Birth of a Phoenix

A gift for *jodipheonix who made my lovely customised journal skin for me!

This one too me...yeah, far too long. Mostly because I kept changing my mind for what I wanted to do. *jodipheonix asked for just a phoenix, but I think I got a bit carried away... I haven't been hanging around DA much the past few days so that I could spend more time getting this finished without being distracted.

If you're interested, read on to find out a bit more about my thoughts behind this painting Also, can I just clarify that I am by NO means a mythology expert. Heh.

With masterful use of my Google-Fu, I did a lot of Phoenix myth research. Yep. What this resulted in was a painting borne from a mutation of mythology and merged with my own "artistic license" (let's NOT call it "I wanted to draw a pretty phoenix-man with red wings" >_> ).

Basically the general myth (that I based this on) goes like this:

The Phoenix bird, at the end of its life cycle, builds a nest of frankincense and myrrh, which, when the time comes, it enters and dies. From its ashes, a new Phoenix rises, then bundles up the nest in which are the bones of its parent and flies to the city of Heliopolis. There, it places the ashes on the altar of the sun.

- paraphrased from Wikipedia. Heheh.

So, this inspired my version of Phoenix-birth. In my myth, this is (roughly) how the story goes:

The Phoenix, having come to the end of its days, builds a nest on rocks too hot for human feet to touch. When its time comes, it bursts into flame and dies. From its remains, a small egg forms, red. Soon it cracks open, and from it hatches a new Phoenix. The egg burns around it, until nothing is left but ash and rock. When it's ready, it bundles up the remains and flies to the sun-city of Heliopolis, placing the ashes on the altar of the sun.

In the happy little fantasy land where I spend most of my time, there exists more than one Phoenix (that's why there's another one flying away from [what is meant to be] Heliopolis in the cloud >_> ), and, because I think it's cool, they can shapeshift. As for the type of nest they build, that comes from something I'd read about how some believe the inspiration for Phoenixes may have come from flamingoes, which build their "nests on salt flats that are too hot for its eggs or chicks to survive; it builds a mound several inches tall and large enough to support its egg, which it lays in that marginally cooler location. The convection currents around these mounds resembles the turbulence of a flame." Creds to Wikipedia for that one. ^.^

So, that's it... uhh.. I hope you all like it. I'm aware of its flaws, as there were a lot of firsts for me with this painting and as much as I'd like to, can't get everything right the first time lol, so I hope I did all right with it. I was torn in SO many different ways with this, tempted to do one thing or another with it, so in the end I've just left it and, maybe I'll come back to it again later...

---

Some custom brushes of Marta Dahlig from [link] were used, mainly to assist with the fire.

Do not use this art without my permission.

Wow, long comment. Sorry. lol Now I must get back to work before my coffee gets cold.