Ken Riley - Illustrator Western Painter 4

This wraps it up with that Ken Riley Reader's Digest job  There are a few more spot illos that I left out... Speaking of Queen Elizabeth, I read Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida - Freaky - We get into the dark, tragic phase of Shakespeare's plays - His father died, Queen Elizabeth died, maybe his wife had an affair - did this affect his plays? It's all conjecture but this one's ending is pretty weird and dark - it's about the Trojan War and is sort of a take on Homer's Odyssey, yet he didn't base it on Homer, but on the medieval Trojan War compilations and additions - 

Revue Lire, France - Hugo Pratt special

http://www.lire.fr/enquete.asp/idC=51245/idR=200 Hugo Pratt gets a cover feature in a French literary magazine currently on the stands. He's basically my role model for what a cartoonist can achieve. I've read a lot of his stuff, they have them all at the library, but it was all in a bit of two-month burst, so the stories are now all one big blur. I do remember feeling that this was more of a literary experience, the stories had a more literate, erudite, mature bent. I got into Robert Louis Stevenson because of Pratt... All I remember is that he lifted Harvey Kurtzman's 'Jivaro Death' in Two-Fisted Tales directly into one of his Ann of the Jungle stories... Corto Maltese in Siberia, which takes place during the China-Russian war, and features Rasputin (not the historical Rasputin) stands out as a favorite. Fort Wheeling is another favorite, story-wise.

Ken Riley - Illustrator Western Painter 3

This was quite a big Ken Riley job - lots of illustrations in this story - dig the pastel colors...

Ken Riley - Illustrator Western Painter 2

Some more Ken Riley and more flamboyant colors - normally he has a fairly earthy and rugged color palette -

Ken Riley - Illustrator Western Painter 1

  

 Ken Riley - he studied with Harvey Dunn - 

p.s. -better known tas a cowboy artist -

http://www.caamuseum.com/members/emeritus/Kenneth-Riley

http://www.greenwichworkshop.com/studio/studio_artist.asp?artistid=55

Frank Cho - Inking samples Liberty Meadows

Frank Cho - that's some cool inking - great line - he knows when to go thick and when to go thin - the lines really flow with all kinds of subtle changes of thickness and tapering - he knows when to go tight and slick and when to keep it loose and sketchy - he knows when to throw in some black, he can go realistic or cartoony - he keeps it clean and clear but his line still has warmth and character; and he keeps it dynamic lively - so yeah that's some cool inking -done with Micron Pigma pens (size 02, 05, and 08) .

Welles' Othello (1952) and David and Goliath (1960)

comparing Welles with (uncredited) Welles. I think there's a similarity in the way certain column scenes were handled in Welles' Othello (1952) and David and Goliath (1960) - (Thanks to Tony for pointing this out on a message board.)

Fritz Lang's Kriemhild's Revenge (1924) and Orson Welles's Touch of Evil (1958)

this one's a more direct comparison between Welles and German Expressionism - we have a shot from Fritz Lang's Kriemhild's Revenge (1924) and Orson Welles's Touch of Evil (1958) - both shots superimpose a character over a horned beast in overt symbolic connotations (on the top, that's Attila the Hun, behind some monster statue, the horns aren't coming out of his head...)

David and Goliath (1961)- Fritz Lang's Siegfried (1924)

The top one is a shot from David and Goliath (1961)- the bottom is Fritz Lang's Siegfried (1924) - Again this is part of my rather oblique Orson Welles and German Expressionism influence theory - In this case there's a memoir form Welles' personal assistant on David and Goliath which confirms that he was quite involved in directing and writing on that film...

Jane Eyre' (1943) and 'The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari' (1919)

let's compare a shot from 'Jane Eyre' (1943) and 'The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari' (1919) - Lurking behind all of this gothic madness is the figure of Mr. Orson Welles, who is said to have done a certain amount of uncredited directing in Jane Eyre, the above shot being a good example - I've tried to substantiate this theory by showing a possible Caligari influence, seeing as Welles' has been influenced by German Expressionism, although the quixotic Mr. Welles downplays this influence stuff: Jane Eyre finally has a half-decent DVD release: http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film2/DVDReviews30/jane_eyre.htm