Backstory Blog 3: Lucky
Added 2021-09-23 12:01:02 +0000 UTCHere's the first picture I ever drew of Lucky, circa 2006. He was originally supposed to be a cat. I was trying to invent several cats each with their own personalities to play off each other like a TV show or something, but I immediately got bored with all of them except the misfortunate one with the white fur ironically named Lucky.
I also immediately dropped cat as his species. For the next ten years he was just a generic, specieless anthro with white fur, long ears and tail, and big ears and eyes. Then I discovered jerboas and thought Hey! Those look familiar! A quick stripe in his tail and boom, jerbo.
There was something powerful about that character I couldn’t shake myself from. Something about his vulnerability. I became obsessed with him and drew him over and over trying to recapture that emotion, but the limitations of my skills got in the way so I had to study with more discipline. After a while I was using him to express other emotions too, still related to vulnerability: strength and speed and health in spite of vulnerability, calm and softness and fragility, then later, social emotions.
For fifteen years he’s been my artistic muse. That’s a lot of mileage. I have other characters too, but I keep going back to soggy old Luck as my favorite means of expression.
