NOTE: This talks about Furaffinity BUT it applies to Inkbunny as well, just to a notably lesser degree. I joined IB nearly 15 years ago, so I been around here a while too.
While not exclusive, a primary motivator behind me taking art more seriously when I was young was how sexually inclined I am as a person. I am hypersexual, and highly imaginative, and these things came naturally together.
In my now 20+ years of drawing furries in particular I have been happy and content to make a buttload of porn both mild and otherwise. I am a sex-positive woman and in general sex itself plays a major role in my identity.
It has not been a lone rider, however. In that same time I have made a near equal amount of comics, shit-posts, horror art, emotional pieces, and even dabbled in fantasy monster design. In matter of fact, there was a time when my sense of humor and ability to make you feel something was as renowned as my ability to make you jerk off.
In 2006 when I first joined Furaffinity it was a social hub for the online furry fandom (which I now prefer to call the community, but we all called it the fandom then). There was a lot of adult artwork here, sure. There was a lot of everything else, as well. Even non-furry artwork could be found in the corners. People came here to socialize. Journals were like blog posts. People and artists would talk about their lives, current events, politics, and furry conventions. Popular art pieces would become miles of comment threads. The FA forums was a very active social place branched off of the main site itself.
FA was, and still is, home to furry social groups. Regional fur meet groups (furries from X-state, furries from x-country, furries of x-identity). FA is still home to large RP groups as well.
It was not just a porn site. Nor was it just a business site. Sure artists could network here, take commissions, and eventually do YCH' and adopts- but at its heart FA was and is still a social hub. Modern furs don't largely treat it as such anymore, though. It's been relegated to... just a porn site.
I came to a discomforting realization yesterday. I was sketching some mildly grim vent art and two things went through my head-
1. I was afraid to post any of this. Ten years ago I would have posted it without hesitation, but not now. Now I worry about upsetting people... and frankly I fucking shouldn't, that is god damn exhausting.
2. I was finding fulfillment in just doing emotional vent work.
The 2nd thought lead me to the uncomfortable epiphany.
I think I hate drawing porn right now.
I feel so strangled and forced to only ever make porn. I feel so pigeon-holed and suffocated by it. I feel as though ever since 2020, little by little, I have been transformed from an artist into mere soulless content.
Not that what I make is soulless, but how I am perceived by many of the young furry consumers is soulless. I am not making art, to them. What I make is not art, to them. It is just content. And for the last two years I have almost exclusively only drawn porn. Nothing but porn. Porn, porn, porn. No comics, no emotional think pieces, no experimental horror art, just porn. When I have done something different it has flopped in terms of getting any attention. You might think that's how it has always been but NO, it isn't.
There have been times where my humorous or emotional SFW art has actually out-performed my adult work. And it wasn't too long ago, to people my age anyway.
So now I am in an odd position. I realize that the primary reason I am struggling to finish projects is because I kinda hate making porn at the moment, or I have grown to resent it I suppose. I want to do something else because the state of things around me is driving me to make uncomfortable artwork. Because I am an artist and that's what we do when we are not corporate frauds.
I do need to be mindful of making money nonetheless. I don't want to spurn the people supporting me. On the flip side, growth has been abysmal since 2023. As the economy has worsened and generative AI has taken hold of the general gooner market and artists hold less value in a more and more competitive online world of content- new people rarely support me as compared to a few years ago when things were a bit more fun.
Honestly I don't think this journal has a conclusion. It's just brain dumping frustration.
I have not become a less sexually forward person, and I haven't personally changed much. Things have changed around me in a way that makes me feel chained up and claustrophobic. I feel creatively constipated. I feel unable to express myself. It's stressing me out to a point of no longer enjoying that which I enjoyed most. Erotic imagery.
Maybe I should just be an artist and do what my heart wants to do for a while. People will abandon me, but it won't be the first time. I am not really built to be a popufur. It happened once, in Brony, and honestly I hated how hollow it felt. I was only huge because I happened to be into a trending topic. As soon as I was back to my own thoughts and creations more than half of my fans decided I was no longer interesting.
*shrug* Whatever, that's being an artist.
