Anavut Synakorn Creates Not Only the Art, but the Characters Too
One day, nine-year-old Anavut Synakorn was sitting at their kitchen table, doodling objects in the room around them with a pencil and a piece of scrap paper, when their aunt, a Ringling college graduate, asked them about their drawing. The next day, she came back with a sketchbook for them. After that, they started to really love art.
They started by drawing characters from their favorite TV shows and videogames, including the popular Pokemon. Synakorn developed an anime art style, obsessed with how the characters’ eyes and hair- styles were drawn. These features are what replicate in their artwork.
During quarantine, while scrolling through the web, the sophomore found some “furry” art, an art style where people design personified animals. With this discovery, they started to render adaptions with a more anime-type style. They also began to switch mostly to digital art, which is “the art of the future,” as they remarked, “since a lot of people use it and it has many benefits and works for whatever job you want, it’ll be hopefully the new norm.” With digital art, there are tools that simulate brush and marker patterns in every color. All the artist has to do is pay for the app instead of expensive materials, and once they have it they can select whatever they need, making it easier to focus on the drawing itself.
Synakorn eventually started to create their own characters, not with just certain poses or eye colors, but developing and writing the background of the character to make it more lifelike. Before they draw a character, they draw the world they live in, the general per- sonality and the theme, taking theme ideas from seasons of nature, music, YouTube, and their favorite anime TV shows.
One character, a deer named Kiyomi, is based on the month May. Kiyomi is drawn with spring like characteristics. She lives in a fantasy village, and owns a flower shop, but she also spends time studying nature and learning about her environment. So, she has very natural, earthy tones, with some flower tones to represent the deepness of her background in the picture. She is an extroverted introvert who enjoys spending time with the people close to her, just like Synakorn. She has no problem with standing her ground and speaking up, although she likes to be alone and work on her own projects. Synakorn added a lot of complexity into her character, to make her more realistic.
When Synakorn first started this type of art, they were afraid to let school friends know about their ‘furry’ artwork, because it is looked down upon by society. But now that they are in high school,they have found supportive friends. “It’s perfectly fine, like they have opinions and that’s valid, as long as they don’t try and hurt someone just for an art style,” Synkorn said.
