Really Old Old-School Artist: Harry Clarke

In pulling together today's images from illustrator Harry Clarke, I thought to myself, "Damn! I never realized how much Russ Nicholson's work reminded me of Harry Clarke's." And well it ought to. Nicholson remarked in a 2009 interview at Sci-Fi-O-Rama, "...my gods were such as Aubrey Beardsley, Harry Clarke, Edmund Dulac and Sydney Sime." Yup. I can TOTALLY see that. I think that's one of the reason I dig Nicholson's work so much.

I've featured Dulac here before, though the pieces I showcased were limited. I've never showcased Beardsley here, though I've mentioned his name several times, and his Merlin illustration graces the title page of the d30 DM Companion. Syndey Sime is someone I've been considering showcasing here, particularly his work for The Gods Of Pegana by Lord Dunsany's, with whom Sime had a long-standing partnership. But I digress.

Like a lot of the illustrators I've mentioned here before are from the "golden age of illustration" (approximately 1880-1920), Clarke was influenced by Art Nouveau. His father was a craftsman, and at that time, his profession was experiencing a rebirth with the Arts & Crafts movement (a reaction to the "cheap and nasty" mass produced goods of the Industrial Revolution), leading into Art Nouveau. That actually puts Harry Clarke a slight generation behind Aubrey Beardsley; Beardsley's influence on Clarke is obvious; but then, Beardsley was one of those guys that influenced a generation of folks. But again, I digress.

These first four are taken from the 1923 edition of Poe's Tales of Mystery and Imagination.




The one below left is from The Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault,
and the one on the right is from Years at the Spring.



These final two are taken from an edition of Goethe's Faust.



Now, partially because you'll see the influence,
but mostly because I love his work, go check out Russ Nicholson's blog.

New Illustrations

There used to be a time on this blog when I would do a new illustration every week (the post was creatively titled "Illustration of the Week.") Then, when I started doing a Monster of the Week (or "MOW"), I sort of combined the two endeavors into a single post, especially since each monster is illustrated by me to accompany the listing. (If you take a look at the labels on the MOW posts, you'll see that "original art" is part of every one.) That being said, sometimes I felt like I was rushed to create the illustration, or did an inferior job inking it, or whatever. And now that the Creature Compendium is numbering over 70 pages (and almost 170 monsters), there are some illustrations that have become real stand-outs to me (the good kind), and others that just feel damn inferior. So I'm re-doing some of them.

Yesterday, I had a couple of opportunities to re-work a couple of them. The first one I re-did was the monster pictured below (a "kala" - an elemental-like disease spirit, originally posted back in April as part of the A-to-Z Blogging Challenge). The new one (below right) is based loosely on a nice public domain pulp image I found, and the new drawing was quick and fun, and works TONS better than the original (below left.) The other image I re-did was the jenglot (also posted on this blog back in April as part of the A-to-Z Blogging Challenge, and picture top right.) The more I looked at that piece of crap illustration, the more it bugged me. To get started, I whipped out a new sketch (above right, below the original Jenglot drawing). Also, something I've been wanting to do for a long time, is a sort of Russ Nicholson inspired inkjob. Usually, I don't have the patience for this sort of intensive inking, but when you're watching the numbers slowly roll in all night for the election, you suddenly find yourself with that time. I think the new illustration (top left) is infinitely better.

Another Really Old Old-School Artist

In my Really Old School Artist post from back in November, I discussed the work of John D. Batten and how I discovered Batten's work while trolling Wikimedia Commons to find images for use in the layout of The System. Such is also the case with the work of Willy Pogany.

Hungarian-born Pogany (1882-1955) made his way to America via Paris and London. Being in those locales (Paris and London) at that time (just after the turn of the century), it seems only natural that Art Nouveau found it's influence on Pogany, especially since much of the most interesting work in book publishing at the time was coming out of the Private Press Movement. Another great thing about the Private Press Movement (from the RPGer's perspective) is that much of the subject matter was fantastic in nature, including mythology, fairy and folk tales, and the beginnings of what we now know as fantasy literature. (See my post How the Industrial Revolution Inspired the Original Fantasy Game: A Brief Timeline for a bit more info about this.)

With Pogany, like Batten, the works they created do not feel out-of-place at all in the context of an OSR milieu. In looking at the work below, I'm struck by the resemblance of the work of both Russ Nicholson and Jeff Dee. I'm not claiming the similarities are intentional. As an artist, I know that techniques are techniques, and personal style is something that is truly amalgamated from the artists who've inspired and influenced you. (See my Favorite Artists post for a bit more info on this one.)

So, without further ado, please enjoy these selections from The Children of Odin and The Adventure of Odysseus, both by Padraic Colum (The Macmillan Company), as well one other image that I can't quite source (the one of the beggar that looks like a Russ Nicholson drawing.)

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EDITOR'S CORRECTION:
In my original version of this post,
the image at left was credited to
Willy Pogany but, in fact, it was done
by Lorenz Frølich.

These Are a Few of My Favorite... Artists! (OSR, of course)

In no particular order...

Russ Nicholson
Loved Russ's stuff in the Fiend Folio, but really started digging his work when I read the book Dicing With Dragons and the Fighting Fantasy game books.

Erol Otus
If there's one artist who typifies old-school art to me, it's E.O. To this day, the AD&D Monster Cards are one of my favorite items in my RPG collection. And just in time for Christmas, the old-school game box adorned with Erol Otus art.

Dave Trampier
It wasn't Wormy that did it for me. (I actually felt like the Wormy strip, while interesting, was space in Dragon that could be used for other stuff more applicable to my gaming; no offense.) It was images like the mouth in the dungeon wall, or the cover of the PHB. Now, he's a 12th level Cabbie. (Does anyone know the prime requisites for that class?)

Jeff Dee
The reason I started playing V&V was because of all those great little ads in Dragon feature J.D.'s art and characters stats. It's an atrocity that TSR threw most of Dee's early D&D work in the trash. But if you're interested, Jeff has already more than doubled his kickstarter goal of $2,500 to recreate the Egyptian Art from Deities & Demigods. And he's got 9 days left to go!

Alan Hunter
Alan's work is an acquired taste. That's probably why he is one of the lesser known names, but I guarantee you remember his work. He's the guy behind the Crabmen, Dire Corby and Hook Horror illustrations from the Fiend Folio. (Please don't hold the actual concepts and content of the FF against Alan. He didn't create the monsters. He just drew them.)

Dave Billman
Billman's another one you might not know as well. He was the guy behind most of the Lords of Creation art from Avalon Hill. Like James over at Grognardia, I regret never playing the game. Billman still does illustration, but in a more commercial/popular children's vein, but also has a full time in-house graphic design gig.

NOTE: I had a really hard time deciding which piece of art to showcase at the top of this page. Out of respect for all of the folks mentioned in this post, this is my first blog post (since I started the page) with no graphic at all.