See the rest of the illustrations here, and Puttapipat's artwork for Jane Austen here, for The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám here, for Andrew Lang's Red Fairy Book here, and for much else here. It's beautiful work, with a delicacy of touch and incredible intricacy that really appeals. The coloured work at those links reminds me of the best of Arthur Rackham, while the Russian legends shown above have the same beautiful and sinister appeal as the work of Vania Zouravliov's, whose cover for Vintage's edition of the Grimms' Fairy Tales I love.
These remind me of Jan Pienkowski's illustrations, for fairy tales too.
ReplyDeleteThe silhouettes are lovely, but it'd be a shame for them to become a kind of cliche.
I really enjoy the illustrations by Niroot - the colour ones are brilliant, i'm a great fan! but the silhouettes are already a cliche, although they look gorgeous. The remind me of course of the Russian artist Georgiy Narbut http://graphic.org.ru/narbut.html
ReplyDeleteI thought 'Arthur Rackham' too. If Arthur Rackham made shadow puppets...
ReplyDeleteActually Rob, Arthur Rackham did silhouette drawings for a version of Cinderella written by C.S. Evans. While they not quite as detailed (which is not to say that they are not detailed) as Niroot's they are still incredibly good, with a certian strength and liveliness that I don't always see in his other illustrations.
ReplyDelete(unless, Rob, you are being too subtle for me and already knew this...)
I think Niroot's silhouette illustrations are clever enough to escape accusations of cliche.
Excellent blog.
ReplyDeleteFancy the content I have seen so far and I am your regular reader of your blog.
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Just so you know.. Niroot really doesn't appreciate his work being used without permission.
ReplyDeleteHi, Sophie: I used the promo images from the Folio Books site, and linked to Mr Puttapipat's website for the rest, rather than posting them here. But I'm certainly willing to remove the images if it's a real problem.
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for such a kind review, JRSM. I've only just stumbled onto it now, quite by accident.
ReplyDeleteThere is certainly no problem with the images at all. I don't mind when full credit is given; including who the publishers are, etc. I'm more cautious about getting into trouble with my publishers or finding my work misappropriated than guilty of a severe sense of possessiveness! I think Sophie may perhaps have been recollecting an instance in which my work has been turned into a tattoo without my prior knowledge, which admittedly I was dismayed by. Only in situations like that would I have been unimpressed!
Thank you again!
Thank YOU--the artwork is gorgeous, and well deserving of as wide an audience as possible. I can certainly understand how irritating it would be having someone steal your ideas and getting it permanently marked on their body.
ReplyDeleteOh man, I was just reading "Russian Myths and Legends" and wanted to learn more about the illustrations. Looking at the devils sitting underneath the tree, I was thinking about what a cool tattoo design they would make...
ReplyDeleteThey would, wouldn't they--lots of black ink, though! Take some painkillers!
ReplyDelete