What Gets Preserved?
The library of Alexandria was the largest and most comprehensive repository of knowledge in the ancient world. In 46 AD (according to some sources) it burned. Countless scrolls went up in flames, in some cases […]
Weeaboos of the Renaissance
Weeaboos? Weeaboos? If you don’t know what a weeaboo is, you probably aren’t one. If you’d rather be quite sure, visit this link and play weeaboo bingo with yourself! The checklist to the right is […]
Great Science Fiction Artists – John Schoenherr
When I was young I purchased most books and magazines in the science fiction field based on their covers. Nowadays that still applies, though much less so since I now know what to look for […]
Sequential Wednesdays #15 – A Brawling Youth & His Magical Wardrobe
“Read the book. Help the people. You already know what to do…slay the monsters.” Paul Pope is a comic creator who has essentially calcified the notion of first-look recognition. His art of splashing squalor threatens […]
Interview: Milivoj Ćeran, Fantasy Illustrator
“Hello, My name is Milivoj Ćeran, I live in Zagreb, Croatia. I’m a professional illustrator specialized in fanastic art.” Q: What made you want to be a fantasy illustrator? A: “That idea was in my […]
The Artful Collector: Handling Difficult People Part 2: The Collector (or) Why I Can’t Sell Art to You
Do you think artists have a monopoly on “crazy”? Heh. You ain’t seen nothin, till you’ve had to handle the people who buy SF/F art. Not for nothin’ do corporations send employees for special training […]
Superhero Portraits, Making Sense of Senseless Destruction and Becca’s Bombshells
So it’s now summer where I am and it’s hot as… well, it’s hot. In conjunction with the sudden heat after two weeks of rain and thunderstorms I find that I cannot string two thoughts […]
Liftoff Scratched for SF Authors Stamps
The countdown has been halted for issuing U.S. stamps honoring science fiction authors, which initially was set for July. According to Linn’s Stamp News, a weekly publication devoted to all things philatelic, the U.S. Postal […]
What Traditional Publishing Can Learn From Self-publishing
One of the first things you learn as a traditionally published author is that you have very little control over a great many things about your books. Cover design, format (hard cover, trade paperback, or […]
AFTER THE CON: Derby City Comic Con 2013 Report
Louisville, Kentucky has grown by leaps and bounds when it comes to conventions. Just a few years ago, the only Con I was aware of in the area was Wonderfest– a great model-making convention/flea market […]
Evolution of an Otaku: Conflict of Identity
If you had asked me at the age of fourteen if I considered myself an otaku, I would have raised one snarky eyebrow at you and said, “Obviously.” And it was pretty obvious, too, what […]
IAAA Gallery: Mark A. Garlick – Cataclysmically Variable
Cataclysmic Binary stars (cataclysmic variables) are star systems in which a white dwarf star and a companion star are locked in a dance of death; matter drawn from the companion can eventually cause the white […]
The Artful Collector: Handling Difficult People Part 1: The Artist (or) Why I Couldn’t Be Your Agent
Let’s say, for the sake of this posting, that our corner of the collecting world consists of two groups: The Creators and The Collectors. Which group, do you think, has the monopoly on “crazy”? I’ll […]
Pixels and Panels #2: Online Comics
Here are two web comics that feature world-building on a grand scale.
Hits and Misses
Before the unthinkable happens and I miss my deadline for this blog post, why not do a meditation on – deadlines. There is art for every occasion. There truly is. Obviously, I am not the […]
The Artful Collector: Vulgaris Triumphus? on Judging (SFWA) Magazines by Their Cover
Judge books by their cover? Everyone does it. That’s why – and despite the mis-marketing, agenting “horror stories” (both artist and author) and egregious lack of talent (cover-wise) – books and yes, magazines, still get […]
Walk like a Zombie
Zombies are strange characters. Their current popularity is a bit of a mystery to me. I guess I’m one of the few who doesn’t “get” the attraction of the re-animated corpse. As an artist they […]
CROM THE BARBARIAN: THE FIRST TRUE S&S COMIC
Comic strips were the only game in town in the 1930s but these strips were eventually collected into omnibuses that lead to the standard comic book. Heroic Fantasy was slow to appear in the “four-color […]
IAAA Gallery: Pat Rawlings – Wide Open for Space
“Creativity exists well within structure. I thrive by having limitations to work within.” Pat Rawlings concluded his TEDxNASA presentation with those words. It is hard to imagine a better definition of the process of creating […]
The Artful Collector: On Sensitivity to Negative Reviews
How many times have we read negative reviews by (mainly) newspaper- employed critics about books or films in the science fiction/fantasy genre that either were completely off base, once we read the book, or which […]
Mechanical Men and Women
It’s one of Science Fiction’s classic tropes and has been responsible for some of the most beloved characters in the genre — robots. Robots are almost pure design personified. The whole concept of a robot […]
World Underground
Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that I recently signed myself up for a Horticulture Certificate with the Open Polytech, and have been assiduously studying the physical and chemical properties of soils […]
Great Science Fiction Artists – James Bama
James Bama single-handedly introduced the entire world to Doc Savage (he and his editors at Bantam Books and art director Len Leone). Doc Savage, as most of you know, was the greatest of the pulp […]
The Artful Collector: Collecting Ahead of the Curve
When we started framing F/SF calendar pages to hang on our walls in the 1960s (the days before commercial prints or posters were available) original Victorian “fairy paintings” by the likes of Fitzgerald, Cruikshank, Doyle […]
The Artful Collector: Should You Worry About Forgery in SF Art?
How important is Fraud in the SF/F art market? I could write lengthy blogs on how forgers break down and then reconstitute the same clay to fashion Mid- and South American artifacts, using original (thousand-year-old) […]
Dan Durda of the IAAA
Dan Durda is a Renaissance Man. Saying that invokes visions of the man as artist – painting, sculpture, close studies of perspective and perhaps human anatomy, but those visions fall far short of the reality […]
The Artful Collector: Is it All in the Image?
At the heart of this debate is a real difference between how some creators of commercial art (i.e, art produced for the purpose of persuasion/marketing) view the kind of art they are commissioned to create, […]
East vs. West: Comic Book Showdown
Though my position here, such as it is, is that of “anime blogger,” I think that my real interest in media from the Land of the Rising Sun is comic books, otherwise known as manga. […]
The Artful Collector: Are Conventions Good Places to Find Art? (Part 3)
Throughout the 1990s, while weekend antiques and craft fairs, and even Ren Faires, were drawing tens of thousands of attendees each weekend, SF cons were still deliberating the good of “one day memberships” and advertising […]
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