The bat is just trying to get along with the sparrows. He looks a little lost and different, though not incompetent. This artwork is about trying to get along with a group of people who you don’t know and who are different from you.
Artist Ty Meier loves to draw bats in non-horror ways, looking like the humble critters they are. It’s interestingly difficult to find photos of bats with their wings down looking earnest and friendly: Almost all photographers and artists lean into making them savage and terrifying. in Ty’s mind bats are just trying to get along like the rest of us! In their defense they’ve had terrible press in Hollywood and in comic books.
Though once a bat got into Ty’s house so he and his daughter had to catch it, throwing a sheet over it like a net. They grabbed it with heavy gloves to bring it outside and it shrieked furiously at them the whole time, looking like the savage that Hollywood wants it to be. They released it and it flew off, shrieking. In its defense, a giant predator had caught it with a net. How would YOU feel?
This 8”x10” print was mounted to an art board, then heavily brushed with acrylic and lacquer.
