This is the first post in a series about things that have inspired and influenced my artwork.<\/p>
First up is the game Mirror's Edge, which was released in 2009. It was released on XBox 360, Windows and Playsation 3, which is how I played it.<\/p>
Mirror's Edge is, probably, the single biggest influence on my artwork, which probably doesn't seem obvious at first, but hear me out.<\/p>
As a big fan of dystopian fiction and parkour, this game was a must for me.<\/p>
The parkour... actually running around around the rooftops of the city, was awesome... the main character, Faith, is a bad ass... but the main thing that grabbed me was how different it was to other \"dystopian\" cities, like we see with LA in Blade Runner or Neo-Tokyo in Akira, or Mega City One in Judge Dredd.<\/p>
In Mirror's Edge the streets are clean, the sky is blue and the buildings are gleaming towers. On the surface everything looks perfect, but underneath there is something darker, and that's what drew me in.<\/p>
It reminded me of ideas I had in the back of my head from when I first watched Ghost In The Shell: Stand Alone Complex, the anime series based loosely on the more famous manga\/anime Ghost In The Shell, but I'll get to that another time.<\/p>
The ideas I had were of a comic or something, with a similar world, where everything was bright and perfect looking on the outside, but something darker was hiding behind it all. A dystopian conspiracy, a world not as it first seems.<\/p>
Those ideas never came to fruition, but when I started painting again a few years ago (after a 20 or so year break!) I realised this was the story I wanted to tell with my art, a world so bright and fun looking but where everything wasn't as it seemed. Where people happily live their lives oblivious to the control they are really under by technology and giant corporations. I mean, who would be crazy enough to entrust all their information with giant corporations, right... right?<\/p>
So my artwork is about a world full of fun, bright advertising, and corporations who... HONESTLY... have your best interests at heart. A dystopia that actually looks like a nice place, and that can (mostly) be tracked back to the first Mirror's Edge game.<\/p>
Also... the soundtrack is amazing, and one I still listen to often.<\/p>
And for my next post I'm planning on talking about Ghost In The Shell.<\/p>","urlTitle":"mirrors-edge","url":"\/blog\/mirrors-edge\/","editListUrl":"\/my-blogs","editUrl":"\/my-blogs\/edit\/mirrors-edge\/","fullUrl":"https:\/\/childrenofwolves.teemill.com\/blog\/mirrors-edge\/","featured":false,"published":true,"showOnSitemap":true,"hidden":false,"visibility":null,"createdAt":1678957484,"updatedAt":1678958239,"publishedAt":1678958239,"lastReadAt":null,"division":{"id":272050,"name":"Children Of Wolves"},"tags":[{"id":2254,"code":"inspirations","name":"inspirations","url":"\/blog\/tagged\/inspirations\/"}],"metaImage":{"original":"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/u6smgw8zuosechvwru1oi3fjjfhiclvggsxc1cra663sw4u8.jpeg","thumbnail":"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/u6smgw8zuosechvwru1oi3fjjfhiclvggsxc1cra663sw4u8.jpeg.jpg?w=1140&h=855","banner":"https:\/\/images.podos.io\/u6smgw8zuosechvwru1oi3fjjfhiclvggsxc1cra663sw4u8.jpeg.jpg?w=1920&h=1440"},"metaTitle":"","metaDescription":"","series":[],"similarReads":[],"labels":[]}