Taral Wayne is the working name of Canadian artist and fanzine writer Wayne MacDonald (born 1951). The name Taral comes from his invented language, Siroihin. His earliest work appeared under his real name. He later called himself Taral Wayne MacDonald before dropping the surname completely.
Much of his work comprises images of young women, and occasionally men, sometimes nude and always attractive. Some are human, some furry, and some belong to his invented alien species.
Two of his regular female characters belong to a more-or-less self-consistent alternate world scenario. Saara Mar is a Kjola, a highly advanced humanoid alien, who arrived on Earth in the 1970s and became a kind of Magical Girlfriend to Taral's fictional self. Tangelwedsibel (usually abbreviated as Tangel'), is a Teh Langgi, a member of another visiting species, with digitigrade feet, black and white fur and a bushy tail. Teh Lanngi are sometimes compared with skunks, but they're actually more like dinosaurs. It's implied that the two alien women are in a threesome with the fictional Taral.
Wayne has also produced fanart, sometimes erotic, starring characters from Cats Don't Dance, DuckTales (1987), Fraggle Rock and others. His self-proclaimed "niche" work involves fetishes such as wet and messy and ASFR (petriphilia).
He is equally at home with vehicles, however, being a keen model collector, and several of his pieces depict imaginative cars, aircraft, spacecraft or imaginary transports.
In the 1990s Wayne collaborated with Steve Gallacci (creator/co-writer) on the short-lived Comic Book Tales of Beatrix. The title character is an ordinary rabbit-girl who is resurrected by hyper-intelligent, pan-dimensional beings after becoming collateral damage in a drive-by shooting. The beings give her a suit which confers total invulnerability. Unfortunately, it also makes her "invulnerable" to things like taste, smell and sexual pleasure, and she can't take it off. To make a living Beatrix is forced to become a Super Hero for hire, which involves something of a learning curve in how to exploit her invulnerability.
Wayne's art can be found on DeviantArt here
and FurAffinity (with the username saara) here. Both sites require login to view NSFW content.
Despite having been nominated for Best Fan Artist Hugo Award eleven times he has never won. He did, however, win the 2008 Rotsler Award for contributions to Science Fiction Fandom, and was Fan Guest of Honour at the 2009 Worldcon, Anticipation, in Montreal.
He has an article on Wiki Fur here.
Taral Wayne's art contains examples of:
- Berserk Button: Do not ever upset Tangel'. Saara will get angry, and you really don't want to make her angry.
- Never call Tangel' a skunk.
- Blessed with Suck: Beatrix (Type 4).
- CoolCars, CoolPlanes, CoolShips...
- Dreadful Musician: Tangel' really can't sing very well.
- Fetish: Agalmatophilia, WAM
- Furry Fandom
- Harmless Freezing: In one 2-panel strip Saara takes Tangel' to visit the moon of a gas giant, but forgets to warn her to put on a spacesuit. As a result Tangel' is frozen solid. In the next panel she's seen thawing out with her feet in a bowl of hot water.
- Another piece of art depicts Saara frozen solid under similar circumstances. Justified in view of the fact that she's more-or-less indestructible. It's never explained how she gets unfrozen again.
- Puni Plush: Wayne's art style is a western, Anime (and Cats Don't Dance) influenced, version of this.
- Quicksand Sucks: And a surprising number of attractive, scantily-clad young women seem to be drawn to it.
- Taken for Granite: or metal, plastic or even occasionally chocolate.
