[Cover Art Post] Pandemonium Books: Lost Souls & Crossroads

I have been a tremendous fan of the Pandemonium Books series, since my friends Jared Shurin and Anne C. Perry decided to take a stab at the publication business. Kudos to them as they have succeeded in doing what a lot of small presses have not right from the get-go and that is create quality products. Their first titles include stories by a number of writers I know and respect, which on itself is rather impressive as you can see how much trust and mutual respect goes around and comes around. 

However, what I find highly impressive is that this editor duo make no compromise with the quality of their anthologies and this can be seen in the newest titles, which are now available for purchase. 

"Lost Souls"

"Crossroads"

[December 18th] Art based on American Gods

In January, I did a  post about art based on books, the example being One Flight over A Cuckoo's Nest and I have been thinking about how different mediums can recreate a single work of art, which in this case is a book, through the whole year. I like the idea of connectivity between arts; how books can inspire art can inspire music can inspire film can inspire sculptures. Above all, I have been meaning to find more fantastic art that recreates a popular book. This time I have struck gold with Neil Gaiman's "American Gods".

The novel itself is extremely visual and well suited for the following illustrations below. What novels would you like to see represented with art such as this? 

[December 1st] Sad Kraken is Sad and Lonely

Nothing to report as of it. December has come. Christmas is being dragged from its grave once again, too early, and I'm in an introspective mood. I'm quilting my thoughts together on a few things and waiting on an announcement, which should be due already. In the mean time, enjoy the image of a Kraken above.

[November 27th] Julianne Moore & The Succession in Art

The story I’m writing at the moment [titled “Blinding”] incorporates Bulgarian folklore, lore and fables. It’s echoing the path “Fables” and Neil Gaiman’s “American Gods” in terms of transplanting characters from their plane of existence and their endings into our current state of reality. Considering that the inclusion of mythical beasts is a popular practice in the genre of Urban Fantasy as it is, I don’t consider breaking new horizons, other than contributing to the expanding story pull. 

The act of writing “Blinding” has me thinking about succession in art and the establishing of a permanent continuity that feeds the collective memory to newer generation through different retellings. “Fables” reintroduces fairy tales to children, who prefer comic books to regular old books and “American Gods” has peaked my curiosity as to the different deities, other than the Greek or Norse ones. Succession in art is common. 

The 80’s synth beats are reliving their glory days in nouveau electronic, pardon my French and the style of the 1950’s [which has influenced visual arts heavily] sneaks in movies, music and an eternal pin-up movement. Which brings me to Julianne Moore, Harper’s Bazaar and a very couture incorporation of famous paintings. Julianne Moore’s photo session has her adopt poses and style of some of the most breath-taking paintings in the last century, along with new creations. I've expected nothing else from Julianne Moore, who is a style icon in the celebrity circles. This concept photo shoot is quite exciting as it shows these memorable works in a completely new medium, which is far from the remakes that we see.

“Adele Bloch-Bauer I” – 1907 – Gustav Klimt 

“The Cripple” – 1997 – John Curring 

“Man Crazy Nurse #3” – 2003 – Richard Prince 

“Seated Woman with Bent Knee” – 1917 – Egon Schiel 

“Madame X” – 1884 – John Singer Sargent 

What do you think about succession in art?

[November 25th] The Art of Exit Man

It's been a long day and I have been to the book launch of "The Act of Walking on Water" by Bulgarian author Angel Angelov. It was a wonderful hour and a half affair with chatting, wine and speeches devoted to the man of the hour, Mister Angelov. The wine has gone to my head, which is why I will be writing a complete report in the morning. 

In the mean time, I've been meaning to bring your mind to the art of Exit Man. He's from Spain or at the very least a Spanish speaking country, judging by his website, which I can't seem to effectively navigate. This type of art I most commonly associate with skaters as it appears on a lot of their T-shirts. It's pretty breathtaking with its psychedelic choice of colors, though I have picked the least colorful pieces of art. 

The peculiar thing about this art direction is that I see it on all the power boxes in my city. There is a real urban movement in Varna to go around and paint over all power boxes out in the street, which would be real dangerous to touch. I have to bring in some amateur photos of these sites. 

In the mean time, enjoy. Also, tell me what is the art that has you interested? 

Art based on Books, I want more of it

I’m still more or less incognito, but I do have some small snippets to sneak a few hundred or so words on my blog. I think that Friday shall be Character Discussion day with me not really discussing, but I shall be providing outsider insight on the matter. Lovely now, isn’t it? Today I have something special. See that image below?

This is art inspired by One Flew over a Cuckoo’s Nest. Impressive, isn’t it? Personally, I’ve not read the novel nor do I have any idea what’s it about [it was in the commentary under the image that I learned it involved an antagonist nurse]. This novel along with many others to be frank bring instant recognition, when I hear their titles, because I’ve grown up hearing their titles thrown into conversations – I think One Flew over a Cuckoo’s Nest is even the name of a late talk show in Bulgaria, but that was renamed, so I maybe fabricating memories. But as it happens, I know nothing about them.

Really though, I will talk about this on my review blog in further detail. What I wanted to talk about is how artists interpret books in their artwork. This is what I’d love to see more:

• Artists rendering new covers to older books
• Artists reworking bestsellers’ covers in various styles. The same way last year’s Oscar nominees received alternative posters.
• More dynamic pieces based on books rather than character development sheets [this is more of a phenomenon, when dealing with graphic novels and comics, but I think that if what I want catches up, then there would be a lot of character stills].

This is really it, really. What do you have to say about the relationship between literature and art?

Something for the Creative Mind

I did say that I was away for the time being and that is essentially so. I have been, however, doing my best to gather materials and you know talk about writing [basically the whole purpose of my wee little blog]. In the mean time, feed your creative energy with some Vintage Japanese Political Posters. Via Pink Tentacle.

[Character Development] Baba Yaga/Wicked Witch of the East

While I've completed "Hurricane Drunk", the darkest and moodiest piece I've ever written, I am still in the throws of creative passion [after edits are due now that the computer is back online]. This is why I'll post the creative history of my witch, the main antagonist and evil beyond salvation, though to be honest she does display affection in the cruelest and sickest of way so as to not give the readers a cardboard representation of EVIL.

In the seed that spawned "Hurricane Drunk" in its dark, gruesome glory, there was no other character. My 'Dorothy' was alone and stuck in a house, which was forever trapped in the arms of a magic hurricane. Eh, so at random I decided to insert random images in the house to see what may happen [I was bored, in class and that story was not even a priority]. What I initially inserted was a witch like this:

"Riding High" by Gil Elvgren

NOT exactly as sexually charged, but I wanted a beautiful witch, who could seduce and at the same time appear wholesome [kinda like the Girl Next Door of Witchcraft]. Of course, I imagined the witch seduce a man in front of my Dorothy. For the witch, the man is nothing more than spell ingredients and the other white meat, to young Ukrainian-Dorothy it's one of her first associations with the word family.

Cannibalism came later. The witch, at that particular moment, seemed good. She lived a life that spelled mystery, but still I could give her motivation or something worth writing about. I do not write good people, so I resorted to creating an evil witch.

Since I had created a version of Dorothy, I felt that I could borrow a bit more and write an incarnation of the Wicked Witch of the East, because of those ruby red slippers. I only took the slippers and did not bother much with the actual character, for I had no idea what role in the Oz universe she played and how I could twist it [which is why I don't have an image of her] in my favor. So, I had an evil witch. This is better, because now she'd have to keep all her horrifying doings secret. Fertile for tension, but still nothing in mind. How did Dorothy get to the witch, etc, etc.

Parallel this brewing process, I was inspired by Theresa Bazelli's work on her novella, Two Sisters, which is currently serialized at Serial Central. She decided to go obscure and used myths and legends from Slavic folklore [my folklore], which made me look at my stories [all oozing Ancient Greek vibes] and crave to involve a Slavic figure in my stories.

Wham, the two ideas merged and my sexy witch, semi-involved Wicked Witch of the East morphed along with Baba Yaga the most notorious witch in my folklore. Like witches from old stories like Hansel and Gretel, Baba Yaga enjoys kidnapping children and doom pretty much everyone else:

"Baba Yaga" by Markus The Barbarian

But I am sure there is a story behind this one:

"Baba Yaga" by Waldemar-Kazak

Subsequently, Dorothy's cottage became Baba Yaga's Hut with big chicken legs, while the story became a coming-of-age discovery of evil and accepting the wickedness inside.

"Baba Yaga's Hut" by Yoitisl

Dorothy of Oz

While I am still enjoying the passionate throws of writing my possibly darkest short story yet and not pulling punches I decided to show you what my Ukrainian version of Dorothy came to be with some images I have found on the web. At first I wanted to write something with a sexy Dorothy in the style of J. Scott Campbell [did not feature this because it is group illustration], who has done some very sexually charged images for Zenescope comics. I work very well with striking visuals and Dorothy as a Vixen came to me as striking. Something like this:

Art by WakenTheDead

BUT then I realized that apart from being a sexual object, that Dorothy had no story to tell and I did want something dark [like my own Red Riding Hood with a chainsaw] so somehow that morphed into a hard-core Dorothy much like this:

Art by Kennon9

There is a story behind that image, no? I have to say that I thought of making her a bit like Storm from X-Men, but that seemed obvious. EVENTUALLY I wanted Dorothy to be strong, but not physically. Physical strength and force does not make a character strong. I have advocated that over and over [the standard Urban Fantasy heroine has me rabies-ridden], so it did not make sense to make my Dorothy a bred warrior. My Dorothy is a captive. She is in the position of a victim, of which she gradually becomes aware and does her best to liberate herself. She is an innocent, forced into doing some horrible things simply because of her situation. Pretty much like this:

Art by Emilia Paw

This picture carries a very American McGee's Alice in Wonderland vibe. It is dark. Dorothy is shown as the victor of a battle, yet she is vulnerable. You wonder what made this girl kill and you sense that the story will be uncomfortable and saddening.