For those of you who are heartily tired of Darkover fan art, let it be known among the mighty handful of By-Productives that I also did heaps of Deryni fan art. The Deryni were a race of psychically powered humans who lived in an alternate Middle Ages around 1300, much outnumbered, and hated, by mundane non-powered humans. The author of these books is Katherine Kurtz who is still writing them nowadays and she's a good friend of mine I'm happy to say. Many times the learned author transfers episodes and themes from our own medieval history to her stories. The miserable-looking fellow in the red cloak is Cinhil ("Kin-hill"), the last member of a royal dynasty who has hidden himself in a monastery to live a life of prayer. The supporters of the dynasty must remove him from his chapel and force him to be King. Cinhil doesn't like the idea but has to do it anyway. There was a real English historical story about this, my learned historian friends will know.
The ink drawing here was done in 1981, and I doubt I could do any better nowadays. If you're a creative type, do you feel despair when you realize that your earliest works are better than what you are doing now? I do, though I tell myself I shouldn't, and then I think, I didn't have the Internet in 1981 and maybe had more time to make art and less time on the keyboard typing out drivel. Anyway I've taken this 1981 effort of mine and colored it in with Photoshop as practice, and at least that came out OK, there's lots more coloring to do. And if I could ever get my studio in decent order that would help.
Black ink on illustration board, about 2" x 2 1/2", colored in Photoshop, 1981.
1 comment:
I'm glad to hear Katherine Kurtz is still alive and writing.
You captured the right facial expression there. I don't remember the real historical story...was it a Spaniard or an Englishman?
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