Quick post as I head out to Norwescon this weekend. Norwescon has one of the largest juried imaginative art shows (fantasy and science fiction) in the US. This will be my 3rd time in the show. It’s fun to attend this as a graphic novel author-illustrator because there’s a significant literary component and a focus on creators, rather than big brands like you might find at San Diego Comicon. They also invite historians and scientists, so there’s new and fascinating things to learn from as well. Some fun activities include a book cover challenge, where 4 artist work on a book cover without seeing how others interpret it, and Pictionary played between teams of artists and scientists. There’s a lot about world building and authors reading their works.
The guest artist is Charles Vess who has a long history of making beautiful fantasy nature illustrations. There’s a lot of beautiful movement in his compositions. I’m looking forward to meeting him at the Art Reception on opening night. His website is here.
Here’s one of his works found at Character Design References:
Here are some additional time-lapses of one of the oil paintings I’m bringing to the convention. Great horned owls are such beautiful birds. It’s called Everything by Electricity, and it refers to Captain Nemo’s passion for driving everything in his ship by electricity.
This second step adds color with transparent paints. This is one of my favorite steps. It takes several layers to bring in richer colors.
I’ll also be bringing 30 prints. I’ll be at the show Thursday and Friday but the art will be up through Sunday. On Saturday I hope to be at Graphite Edmonds in the afternoon when it’s open to the public.
In my next newsletter, I’ll share some of my adventures going on an “Owl Prowl” and this is what I’m working on now.