A. DeGagne and Gregg Steffensen, will open on August 4. The show will be part of the New West Cultural Crawl on August 13 and 14. Thanks for playing; the weird legacy of ‘Homestuck' > Long-running webcomic finally ends Rebecca Peterson Staff Writer t has been analyzed as a modern epic, a work of philosophical genius, and over gooo pages of garbage. For the past seven years, the interactive webcomic Homestuck has carved out an entirely unique niche of Internet culture for itself, impacting the online arts community at large. Inspiring both fervent adoration in some and frustration and irritation in others, the bizarre comic concluded this past April 13 with a nine-minute flash animation that left many questions unanswered. What started as a simple comic that had a plot driven by questions asked by the author, Andrew Hussie, to be answered on forums by fans, rapidly evolved into a sprawling story that, for a long time, seemed too vague and complex to describe. It is, essentially, a kind of creation myth in which four kids play a computer game that brings about the end of their universe. If they manage to win the game, their i couldn't think of an ending Image via http://rebloggy.com reward is the creation of a new universe, where they can live as gods. However, this game has been played before, and both the heroes and the villains from the last session spill over into the new game, threatening to destroy the new universe before it ever has a chance to be created. It sounds simple boiled down to three sentences. However, it’s worth noting that there are over a hundred main characters in Homestuck, as well as many alternate timelines and universes to keep track of. The narrative sends the reader back and forth and sideways in time, raising questions that are answered so far down the path of the story that you've forgotten you had a question to begin with. It’s confusing, dizzying, and the first couple of acts are downright tedious. Still, the comic has amassed an enormous community of heavily devoted fans, including Scott Pilgrim author Bryan Lee O’Malley and actor Dante Basco. In terms of medium, Homestuck combined simple, static panels with gifs, flash animations, music, and interactive portions where the reader guides the character around like in a computer game. The art style ranges from simple sprites, to stick figures, to fully coloured scenes and beautifully detailed panels. The comic is anything but constant in its style, which could explain how so many were able to slog through the first couple of thousand pages of set- up and backstory. The tone of the comic is ever- changing, from simple slapstick comedy to abject nihilism and despair. Characters are gleefully killed off, brought back, and killed again, to the point where it becomes hard to keep track of which characters are still alive, and which are not. Many characters have multiple versions of themselves running around, both alive and dead. It certainly adds to the confusion of your average reader, though it provides an infinite amount of cosplay opportunities to the dedicated fan. Though the source material itself is incredibly impressive, the lasting impact of Homestuck lies in its legacy, much of which expands far beyond the comic itself. A spin-off comic series, Paradox Space, has been running since 2014, a collaboration project between many artists and writers who've added their own stories and ideas to the series. A game based on the comic is set to come out soon, funded by a Kickstarter that amassed over two million dollars from readers worldwide. Many musicians and artists who contributed to the original comic have gone on to find success in their own original works outside the series. Most notably, one of the lead composers for Homestuck, Toby Fox, created his own computer game while working on the comic. That game, Undertale, has become incredibly successful since its release last fall. As a nod to this, there was a brief tribute to Undertale’s battle system in one of the last flash animations of Homestuck. Love it, hate it, or utterly confused by it, Homestuck is a significant achievement in modern storytelling. Fans who were left unsatisfied by the comic’s ending will be glad to know that Hussie is planning on releasing an epilogue... at some point. For better or for worse, it is unlikely there will ever be another comic quite like Homestuck, and it will be interesting to see what Hussie is going to work on next.