#KAIJUNE - Instagram Drawing Challenge for the Month of June (#KAIJUNE2018)
"#Kaijune" is a month-long giant monster drawing challenge created by Riley Phillips (@phileyrillips), which sees the entire month of June filled and fueled with 30 x monsters - in the vein of "Inktober" and "March of Robots" (Both of whom I've personally been attempting for a few years myself :p).
I'd first featured Kim Hu's #Kaijune, which had since opened me up for this discovery, and am considering jumping up, even if it meant a few odd scribbles here and there LOL ... we'll see... meanwhile, folks can also refer to the *Prompt List for 'Kaijune 2018' (*Where you just follow the prompted words for the particular day, instead of cracking your brains o think of anything specific :p).
Scroll down to view some of my favs (Spotted thus far on the #kaijune-hastag), which I'd love to share with YOU folks!
The lyrical and fantastical behemoths by Alan Cortes (IG @flancortes / KAIJUNE 2018 / ko-fi.com/flancortes / ko-fi.com/flancortes) - who had also done the top banner image for this blogpost!
The magical neon-esque illuminated kaiju by Kelly Smith (IG @beatfist / beatfist.storenvy.com).
Designer & concept artist Katerina goes analog with her #Kaijune kreations in stark black+white (IG @kay_cit / DeviantART / VIRINK).
Magical and adorable wee kaiju abound in every corner of Mother Nature, with visual development artist Fayefox's creatures! (IG @fayefox_art / ArtStation).
Don't know about you folks, but I am pretty charmed with Collin David's "League of Kaiju Wrestlers" (Not real name, I just made it up :p) as I'd think they'd make pretty fun three-dimensional (in)action figures! Somebody help make it so! (IG @resfishdesign / Online Shop).
Charmed by the adorably-kawaii food-stealing kreatures by webcartoonist/illustrator Elle Skinner, looking very much "alive" with their water-colour treatment too! CHARMED, I say! (IG @ellescribbles / Tumblr / Etsy Online Shop)
Canada-based graphic designer Phou Camvan evokes a "super-sentai"-influenced line-up of (possibly) nefarious ladies with kaiju-heads (IG @arealdesigncynic).
"MONSTER'S PARADISE"-creator Eric Schuster presents more "traditional" Ultraman-kaiju in glorious and "fun" action! (IG @ericjschuster / Patreon).
"KAIJUNE" looks to be made up of to words: "KAIJU" and "JUNE", which makes for a clever wordplay to use for a hashtag and theme, IMHO!
The term "Kaiju" has been used and interpreted for decades, ever since the terminology originated with Ultraman starting in the late-1960s ("Kaiju" roughly translates to "monster" - see quote below from Ultraman Wiki), and had been a somewhat niche moniker in toy culture - in the not-to-distant past literally referring to vinyl toy adaptations of Ultraman and their monstrous nemesis.
"Kaiju (ęŖē£ KaijÅ«, Mystery Beast?), which roughly translates as Monster, is the classification given to any non-intelligent beast found throughout the works of Tsuburaya Productions. Kaiju are generally organic, and do not cover robots. They can be both terrestrial or extra-terrestrial, but are not labeled as aliens (Seijin) unless they show major intelligence like that of a human." (ultra.wikia.com)
UPDATED: I have since started doodling kaiju/monsters, and they can be found Hashtagged #kaijune2018toysrevilart, or on my dedicated TOYSREVILART-Facebook ~ Thank You For Your Indulgence!
In recent years, the term has been co-opted into current toy culture, to represent more than established Ultraman monsters, beyond to anything that resembles a non-traditional humanoid / bipedal / quadrupedal creature that came be and is termed a "monster" (re: the yummy selection of drawings I'd featured above) ... and speaking purely as a non-traditionalist and ultimately greedy consumer, I am delighted that the term is as "endearing" to current culture, as is it "consumeristic" enough that Western Hollywood had adopted it into their filmmaking eco-system - prime example being "Pacific Rim"!
Cheers
Andy TOYSREVIL
