Watercolor of the Month 40: Luna in Knotted Bun (“The Order of the Phoenix”) 💙

I hope you all are having a very nice summer out there, wherever you are, and just enjoying the warm sun. What’s happening on today’s new topic, we are reaching towards the end of June, and July will be coming away, but it doesn’t mean it’s the end of summer. As such, it’s time for the new Watercolor of the Month post! 🎨

As you have just read the topic’s title above here, this is the 40th Watercolor of the Month! 🎉✨ The one-and-only 40th Watercolor of the Month topic! Can you believe it? 🤩

For this year’s Watercolor of the Month post for June, I have chosen a simple watercolor fan art drawing of the wonderful Ravenclaw, Luna Lovegood, in a scene from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, done back in year 2020.

This was first presented two years ago this month, very surprising! The drawing illustrates Luna Lovegood, who you can see that she has her hair tied up in a knot, from the thirteenth chapter in the fifth Harry Potter book, The Order of the Phoenix by J.K. Rowling. It takes place right after Harry had detention with Professor Umbridge and receiving a painful cut on his hand, with words written ‘I Must Not Tell Lies’, and then getting really fed up with Draco Malfoy and his cronies for insulting on Hagrid and on his absence, during the Care of Magical Creatures class, with Professor Grubby-Plank teaching. Just as the Care of Magical Creatures was finished, Harry, Ron, and Hermione were leaving out of the class, until they were about to pass by fourth year students, including Ginny Weasley and Luna Lovegood. Right away, Luna begins to speak to Harry, and tells him that she believes in him for seeing Lord Voldemort, seeing his return, witnessing Cedric Diggory’s death, fighting against him off at the graveyard, and then escaping from him.

When she saw Harry, her prominent eyes seemed to bulge excitedly, and she made a beeline straight for him. Many of his classmates turned curiously to watch. Luna took a great breath and then said, without so much as a preliminary hello: “I believe He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is back, and I believe you fought him and escaped from him.”

“Er – right,” said Harry awkwardly (Chapter 13, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix).

Not only this drawing just shows you of Luna looking all very quirky and imaginative, and then telling Harry that she believes in him, it represents only Luna showing her greatest support for Harry, while he was feeling under water in the bridge, because the Ministry of Magic was in denial on Voldemort’s return, and putting on against Harry and Professor Dumbledore, as if they were all telling lies, which is definitely not true at all. How could Harry tell a lie on Voldemort, after he had witness seeing the Dark Lord’s return and coming back in a flesh at the graveyard, and even seeing Cedric Diggory murdered right in his own eyes? With Luna, it goes to show that she understood Harry’s frustration and loneliness, and she feels connected with him.

Luna didn’t have many friends. She would be teased and being called ‘Looney Lovegood’ by the students, and they would steal her things, but it never bothered her. She is proud of being different and prefers to be different and quirky than acting like any other normal kids in Hogwarts. Not only that, but she also knows what it feels like to witness a death of a loved one, which is how she was able to see the Thestrals. When Luna was nine years old, she had saw her late mother’s death for using one of the spells that went terribly wrong. She tells Harry that she sometimes feels sad about losing her mother, even though she has her dad as her only living parent she’s ever got, but it’s not like she is ever going to see her mother again. She knows that things we lose will always find a way to come back to us.

This was done around before COVID-19 pandemic had begun, but it was finished in March, so maybe sometime before or after the pandemic hit, and I posted the drawing as a full-length topic in June, two months after the pandemic came across. It was drawn on my old drawing pad, where I have worked on all of my early watercolor drawings and paintings there since 2019, and colored and painted with my old set of watercolor pencils.

It all begins with a rough sketch in pencil, but lightly, then cleaning up with the black ink sharpie pen and light blue for Luna’s Hogwarts cloak to represent the color of her house in Ravenclaw, coloring and painting Luna, and finishing off by painting a full background in gray. Even before explaining the small process of working this project, I also shared my very first sketch of Luna with her hair up in a knot, drawn in blue pen on paper, and I have shared it on social media, probably before sharing it in the exact topic.

To learn more about the process behind this Luna Lovegood fan art, you can find the full topic at The Autistic Animator’s Desk, titled: Luna in Knotted Bun (“The Order of the Phoenix”) (watercolor, 2020). If you have missed the previous topic from yesterday, on the Helen Keller at the water pump watercolor drawing, please check it out. It was posted on Helen Keller’s 142nd birthday.

And also, for a special news, in case if you have been following me on Instagram, I am working on two set of Harry Potter watercolor fan art illustrations, and they will post in their own topics this July, which will be Harry Potter’s birthday month, including the author, J.K. Rowling. So, I am very excited about it! What else would a be a fun and special way to celebrate the birthday for The Boy Who Lived and his creator? One will be from The Order of the Phoenix, so you will see Luna Lovegood again, and second will be from The Prisoner of Azkaban. I’ve already finished The Order of the Phoenix illustration, but The Prisoner of Azkaban fan art is still in working-in-process.

If you have missed yesterday’s post, on the special Helen Keller birthday topic, with my Helen Keller at the Water Pump watercolor drawing, you can find it here at The Autistic Animator’s Desk.

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