Dark Horizons: The Spirit of '76.

A short post as I'm fairly busy doing other stuff from drawing to sorting taxes.
Had three deliveries this past 'week'. All which deserve mentioning for their excellent production values.
First to arrive were copies of Le Grimoire's latest, Loup Solitaire - Les Heros du Magnamund. http://www.legrimoire.net/store/fr/loup-solitaire-rpg/161-loup-solitaire-les-heros-du-magnamund.html
 Nice production, with nice art throughout and which also includes has some pieces of my work, which I've posted about in an earlier blog. 

Next to arrive was a copy of Monster Island [Runequest] from The Design Mechanism, again a lovely job which also features some of my stuff, again which was shown in an earlier blog post.http://www.thedesignmechanism.com/products.php#!/~/product/category=5186110&id=25252033

You might think, here I am promoting stuff I'm in, well the last, but by no means the least, features none of my work, but [grin] I am mentioned. 

This is The Art of Sean Philips, a copy of which Sean kindly sent to me. When it arrived the postman was concerned my wrists could hold the parcel, luckily I could.  
http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Art-Sean-Phillips-HC/dp/1606904205
I'm not going to go into it here, but Sean was one on my early art students whom I taught at school, and whom I tried to encourage and support his obvious art talent back in the late 70's. For those who recognise the name you'll realise he has since become one of the top comic artists with a vast following around the world. Over the years I've followed, off and on, his career with interest. The book itself covers his art with loving detail, from its early beginning to the present day, and again is a very good production. 

Now, why the blog title you might be asking yourself? Or not [lol].  

Well 1975 and 1976 were not a good years for me for many reasons, but it did result in me changing tack with my illustration, and applying and being accept in 1976 for a PGCE teaching course. The change in tack in regard to my art was to develop even more my more personal fantasy work and one of my sources for showing this work was The British Fantasy Society's house organ Dark Horizons in 1976 and on. 

But, enough yammering, so, before we go any further, let's look at some art pieces. The first is not from Dark Horizons but from a comic fanzine produced in 1979.

This particular picture sort of developed out of my work on a proposed comic strip panel for White Dwarf magazine, but it never saw the light of day as I assume, my art and my love of bad puns etc., was not the right flavour wanted. They never did say... it was just silence. Silence can be dire [laugh, or should that be gibber?]. 

Now what brought about this re-look at Dark Horizons well the magazines were recently on sale on eBay and even mentioned my name but had no takers, but it made me think I've lost contact with much of those originals but have the magazines so why not use as my next post, and so here we are. I've tried to keep the image posting in sequence and the first few come from Dark Horizons #12 [dated Winter 1975]. There will be no real commentary [hooray you cry!] unless I feel it is needed.

... and so into 1976.

The next three pictures relate to a story I was asked to illustrate, which was a comic spoof.

The next was for a story by the writer Adrian Cole, who, if memory serves, contacted me afterwards to purchase the original drawing. He was shocked I think by what I asked, but, although I'd sold paintings and prints in the past this was, I think, my first Fantasy/SF sale. 

and thus we come to the end of '76...

So what's new? Quite a bit, several commissions, but unfortunately I'm not allowed to post that work yet. But I did do a study for Jason Lenox's latest B/W comic production [hope I have that right]. http://www.jasonlenox.com/online-store/

  

 Also, do look out, soon, for John Whitbourn's new book 'The Two Confessions' with my cover art.

 Did I say a 'short' post? Till the next time  ... errors are a creepin'; need to eat [grin].