Michael Whelan does Elric of Melniboné

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.

Chris Achilleos's Men-At-Arms

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.

Bob Pepper Introduction

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.