How Much Art Can You Take?

John Howe's art for The Lord Of The Rings

2009-12-11T12:03:00.000-08:00

Part four of four. Overall, I don't know what prompted me to post four sequential galleries on John Howe. It might be because this month always makes me want to curl up with a good fantasy novel under a blanket. Or possibly it's because growing up, there was always this tradition of seeing a new fantasy film right before Christmas (mostly, Lord Of The Rings when I was in high school, then continued with substandard films trapped in it's colossus shadow). Either way, this is my way of expressing what gets me pumped when snow starts to fall and I'm stuck indoors due to weather as opposed to exploring some abandon dams in the woods somewhere during the warmer months. Or something like that, but I digress.

Looking at these, I realize that his work for Lord Of The Rings is pretty dark. If only the Uruk-hai in the films were more like the ones pictured. I feel like they are more menacing, but that's just me. I'm also going to point out that The Witch King is more imposing and terrifying in these paintings. AND that the Balrog looks demonic and nightmarish. The movie one was good, but John Howe's comes off as some creature from hell, stuck in a foreign landscape, which I feel makes it more effective than a skull headed ash being with crinkle-cut ram horns. The Film version one is scary, but I'd prefer something that could be more of a variation on satanic imagery- possibly with bits of ancient war armor, but that's just my personal taste. Enjoy!

John Howe's art for The Hobbit

2009-12-11T07:45:00.000-08:00

Part three of my four part intro to John Howe. Peter Jackson is producing a two-movie version of The Hobbit as a prequel to his Trilogy. He'd be smart to hire John Howe for production art again. Hopefully the dwarves and goblins look more like these versions than what was in the film trilogy. No to say they were bad by any means, just that these variants are more interesting. The painting of the interior of Bilbo's hobbit hole is pretty much what was seen in the LOTR films.

John Howe's art for The Silmarillion

2009-12-10T09:23:00.000-08:00

This is more of a gallery in conjunction with my four part introduction to John Howe. His art for "Lord of the Rings" is probably some of the best conceptual work for anything fantasy related. We all know that Peter Jackson hired him for his conceptual skills for the movie trilogy, even though I can't make out how much input he had int he final product. I always felt that the Armor and Weapon design was sub-par and pushed too far from anything based on historic Europe.

Anyways, the following three posts will be based on his Tolkien-based works. I'm doing The Silmarillion, The Hobbit, and Lord Of The Rings. If i can get his material for "Unfinished Tales" and "History of Middle Earth" then I'll post that later. I Feel like this is his strongest work, simply because of the Biblical content "The Silmarillion" contains. Seriously, It talks about the creation of middle earth and the heros of the earlier eras and how The Third Age came to be. This includes sinking continents, the destruction of ancient cities, armies of dragons, etc. Heavy stuff, and it isn't an easy read AT ALL. It literally reads like a cross between a text book and the bible. Someday I'll grind through it (or hang out on the LOTR wiki). Anyways, the following images are BIG so you can fully enjoy John Howe's mastery of the brush and of the imagination. They also make great desktop images!

The real reason why John Howe is brilliant

2009-12-09T09:44:00.000-08:00

Why is John Howe incredible? Is it because his technical ability to paint is jaw-dropping? Or maybe it is his use of composition? Possibly it is because his art is organic and has a kinetic quality? In my opinion: Yes, but his strongest point is that he's a Nerd. This is my four part introduction into one of the finest, most skilled, artistic nerds around.

He loves the Medieval Era ALOT. On his website (which I'll link at the end of his post) Here is a section called "Medieval" which is photos of him in various forms of medieval armor, garments, feasts, and yes- even a monster costume.

I have no idea who or what he does these recreations with. When I lived in Vancouver, BC, I studied and practiced Western martial Arts (WMA). Since Mr. Howe is from Vancouver, I thought maybe there was a chance I happened to rub elbows with someone who knows him through Historic European Martial Arts (another way to say WMA), but i find it doubtful. Then I thought that maybe he was a member of Society of Creative Anachronism (or SCA). But I also doubt that, because the SCA is more of a repectable form of LARP-ing based in historic fact.

It turns out he is a member of the "The Company of St. George" who are a group of medieval warfare reenactors. It seems similar to the SCA, but minus the nerd element and based in Europe. I don't think they have a Chapter in Canada, so I'm curious to know if he flies to Europe with his Sallet (helmet) stowed under his seat. Doesn't matter, he knows his material (he practically lives it).

Since he is so familiar with the medieval era, His work is that more believable. He takes a 15th century Germanic armored knight and throws a dragon into the picture (see above image). BAM- functional fantasy art. It's very honest to me, and makes more of a impact on my imagination than someone in non-functional, jewel-encrusted elvish rune armor. His use of Medieval realism really pulls me into the image more than any mediocre piece of art commissioned for Dungeons & Dragons could. His art is real. Any artist can paint landscapes of other worlds populated by various characters and creatures, but it will all blend together with other works. If you use real world elements rooted in European history, your work will stand out above the rest, because your using fact as your basis for creativity.

The following gallery is his art that isn't Middle-Earth based (that will be the following three posts). All of this is based off of either Arthurian Legend, various forms of contemporary fiction, or non-commissioned paintings. All of the characters are historically accurate, even if they're placed in an alternative or fantasy world.

John Howe's personal website- http://www.john-howe.com/
Historical European Martial Arts (Get hip to it)- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_European_martial_arts

Moebius's concepts for Jodorowsky's "Dune"

2009-11-16T09:33:00.000-08:00

The Film that never was. The 14-hour long adaption of Dune directed by Alejandro Jodorowsky and starring Salvador Dali and Mick Jagger, might never see the light of day, but the snippets of what was made by artists HR Giger, Chris Foss, and comic-master Jean "Moebius" Giraud has appeared over the years. Check out this website that has some of the storyboards and character designs by Moebius.

Apparently 2 million dollars of the 9.5 million dollar budget was spent on pre-production. Moebius did storyboards for the whoooooooole script, which was apparent the size of a phone book (according to Frank Herbert). I just hope that one day, that gets released, because i know it would pretty much be a Dune graphic novel. Although some of Giger's design bleed over into David Lynch's adaption, the concept art by Moebius makes me wish it was made. It's so fantastic and otherworldly, I can't even put my head around it. Ever since Peter Jackson did his 11 1/2 hour version of The Lord Of The Rings, i feel like a proper adaption of Dune should be made. Not to say David Lynch's version was terrible, it just had a bad flow. And was confusing. You can't condense a novel like Dune into 137 minutes.

Anyways, here's the link- http://www.duneinfo.com/unseen/moebius.asp

Michael Whelan does Elric of Melniboné

2009-11-15T08:04:00.000-08:00

When it comes to cover art for fantasy novels, I normally think of bland adventurers hanging out in some painfully boring forest aided with over saturation of primary colors that are accented by an overly glossy polish on the painting. This is the case with a lot of novels that came out in the later 1980s and 1990s on TSR, and even some of the artists commissioned for Advanced Dungeons and Dragons. But then there are always those artists who have a good sense of conceptual design, composition, and a strong sense of style tot he point where they wouldn't even need to use a signature to sign their works.

Enter Michael Whelan, fantasy artist supreme. Not only is he one of the better of the genre, but he's also one of the most productive. You can tell he loves what he does by the sheer output of paintings he's done. AND he has galleries of his work all over the nation, trying to break into the art world. I have a lot of respect for that. Amongst all of these art school dropouts trying to imitate Donald Judd *yawn, guess what- minimalism is over* there are people who are doing decent figuration work, but adding character to it. Although his character is more fantastic, nevertheless snobbish art elitist are looking at it and trying to convince themselves they shouldn't it like it because it's blatantly Fantasy-oriented and not pretentious in the least. But I digress

Michael Whelan is known for his art for fantasy novel series for Dragon Riders of Pern, Edgar Rice Burrough's Barsoom, Tad William's multiple series, Melanie Rawn's Dragon Star and Dragon Prince, and the DAW editions of Michael Moorecock's cult hero Elric of Melniboné in addition to Record jackets for Heavy Metal Bands Sepultura, Obituary, and these guys-

All four original albums by Cirith Ungol uses Michael Whelan's art he was commissioned for the Elric series as their cover art*. One opinion that i still have for most fantasy artists is that their best stuff is made in the earlier part of their career. Whelan breaks away from that to a degree, but I feel that his work from the 1970s-1980s is his strongest. The work he did for the DAW editions of Moorecock's novels are brilliant. Whelan is on the top tier of Fantasy artists not because of his technical abilities as an artists, but because he is one of finest fantasy artists with a sense of composition this side of Frank Frazetta. And that's saying a lot. But I think i understand why, because Elric is one of the the most badass character concepts since Howard's Conan of Cimmeria (the barbarian to you squares.) Check out this powerful image in full-

Elric of Melniboné is the albino emperor of a dissolving empire of a humanoid race (similar to elves, but evolved from cats?) who has to take "herbs"(drugs) to function normally because his body is terminally ill. He is estranged to the decadence of his race's culture and sees the human kingdoms as potential threats to his kingdom and everything else. And he wields a black-bladed long sword called the Stormbringer that drains Elric of his energy and health, but is powered by the souls of those who are slain by the Stormbringer's blade. I need to get every book.

With such a strong literary character, Whelan does wonder's with portraying him. In fact Michael Moorecock said that he's the only artist to depict Elric properly to his liking. And I feel that Whelan does justice by not only making strong compostions of elric being awesome, but also adds atmosphere, something that alot of fantasy artists never even attempt. He is truely a master of his craft, and I hope to own an original by him someday. Plus he can hang with Obituary, and that's okay in my book. Here's a gallery of his images of Elric.

And here's the Cirith Ungol sub-gallery-

*If you claim to like Metal and don't know who Cirith Ungol is, then you pose. Put down the burrito, stop listening to Municipal Waste and get Frost and Fire.

Roger Dean's record jackets: 1970-1974

2009-10-30T08:25:00.000-07:00

Progressive Rock bands always have the best cover art. It's usually some kind of otherworldly landscape, sometimes littered with strange animals creepy crawling on giant mushrooms. Or its an image of some strange character (probably some kind of wizard) casting magic or screaming (see King Crimson's self-titled), with a moon or two (or Saturn) thrown in the background for good measure. We've all seen it, and the art works because it makes us pause and look at the record for a few seconds longer when browsing the racks at the nearby record store. Now I'm not as well versed in Prog Rock, but I do know that Roger Dean has been doing art for bands since the genre's early days. You say you don't know who Roger Dean is? Well maybe you might recognize this logo he made:

If your at all familiar with Yes, then you've seen his art. Roger Dean is the primary artists for Yes, and their entire catalog displays the progression of his artwork. They have collaborated so much together that they're trying to currently make a 3D animated film based on his art. Can't say I care to see Roger Dean's landscape in a mediocre computer-generated way. Whenever anyone forces the illustrative style into a three=dimensional CGI image, it is always terrible. But I digress.

Anyways, I'm going to focus on his art from 1970-1974. Why 1970-1974? Well because that's when he was more raw and illustrative, which I'm really into. His images are flatter and less skillful, but come off as honest and imaginative. Don't get me wrong, his later stuff is gorgeous and incredible, but I want to focus on his time before he developed the caliber of craftsmanship he has today. The other reason is because I want to show how illustrative cover art was back then, with heavy use of pen & Ink with watercolor as opposed to the overuse of Adobe Photoshop/Illustrator that we see today. I'm really into watercolor art, since it's so organic and almost chaotic. An artist can release his energy into a watercolor piece of work, and it will be captured but he medium. Anyways, If your a fan of Hard Rock/early Heavy metal, you might also recognize some of these images-

Uriah Heep:

Greensdale:

Gentle Giant:

Osibisa:

Budgie:

Yes:

Dragonmaster

2009-10-25T09:14:00.000-07:00

Back in the fall of 2005, I went over my friend's new apartment. She and I have been friends for awhile at this point, and one of our strongest bonds is over nerdy fanatasy material. Such as getting pumped about classic Dungeons & Dragons monsters and Warhammer figurines. From the moment I entered her apartment, she threw this card game called Dragonmaster in my face. She found it earlier that day at The Goodwill. I FLIPPED out. The artwork is brilliant, and I knew it seemed familiar. Then I FLIPPED out harder when I saw on the game credits that Bob Pepper did the art. This was around the time when I first started to get into his work, so stumbling across this gem was very exciting.

His style sets him apart from any other illustrator I've seen. His figures are very unique looking, somehow portraying a 1970s cartoon-esque style with darkness and depth. It's all so very detailed though, giving everyone on all of the cards their own distinct personality. His style is not using watercolors, surprisingly enough. I'll let him explain how he does it 9Taken from an interview from well-of-souls.com)-

"My technique is to cement down charcoal paper, float water into areas of the illustration, and border the area with dark gouache which spreads and settles in the warpings of the wet paper. After that dries flat, I float dyes on top to color the area. I love the whole process of illustration, but mostly the research and bringing together of many different parts to form a coherent whole design that I like. I also think that your state of mind, (what interests you) has, really, everything to do with it!"

His work is fresh and exciting, even now. He went on to create the art for a board came called Dark Tower, which has become a cult classic amongst board game enthusiasts. I've seen glimpses of his work in in fantasy art books from the 80s that continued this style, which I'm currently trying to hunt down. The following is the complete set of Dragonmaster cards. I'll categorize them by "kingdom" and specialty cards

The Druids

The Dragonlords

The Nomads

The Warriors (my personal favorite)

Specialty Cards

for more info check out http://well-of-souls.com/tower/dmaster.htm (all pictures taken from well-of-souls)

Chris Achilleos's Men-At-Arms

2009-10-24T12:11:00.000-07:00

I've never seen or heard of Chris Achilleos until a few days ago, and I'm surprised That i haven't. I stumbled across an art book of his (Sirens to be precise) at a nearby Barnes & Noble five days ago. The funny thing about This particular B&N is that they throw the fantasy art books in the Fantasy literature section, as opposed to the art book section, which is beyond me. regardless, I found it while looking for Boris Vallejo books for a good laugh. When i opened it, i was shocked to see what I saw. His work is definitely up there. Most fantasy artists have pieces with epic battles, dragons, men armed with a sword (sometimes half-naked), scantly-clad fantasy babes, and Dragons. And they're all usually for Young Adult novellas or pin-ups for comic nerds. He's no exception, but his work definitely is better than most. This post will be based on his "single dude with a weapon, possibly fighting hordes of brutes" type images.

This image made me a fan of his for numerous reasons:
1) The Quality of The Art- It has texture and that means alot to me. Most fantasy artist ruin their work by making it as shiny and glossy looking as possible (like Boris Vallejo) thus making the image annoying to look at. It has a certain roughness to it where I believe this guy is lost on the ice somewhere. You can also tell that he did a detailed drawing and just filled it in with paint, keeping the "black line" semi-intact. That's considered a "no-no" by some professionals. I think it works for what he does. I'm under the impression that Chris Achielleos probably spent a good chunk of his time in high-school drawing "Eddie" of Iron Maiden in the back of his math notebook, then when to art school for a few years** (this is more apparent in the other images I put up later in this post.) This certainly adds to the rawness of his figures. I'm also going to throw out there that this piece (and all of his other works) have that look where you can tell he was hired to make this for a publisher, unlike Frank Frazetta who is a Painter as opposed to an Illustrator that paints. Not that its bad, I find his "chunky" anatomy functional and better than people who have spent more time on the ideal anatomical form who've forgotten to add imagination (again, this is more obvious in the later images). His art would be at home on a Magic card or on any respectable metal band's record jacket (he did; unfortunately; do one for Whitesnake , but that's a later post). Then again, his work is a step above any artist who works in those spectrums. The one thing that doesn't work in his favor is that his characters come off as posing, as opposed to being in motion. Then again, most people aren't successful at that.

2) The Imagery- When I saw this, I was interested in knowing what this guy's deal is. Like, where is he going, why is he leaving that castle, who's is that old guy he's thinking of/being haunted by, etc. In my opinion, a Fantasy Artist has succeeded in making a good fantasy image if it comes off as a glimpse of this larger, fantastic world that i believe exists somewhere in my imagination. Which leads me to my last reason...

3) The Characters/Environment- The outfit this guy is wearing is awesome. Bits of 15th Century armor clad with functional leather garments that are semi-historically accurate, trudging through a icy landscape, chained for whatever reason. I can tell this guy is from somewhere, and he just escaped from the castle int he distance, in attempt to return to where he is from. He's just one in many people that fill this other world that is filled with fantastic landscapes and amazing architecture. Chris Achilleos does a great job at blending European-style armor, clothing, architecture, etc. in a more fantastic setting. Or pushing them from realistic to plausibly realistic. His work has a sense of function to it. Most of today's fantasy art is either plagued by trying to have that jagged, WETA fantasy vibe from LOTR or bad Manga-style quality to it. Whatever happened to having a Classic Medieval look?

Here's a collection of "Men-At-Arms" hero type images, to get an idea where I'm coming from-

*note- The first image at the beginning of this post is his illustration of a Nazgul from Lord Of The Rings. I think that character design schools the cloaked robed wraiths of the trilogy films by Peter Jackson. That Nazgul looks like a warrior decked out in various exotic garb from his travels haunting Middle-earth. Awesome.

** He was already a professional artist by the late 1970s, but he has that attitude in his work.

Ian Miller's contribution to "Wizards"

2009-10-23T11:34:00.000-07:00

As far as fantastic, other worldly landscapes go, few come close to touching Ian Miller. Granted- his work is more abstract than most, but that's what makes it truly remarkable. I love images of misty mountain-tops with dueling wizards as much as anyone, but The worlds he illustrates (or scratches out) is dense. This "density" is brought about by images of ruined man-made city-scapes, deteriorating castles, and colossal industrial machines. It's no wonder why Ralph Bakshi wanted him to illustrate the backgrounds in his 1977 animated classic Wizards

Above is the establishing shot of Scortch, which is a desolate wasteland that is a remainder of the war that destroyed the world 300,000 years prior to the story. If you've never seen Wizards, you've been missing out. The basic plot is about how humanity destroyed itself during a big nuclear war, and basically no one lived. Those who did were usually mutants or some other type of monster. Over the course of thousands of years, fairies, elves, and other related fantasy character type emerged and magic came back to common use (because it was apparently forgotten due to us worshiping technology). Then this queen of sorts gave birth to a set of magical twins. One was completely good (Avatar), and one was completely evil (Blackwolf). The movie is about Blackwolf trying to eliminate magic peace from the world through the use of technology, black magic, reanimated evil knights summoned from hell, and armies of mutants from his realm of Scortch.

The above image is Blackwolf and Avatar standing in Blackwolf's castle before their final showdown. Witht he use of silhouetted objects in the foreground, it encapsulates Avatar and also makes you feel somewhat claustrophobic. This image gives you a good idea of what Ian Miller's work is like in the film. It has this crowded but colossal architecture that feels like it's the product of another time. Much like this screen grab, many of of the images of Scortch are of parts of massive castle-like structures that you never see the whole structure, only parts. Even from shots of the distance, the Castles are part of the overall landscape, blending in with more layers of jagged architecture. The Castles have this look that they are in the beginning stages of degradation. Example-

Although most of the backgrounds he's done are super complex, he's also done his share of rough line sketches for backgrounds. Usually for the more "organic" but eeire tone that is Scortch outside of Blackwolf's castles and surrounding city. Maybe it was done for budget reasons or time reasons, but whatever the reason, it feels more desolate and cold. The two images above are rough drawings he did for the production. Below is a collection of the rough, freehand work for the final film (note that the establishing show of Scortch is of this style)

These are screen shots i took, so I did my best to capture a frame with as little animated characters on it as possible. Some of the screen shots are just covered with them, but you can still see the backgrounds pretty well. I'm gonna post the rest of the backgrounds i grabbed for you to look over. I strongly encourage to to look deep into them. They're all very complete and thick. You can honestly loose yourself in them. Side Note- The first image on this post and the image following this paragraph (The red Castle) is my favorite establishing shot in any animated film, ever. It's also one of my favorite illustrations ever. I'm not kidding.

On an trained animator note- In a couple of scenes, Ian Miller's illustrations are used as layered background to show movement (moving foreground element, or a panning mid-ground element) which really add a whole new level. take this image for instance (spoiler!) The background is a flat image, but after Blackwolf is killed, this happens- The flat background is cut into seperate pieces, with a mid-ground and foreground shaking back-and-forth, while the background gets saturated with color to amply the action that just happened. Ralph Bakshi is a skilled director, i don't care what anyone says. Wizards is one rare Independent animated film from America that aimed to be artistic in it's own way and not follow the standards held by the Disney school of animation. Yeah, it was made on no budget and they characters break their model all the time, but at least it's honest and unique. Something those other studios seemed to have lost a looooong time ago. ALSO- These images lost some quality (and size) when i converted them from bmp to jpeg, so if you want any of these at a high-resolution, send me an e-mail and i will gladly send you them

The Repairmen

2009-10-22T08:25:00.000-07:00

Over the years, the work of Moebius; or Jean Giraud; has always avoided me, not because I was oblivious to the fact about his brilliance, but because his work is IMPOSSIBLE to find. Everything published in North America is looooong out of print, and the sellers on ebay know this. Sorry, but I don't feel like throwing down $15 that I don't have on "worn" Heavy Metal no. 8.

Thanks to the Internet, some hero posted on a torrent file hosting site the near complete works of Moebius' domestic publications. I flipped out. Finally I was going to be able to dive head first into his narrative work.

Moebius Vol. 1 (of 9, and three related releases) published by Epic Comics in 1987. This is a fantastic release, because not only does it contain the building blocks of "Moebius-verse", but because he had a hand in every aspect of these releases (translation, coloring, editing, etc.)

The opening story is titled The Repairmen, which establishes the two main characters of his arching "Aedena Cycle" that permeates all of his multi-verse. The rundown of The Repairmen is about two mechanics (Atan and Stel, these characters are important to later works) who go to some alien world (the planet Styrinx) where the only beings are these gigantic, hovering car-androids (called Waymasters) that are in a constant state of racing. They're job is to fix up one of the Waymasters so he can continue racing. That plot alone makes me lean back in my chair and ponder what kind of universe these characters live in. Seriously, with that simple premise alone, Moebius has created a surreal, dream-like world that comes off as being filled with planets, creatures, characters, etc that I don't think he even thought about until later. Thats just the written plot. Check out this composition-
Look at how the Waymaster is illustrated. It's the perfect progression of 60's psychedelic art, but used in a narrative context and updated to a more modern (er, 1970s/1980s) contemporary styling. And the use of complementary colors, with different hues of orange to vary from red to brown. This gives you a good idea of Moebius's "layered" style (for lack of a better term). By "layered" I mean he draws overlapping shapes of repeated (sometimes similar) forms to create depth and texture. It's so thick, but organic. But enough on form, check out the last panel that shows you the Waymaster's homeworld-

Again, note the colors. Through reading most of Moebius's work, it's apparent that he's a master of color. He uses it to highlight the characters, to direct the eyes to the action, or to create the sense of space and environment. The above image is slim pickins compared to his other stuff, but fuck man, i just want to know what is going on in his head. His conceptual art is definitely beyond the realm of what could be real (hence why i said dream-like) but he makes it believeable. You don't question what is presented in front of you, it's just accepted.

I'm going to post the complete story of The Repairmen so you can have a good idea of what Moebius is about. If the following doesn't provoke any sense of imagination or leave anykind of artistic impression, then your a square and should go back to reading Archie comics

Epic graphic novels: Moebius vol. 1 Upon A Star. Art and Story Copyright 1983 Moebius. Translation & Text copyright Starwatcher Graphics. All rights reserved

Bob Pepper Introduction

2009-10-21T21:13:00.000-07:00

If you partake in embracing anything psychedelic related, there’s a good chance that you’ve seen the work of Bob Pepper. Most known for his album art for Love’s classic “Forever Changes”*, His art has appeared here and there over the course of the 70s and 80s. For the literary world, he’s mostly known for his work with Lin Carter’s “Adult Fantasy” series on Ballastine Books and for doing covers for Philip K. Dick in the 1970s.

I’m currently tracking down as much of his work as possible. Funny enough, more and more blogs are keeping is work alive, by posting this art. To be honest, this is where I get most of my images from. If anything, I’m re-posting what they put up to spread the word about him. Expect to see me post about him frequently. Enjoy

Fantasy Book Covers-

Sci-Fi/Psychedelic Book Covers-

*note- If you've never listened to Love, but are into 60s pop/psychedelic/garage music, then you have to check out Forever Changes. And while your at it, get Nuggets vol. 1.

Frank Frazetta does Middle-Earth

2009-10-21T21:05:00.001-07:00

Frank Frazetta is my favorite fantasy artist. No, seriously. When I see any kind of art related to fantasy spectrum of things (card games, book covers, rpg, etc) I rate it next to a Frazetta. As far as I'm concerned, he invented modern fantasy art, thus sets the standard. I'm not going to ramble about him this time, this post is only to display some Pen & Ink art I found of his based on characters and scenarios from Lord of The Rings. Even in his clean line drafts, his inertia is still there, showing the constant energy of toned organic bodies amongst hard steel. You know exactly what is going on in the minds of all of characters in every piece of art he's ever done.

There is still a sense of rawness in these, which keeps it from being too clean and "safe". Yes, safe. His art is NOT safe. All of his work is raw and has a threatening texture to it. It's gritty and violent, but it is portrayed exquisitely. But now I'm ranting. I'll save that for a future post. Anyways, check out these drawings. The bottom drawing of Gandalf The Grey is thee best image of the character. Step aside, John Howe. (FYI- I have high respect for John Howe, and enjoy his work Immensely, but Frank Frazetta is King)

Simply Brilliant