I call this thing a rather neat picture. It confuses the hell out of others. People just don't know what to say about it; most just dismiss it as, you know, art. The sane people should not try to understand art.
This picture does have some special meaning to me. As you might know, the creature depicted represents me - my "furriness" is so deeply rooted that I cannot draw other kinds of self-portraits. I am WWWWolf.
What's this picture about? It's all about end of a certain period of my life. My childhood is over, and it's time to be an adult.
The sun sets. A hard day is over, and the new day will come with new challenges. The hourglasses symbolize the end of one period and beginning of another one: the empty glass has been left behind.
The book on the bottom is just like the books Death has (blatatant plug: read Terry Pratchett's books NOW!)... It should be obvious that a book called "Life and times of Weyfour WWWWolf" tells the story of this wolf, as accurately as possible. We see that the 19th chapter is just beginning. The chapter is titled "Leaving the past behind"; I hope I can leave all the uncomfortabilities and restrictions I have had behind and start living my own life the way I want to live it! The book is written in first person, of course, and the beginning of the chapter is a good place for all sorts of whining about what should we do next and how we did last year. Comments like "WRONG!" and "grrmrr" suggest that my life so far has not been an easy one.
But what about that ship? I don't know... The sea came from one of the Obvious Sources Of Inspiration, and it was logical to put a sailing ship to the picture. Besides, I drew the first sketch of the image during my trip to Germany (and guess how we crossed the Bothnian Sea? Right.)
Inspiration? Well, one of the inspiring things was Purple Motion/FC:s "Purple Sky"... don't know why, but that's the case. The main inspiration for the "surrealness" came from a Mickey Mouse story published in the Finnish Donald Duck magazine. I can't remember the name or writer - I think it was published after 1996. If you see that story, the relationship with this picture should be obvious. If you know the issue in which the story was published, please tell me.
[6.2.1999: I found it! Or rather, the second part of the story. The Finnish title of the story was "The Fighting Sword of Shambor" (D97405), written by Pat & Carol McGreal, artwork by Ferioli, published in Aku Ankka issues 19 and 20, May 1998. I found the second part - and the inspiring image was in the first issue.]