#Arnie Fenner

[archivist-dragonfly]

Book 532

Icon: A Retrospective by the Grand Master of Fantastic Art Frank Frazetta

Arnie Fenner and Cathy Fenner, ed.

Underwood Books 1998

Until very recently, this was my sole Frank Frazetta book. And it’s a pretty good one, too. Published by a small press in the town of Grass Valley, California, the image quality of this book is very good on high quality glossy paper. It includes most of the Frazetta images I wanted to have, but somehow I just knew this book would become redundant in my collection someday. He’s just too significant a figure to limit myself to just one 160-page book. Frazetta was a master illustrator of anatomy, fantasy, and action. He was so good, people don’t even really see it anymore. He inspired so many second-rate knockoffs that he became kind of lumped in with all his imitators, and people sort of stopped seeing how incredible his work actually is. But, like I said, I have a new Frazetta book, so I’ll get into this a bit more later on.

[doppleganger-rental]

Art by Arnie Fenner

[lagaleriapopurri]

ARNIE FENNER --  Gate of Fire

[jedivoodoochile]

Frank Frazetta’s “Star Trek” watercolor rough work (1978) Published in Icon: A Retrospective by the Grand Master of Fantastic Art, Frank Frazetta, edited by Arnie and Cathy Fenner.

In 1978, Frazetta was hired by an ad agency to create a poster for one of the early Star Trek films. He completed some rough works, including this one, but the job stopped there for unknown reasons.

[frazettagirls]

Frank Frazetta’s Cover Artwork to “Conan The Buccaneer” by L. Sprague de Camp & Lin Carter (Lancer Publishing, 1971) in black and white.

Frazetta's original cover painting for 'Conan the Buccaneer' was loosely inspired by one of his own illustrations for the Canaveral Press edition of 'Tarzan and the Castaways'. Certainly a far more complex composition than many of his other book covers of the same time period, Frank's painting electrified audiences and revitalized sales of the flagging 'Conan' series.

Fans rejoiced, the publisher was ecstatic, but Frazetta was not satisfied: something just didn't look right. When the original was returned to him, Frank repainted Conan’s face and helmet, adding armor to the figure and detail to the necklace. Still sensing that the work was unbalanced he ultimately elected to remove Conan entirely and start over. The painting in its present form is entitled 'The Destroyer' and is easily one of Frazetta's most popular works.

Excerpt from (Testament The Life and Art of Frank Frazetta. Edited by Cathy and Arnie Fenner, 2001).

To date, this is the best scan of Frazetta’s original painting, “Conan The Buccaneer.” Frazetta photographed the painting after he completed it but only developed it in black and white. The colored version is available in the comment section below.

To learn more about Frazetta visit our blog at FrazettaGirls.com

[weirdellis]

Edit- months after posting. Frazetta Girls instagrammed the bottom image. A much lighter  touch  on much of the hatching that forgives all the stuff that concerned me. So the two above are just bad reproduction work. Turning the wash to black.

Old post

I guess I just felt blasphemous today. Frazetta Girls posted this on instagram (top version) and it was glorious and every thing. A Frazetta line masterpiece I don’t remember. Then I admitted it bugged me. The shoulder girdle, the length of the neck and the black pool of hatching for the deltoid going into the pects. So I changed it in photoshop and decided I did improve it. I haven’t got a glimmer of a notion I could ever do line art with this master’s touch. But no one hits on all cylinders all the time.

edit: I posted this several days ago, was Frazetta surfing , and found another guy being blasphemous with photoshop. But he was showing his work to Frazetta. Dang. Just shows you Frazetta was just about the art. He knew it is always something that changes, can be improved, etc.  Arnie Fenner has a lot of Frazetta on his blog

https://www.muddycolors.com/2017/02/blasphemy-for-fun/

[musicincommon]

Frank Frazetta’s “Satanika” cover artwork for Verotik’s comic Satanika [issue #0, 1995]

Perhaps as unusual as his association with the National Lampoon was Frazetta’s working relationship with rock-musician-turned-comics publisher Glenn Danzig’s company, Verotik, throughout the mid 90s.

“I guess I’m old-fashioned. Maybe I’m a little out of touch, I don’t know, Frazetta reflects. “The key word is taste. And taste makes for beauty. When you start doing pornography, there’s just no way it can be in good taste. And for the most part, it isn’t beautiful. There’s a big difference between sexuality and pornography. Pornography is just plain dirty. Sex can be beautiful. You can suggest it and you can do it so it’s not explicit, and yet it’s sensuous as hell. You can get great joy out of something that is beautifully done, that has some thought and feeling put into it— that’s more stimulating than the trashy stuff. There’s something really wrong with people who get excited by rape and murder. I don’t think that my work shows that I am a prude and I’ve done some art that could be called erotic, but I was surprised at some of the stuff that was going on inside some of the comics with my covers on it.”

Regardless of the controversy surrounding the content of their comics, Verotik featured work by many prominent artists, including Dave Stevens and Simon Bisley, both Frazetta admirers. Danzig published a book of Frank’s exuberant pencil drawings, Frazetta: Illustrated Arcanum, in 1994 (Frank Frazetta ICON, edited by Cathy and Arnie Fenner)

[cloudeddemonthoughts]

Arnie Fenner

[terieu]

Mead Schaffer’s nighttime scenes (and outerwear) were tremendous. Discovered via this Muddy Colors blog post by Arnie Fenner.

[jedivoodoochile]

Frank Frazetta’s “Kane on The Golden Sea”

“I liked doing the Kane series. There is a dark mood going on: you don’t know whether to root for this guy or hope he gets taken out. Which would you prefer? That’s the question I want going through the viewer’s head when they look at these paintings.”

- Frank Frazetta (LEGACY Selected Paintings & Drawings by the Grand Master of Fantastic Art. Edited by Arnie and Cathy Fenner)

This artwork by Frazetta was created with oil on board. The original work measures 16x22inches. It was the cover artwork for the paperback, “Darkness Weaves” by Karl Edward Wagner (Warner Books, 1978.) Karl Edward Wagner was a respected editor as well as a writer. He compiled fifteen volumes of “Year’s Best Horror”, several fantasy anthologies under the title of Echoes of Valor and restored the preferred original text to Robert E. Howard’s Conan stories in a series for Berkley books. In the latter part of his career Wagner turned to writing horror fiction and he was the recipient of both the World Fantasy and British Fantasy awards.

[frazettagirls]

Frank Frazetta’s “Dracula” (1970)

“I’ve always loved movies,” Frazetta says. “When I was younger we would go to the theatre all of the time. Today they can do a lot more with special effects and, yeah, they can leave you with your mouth hanging open. But I think there is a lot to be said for the mood and atmosphere of some of the older films — a lot of that is missing in movies now. Sure you can watch Dracula or Frankenstein and it might seem corny, but if you really watch, if you really give them a chance, you’ll find yourself getting caught up in the character and the story and overall mood.” (Legacy: Frank Frazetta, Edited by Arnie & Cathy Fenner)

FrazettaGirls.com

[lairofwonders]

Finally scored my first JCJ art book! Super excited to add this to my art book library. A beautiful book that is wonderfully edited by Arnie & Cathy Fenner! Now I can look at these images in my hands instead of searching for them on the internet :-) A big thank you to HOOKED ON BOOKS for finding this for me! Audrey! You are awesome! 😎😎😎 #JeffreyCatherineJones #AgeOfInnocence #TheRomanticArtOfJeffreyJones #ArtBooks #ArtLibrary #ArtLegend #IllustratorExtraordinaire #ArtLove (at Hooked On Books) https://www.instagram.com/p/CKh5jOOBenR/?igshid=1shmjbdv1l4nr

[billcarman]

It is always an incredible honor to be included in the Spectrum Annual. To receive an award still makes me giddy and giggly. Congrats to all of the well deserved artists who are in the book and to those who will one day be in the book too. Thanks again to the all wise jury and of course to John and his crew. This book is beautiful as always. Special thanks to Cathy and Arnie Fenner who have befriended and always supported me for some strange unknown reason. On another note, I have been besieged by modelling agencies after seeing this photo of me. Something about a dangerous man moves people.

[studiobowesart]

Figure Drawing: Repeating What You Should Already Know

-By Arnie Fenner

I think a simple truism about being an artist is that, regardless of stature or status, regardless of the number of years spent sitting at the table, easel, or monitor, regardless of degrees from universities or from the School of Hard Knocks...you're always something of a student. And always will be.

As an artist, you're never (or should never be) entirely satisfied with "where you're at" and, essentially, are always practicing—striving—to get better at the craft. Every doodle, every scribble or sketch is part of the process, part of being an artist. It doesn't stop: you're always experimenting and exploring and observing and thinking. You're always trying to learn or master techniques; you're always studying color and composition and light and gestures and character and, above all, anatomy. Regardless of personal style or career direction, the ability to draw a convincing human figure is truly the core of being an artist. Continuing to practice at it helps artists maintain their visual and spatial abilities: it's almost a form of calisthenics of skills. Every time the model moves their arm or tilts their head, every time they change their pose, there is something new to see, to understand, and to learn.

And, because drawing the figure is fundamental, successfully communicating with and connecting to an audience as a creator—whether the approach is realistic, distorted, cartoonish, or abstract, whether the subjects are people or animals or monsters or landscapes—rests firmly on that foundation. It is the beginning for anything you want to do artistically. As Donato said in his post last year on MC, "I find that life drawing is an important way to reconnect with the main subject in much of my work, that of the human figure. The varied forms of expression and the enlightened discovers which occur while drawing helps to fuel my imagination and inform my eye as to what is possible for shape design within characters."

Above: A figure drawing by Andrew Loomis.

Above left: A late-1950s drawing by Frank Frazetta. Above right: Drawing by Willy Pogany.

A highlight of Spectrum Fantastic Art Live has been the late-night figure drawing party (with several nude models) generously sponsored by Kansas City's The Illustration Academy. Even with pizza (graciously provided by the Aladdin Hotel) and a cash bar, it is a surprisingly serious party; there's relatively little chatter and what there is tends to be in whispers. The focus is on drawing, on getting the most out of the opportunity. I've heard that some have been somewhat intimidated by the intensity of the room, but I've also heard that others were absolutely giddy to be sitting and sketching next to—and getting feedback from—Justin Sweet or Donato or Iain McCaig or Android Jones or Mark English.

Above: John English conducting a figure drawing class during The

Illustration Academy's 2017 Summer Workshop. Photo by Timmy Trabon.

Starting clockwise above left: George Pratt, Bill Sienkiewicz, Mark English, Jeffrey Alan Love.

Figure drawing classes, led and critiqued by the teachers, are an important part of

The Illustration Academy's annual workshops. At the conclusion, the instructors' originals

(like the samples shown above) are given to the students via a raffle. 

Drawing from life whenever possible should be high on any artist's list—and, of course, the knowledge obtained through the process is applicable to everything you do, whether you work digitally or in traditional media. I talk often about The Illustration Academy because I know them well (they're local, after all), respect the hell out of what they do, have had the opportunity to sit in on their workshops, and have spent time with their instructors over the years. They're devoted to not only helping artists improve their skills but also in helping them achieve their professional goals. Besides actively emphasizing figure drawing in their curriculum—and hosting drawing events as they have at SFAL as a part of their outreach mission—the Academy hires models and sponsors semi-regular sessions open to all artists at the Interurban Art House (in one of KC's suburbs) throughout the year. Watching IA's Facebook page is a good way for people to stay abreast of dates. Naturally, there are similar gatherings all over (like the Sketch Nights at the Society of Illustrators in New York every Tuesday and Thursday) and it shouldn't be a surprise that I encourage everyone to take advantage of these opportunities whenever and wherever they're offered. (The social and networking aspects of such gatherings are extremely important to career growth as well.)

Above: George Pratt (on the right) oversees the give-away of the instructors'

figure drawings to students. As an aside, let me talk about George for a moment:

A renowned comics artist, illustrator, and Fine Artist, his graphic novel

Enemy Ace: War Idyl has been translated into nine languages and for a time was

required reading at West Point. Besides teaching at the Illustration Academy,

George has taught at Pratt and the SVA and is currently an instructor at the Ringling College

of Art and Design. The IA's Summer Workshop lasts five weeks (students can sign up for

one or all) and features a different group of instructors each week: George and John English

teach during all five. And, yes, there are on-line classes available, too. Anyway, readers

can learn a bit more about The Illustration Academy and other great workshop

opportunities in my "Summer School" post some weeks back.

Depending on location, finances, or other circumstances, I know it can be difficult-to-impossible for some to take part in a figure drawing get-together...but that doesn't mean you can't still practice. Use family members or friends as models and if even that doesn't work out, you might recall that I've previously pointed out various video resources via YouTube that you can use at your own time, pace, and convenience. Like this:

Jon Foster says, "Students will ask me, 'When do I know it all? When does it get easier?' And I tell them: Never. It never gets easier. You have to work to make a career and work to maintain it."

So the Word of the Day is...well, the same as it is everyday: Draw! Or better, the three Words of the Day are: Draw The Figure!

from Muddy Colors http://ift.tt/2w5JupI

[fic-dreamin]

Fantastic Frazetta This book is a treasure trove of art and information about Frank Frazetta. It is much better than I could have hoped for. If you get a chance to purchase it, don't hesitate. I got a great price and the book is like new. I'm very happy with this purchase and the seller is the best. Go to Amazon

Fantastic Book With Everything A Frazetta Fanatic Could Want! I first discovered the art of Frank Frazetta through the film Fire & Ice. I was completely blown away by the visuals so I did some research on the man behind it. Little did I know he was also responsible for one of my favorite album covers of all time, Wolfmother, who used The Sea Witch (a painting also presented in this book). Go to Amazon

Great paintings and story Great book full of illustrations, paintings, by the great Frank Frazetta. Nice collection. Go to Amazon

The essential Frazetta must-have I discovered Frazetta as a teenager through the 5-volume Ballantine books, which mysteriously vanished from my collection over the years. Not sure why it took me so long to update with Icon, but it was always just a matter of time. Unlike the Ballantine books, Icon and its sister volumes (Legacy and Testament) offer a wealth of information about Frazetta himself, the circumstances surrounding his ascent to fantasy art godhood, and details about the paintings that got him there. It's great to be able to put a complete human being behind the legendary name, and the artwork here is glorious and accurately colored. All 3 books together show a greater range of Frank's repertoire than what I remember from the Ballantine books. Nicely done, Underwood books and Fenner & Fenner. Go to Amazon

Fantasy Master's First Great Volume! His origins are classic... and so are his paintings. This Go to Amazon

For Frazetta lovers If you love the work of Frank Frazetta, as I do, you want this volume in your collection. along with the art work it's a mini-history of his career, with insights into who he worked for and when, and how these works came to be. Go to Amazon

How to improve on the original My last review was much too long. Here's a new take: how do you improve on something as beautiful as the original Icon? Simple. Add more art, and more pages. Fill the pages from one corner to the next with more art. Put it in a sturdy softcover binding and charge less for more. If you don't know who Frank Frazetta is this is your chance to discover a master artist. Add some dazzling images and powerful designs to your bookshelf by buying this book. His work is provacative, emotional, and has an uncompromising impact on those who view it. From the primal strength of his Conan paintings to the erotic beauty of his defiant women, it's the vitality of his art that makes it distinctive.Discover Frank Frazetta with this new book.Rediscover his incredible range if all you have are his old books from the seventies. Go to Amazon

WHAT A PLETHORA OF FANTASTIC ART! Just when all us artists and fastasy fans thought we had seen the best compilation books on Frazetta's awesome art along comes ICON! Not only are pages printed with exquisite care but the text offers keen insight into the creation and inspiration of Frazetta's most trend setting pieces. If you can't go and see a Frazetta masterpiece in person then by all means get this book and you'll see why his art is top of the food chain! Go to Amazon

Not always right but unmistakable... Bad thing is Amazing illustrations of Conan the Barbarian--and a lot else Five Stars He's so good!!! Can't go wrong with Frank. The Master Love Frank Frazetta Great Coffee Table Book and Interesting Too Five Stars