"This day's experience, set in order, none of it left ragged or lying about, all of it gathered in like treasure and finished with, set aside." –Alice Munro, "What is Remembered"
Promotional film for Andy Partridge’s album, Powers: 12 Sound Pieces Inspired by the Art of Richard M. Powers, which was released on Partridge’s Apehouse label in early 2010, was available as a limited-edition CD, and is available now only as a digital download:
Designed to look like a worn SF pulp paperback, the cover of the limited-edition CD incorporates a painting by former XTC front-man Andy Partridge intended as an homage to the classic Powers style:
Click the crone to view the images by Bernie Wrightson published in The Monsters: Color-the-Creature Book (1974), which was featured just before Halloween at the ComiCrazys blog:
Scanned within the past hour by yours truly from a worn copy of Weird Mystery Tales #16 (Feb.-Mar. 1975), and posted here at RCN a few of days too late to celebrate Halloween, “Neely’s Scarecrow” features a “story” by David Michelinie and art by the great Alex Nino:
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It’s the art that’s the sole attraction here. Nino’s visual storytelling is impeccable.
Well… in all fairness, the two paintings posted below are different enough that I probably should have tossed this post into the “Connections” category. And you know what? I think I might have done so, if only Boas’s style here weren’t every bit as derivative as his concept…
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Marcus Boas’s debt to Frazetta in the above painting is clear enough, I think; however, in terms of painting technique, colour sense, and model types, Boas owes an even bigger debt to Boris Vallejo circa 1980. Because the fact is, Boas’s Heroic Fantasy painting is pure pastiche. It has nothing original about it other than the poorly designed creatures whose misshapen wings are attached to their bodies by wishful thinking rather than by anatomy and the inevitable awkwardness that seems to emerge whenever a mediocre illustrator attempts to make changes to a composition he has cribbed from an acknowledged master.
BONUS IMAGES:
Two covers by Boris Vallejo, scanned from the paperback library of yours truly:
As I recall, Boris’s un-Frazetta-like cover for Demon in the Mirror made a big impression on me as a teenager, and truth be told, it remains one of a handful of Boris’s covers that I quite like. In recent years, Boris has unfortunately transformed his fantasy art into a platform to indulge what can only be described as a personal fetish for the bodybuilder physique, both male and female. Notice, however, that no bodybuilders were recruited to pose and flex for either of the above covers — thank god!
Yesterday, I won an ebay auction for 12 items with art by Jeffrey Jones, some of which I already own, but the majority of which I don’t. Here’s the list that was provided by the seller, followed by the auction images (although, of course, I intend to post better scans once I have the items in hand):
8 paperback books with Jeffrey Jones cover paintings
The Planet Wizard by John Jakes
Day of Beasts by John Muller
The Dirdir by Jack Vance
Swords in the Mist by Fritz Leiber
Dark Planet by Hunter
Uncharted Stars by Andre Norton
Sargasso of Space by Andre Norton
Nine Princes in Amber by Roger ZelaznyThe paperbacks vary in condition. Most are decent. Some have surface wear, and corner bumps. [….]
The two tabloid issues of ART SHOW from 1977 and 1978. #1 has Jones art inside and #2 has the DARK MANSION OF FORBIDDEN LOVE cover printed from the original art. This is what the painting actually looks like. The color was added photographically for the printed comic book.
Jeff Jones postcard from a privately printed set from around 1974 which included Frank Frazetta, STEVE HARPER, Mike Nally, and Norman Lindsay.
COLOUR YOUR DREAMS — with Jones covers and one image inside. Also inside are drawings by Kaluta, Wrightson (a very early Frankenstein piece), Barry Smith, Fujitake, Dave Cochrum, Roy Krenkel, and others. Nice portfolio — 32 pages. Published in 1972.
YOU NEED NOT BOTHER CLICKING THE IMAGES BELOW;
THEY’RE ALREADY DISPLAYED AT FULL SIZE.
WHAT YOU SEE IS WHAT YOU GET.
Regular visitors to RCN may recall that I already own and have posted scans of four out of eight of the paperbacks pictured above; the other four, however, will be new to this site, assuming they are in good enough condition to produce a decent scan. But that being said, the main reason I bid on the lot is to get the postcard, the two issues of Art Show, and the Colour Your Dreams portfolio publication.
All of which is to say: Jones fans, you have something to look forward to here at RCN in a couple of weeks!
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The lesson here: if you’re fleeing from danger, or just out taking the air, alone, on the verge of a dangerous precipice, and you’re wearing a dress, you’re going to have to hike it up in front with your hands to avoid tripping headlong into the clutches of an insistent lover or over the brink. Women already know this; men, not so much.
A handful of photographs and preparatory sketches are all that is left of Klimt’s controversial “Faculty Paintings.” All three — Philosophy (1900), Medicine (1901), and Jurisprudence (1903) — were destroyed in May 1945 when the retreating Nazis, who had illegally seized Klimt’s paintings from their legitimate owners, set fire to Schloss Immendorf, a castle in Lower Austria to which the paintings had been transported in 1943 for safe keeping.
P.S. The reason I’ve included the photo of Jurisprudence is simply to complete Klimt’s triptych for those who haven’t seen it. It’s not because I think it had a particular influence on the paintings by Jones included above.
P.P.S. Yes, I am aware that there are several other Klimt-inspired paintings by Jones. Maybe another time…
From Boris Karloff: Tales of Mystery #21, here — more for the sake of historical interest than for its intrinsic merit, which is slight — is “The Screaming Skull,” with art by Jeffrey Jones:
Published in March 1968, “The Screaming Skull” must have been among the first freelance jobs that Jeffrey Jones landed after he moved, with his wife and daughter, to New York in the winter of 1967 to look for work as an artist, and frankly, Jones’s inexperience shows. But keep in mind…
“Beginnings are always messy” — John Galsworthy
“There are two mistakes one can make along the road to truth — not going all the way, and not starting.” — Gautama Buddha
Back in 2009, art collector and big-time Jeffrey Jones fan, Rob Pistella, generously invited me to use scans from his Comic Art Fans gallery on RCN. The first item I highlighted was a letter by Jeffrey Jones dated 7-20-73. The second is right here:
What’s interesting to me about the above comparison is how much of John Buscema’s original composition for the cover of Conan the Barbarian #150 was cropped out of the printed version, presumably either by editor Larry Hama or by editor-in-chief Jim Shooter. Maybe if Buscema hadn’t shown Conan chopping a guy through the throat with his sword, the editors would have published it uncut. Maybe.
The only issues of Conan that I have ever searched through dusty back-issue boxes to find and add to my collection were issues in which Barry Smith inked Barry Smith, John Buscema inked John Buscema or Gil Kane inked Gil Kane. The unpublished cover of Conan the Barbarian #150 looks like pure John Buscema to me.
Bonus Video:
Here’s a youtube video that includes footage of John Buscema pencilling and then inking a pin-up of Captain America along with footage of Bill Sienkiewicz creating a quick portrait Electra with marker, brush and ink, and white-out:
Ragged Claws Network 