Cinders and rain 

Editor: This is “Cinders and Rain” by Fernanda Suarez, a digital painting featuring a horned, serpentine figure on a beach. I’m struck by how the muted tones and fantastical elements create an ethereal, almost melancholy atmosphere. What are your thoughts on it? Curator: My eye immediately goes to the digital tools Suarez would have utilized. The textures she mimics – skin, scales, even the implied grit of the sand – are all rendered through the labour of digital manipulation. We should think about how fantasy illustration as a genre relies so heavily on technology and consumption of it, especially when it's as flawlessly made as this. Do you find it curious to think about how we might normally divide this as either digital art or 'fine art'? Editor: That’s a perspective I hadn't fully considered. I tend to separate digital paintings, thinking there's less emphasis on physical material but doesn’t this type of art depend on digital labour as its medium and tools as its means? The final image is infinitely reproducible, it exists as data that relies on software and hardware production. Is there something significant about it depicting a mermaid-like character with what looks like a synthetic rendering technique? Curator: Absolutely! This rendering can be read as an examination of labor within digital spaces, particularly regarding gendered avatars and their representations in gaming and social media. And because it is infinitely reproducible we see more engagement. Where might we locate authorship? Is it the hand or Suarez using their software? Editor: It really makes me reconsider my initial perception. Thinking about the labour behind this polished digital aesthetic shifts it from pure fantasy to a comment on modern production and online representation. I hadn't noticed the level of commentary until now! Curator: Right, by viewing this digitally produced fantasy image through the lens of its means of production we're more keenly aware of a changing reality!