Notes from the Studio

In my effort to meet publishing deadlines, right now I’m having to constantly juggle multiple jobs and this week was a Stardust week. Its been almost 10 years since I completed 175 paintings for the initial edition of the book but now the fallout from the movie has brought me back to that visual world. Besides a new hardcover edition of the actual book, Paramount Studios is asking for art to use on their promotional website and Titan Publishing is producing a ‘Making of…’ the movie book and they also want some art from me. After a bit of mental adjustment and a quick re-read of the text I was happily conceptualizing scenes that for either deadline or textual reasons I wasn’t able to complete the first time around. Here are a few. I was really happy to get a chance to re-conceptualize the Village of Wall as I thought that my earlier depictions of the place were far to ‘normal’. Neil’s descriptions spoke of a ancient village with one building built on top of another and all of them leaning into each other in an effort to remain upright and defy gravity. So this time, I think I got

One project that has been simmering on the back burner for awhile now is a new YA anthology edited by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling, ‘Coyote Road, Trickster Tales’ (Viking) for which I’ll be painting the cover and drawing a little over 20 smallish b/w pieces. The book, a follow up to the earlier collections, ‘The Green Man’ and ‘The Faery Reel’ has a brilliant list of contributors, such as: Carolyn Dunn, Chris Barzak, Nina Hoffman, Delia Sherman, Ellen Klages (go Ellen!), Dora Goss, Charles de Lint, Holly Black and Jeffrey Ford among others. I’m very excited about finally jumping in and working on this one. Here are my sketches and the finished cover art for the book. I really enjoyed the first sketch but the powers that be at Viking ruled in favor of the second image. And truth to tell, after I’d finished painting it, I agreed with them. Perhaps I’ll use the first piece as a title page drawing? Anway both images show the creation of the world with a host of trickster archetypes reading to jump in and start the wheel of life rolling on along. Later, as I finish up some of the black and

In mid-October, Bloomsbury will be publishing a collection of Susanna Clarke’s short stories, ‘The Ladies of Grace Adieu’ which will contain almost 20 illustrations by myself. I was thrilled when asked to contribute to this book as I’ve long been a fan of Susanna’s writing and knew that it would bring out the very best in my art. However the due date was tight and even with a great deal of deadline manipulation on the publishers part (thanks to the the redoubtable Polly Napper!) and all my good intentions 5 planned for illustrations were never completed, much to my sorrow. So here’s a taste of some of what I did manage to finish… And here’s my initial sketch for the same: Each of the 8 stories have their own full page illustration as well as its own illumunated as well as hand lettered title page design. Then there are the fun extras that I like to include in any book. Here are a few of my interior illustrations accompanied by its pencil sketch. As you can see I reversed the density of the foreground and background in the inking stage. That hedgerow just seemed to call out for some texture.

Okay, here is the finished painting for the new Stardust hardcover. I posted the preliminary pencils last week if you want to compare them. I really wanted a more 19th century poster effect for the piece than strict naturalism, hence the more densely outlined contours of Star and her hair. There were really only minor surprises waiting for me in the translation from pencil to paint. The biggest of which was a large slippage of the dark blue background sky color over the top of Evaine’s hair due to my slopping the paint around much too casually. I thought that a bit of opaque hair color would quickly fix that right up. two or three hours later major portions of her hair had been repainted. This type of thing can be maddening when on a tight deadline but here I like the effect gained. Enjoy! Charles

I can’t believe that this book is finally out. When George Martin asked me way back in the winter of 2001 if I wanted to illustrate one of his books I never thought that it would take quite this long. But, after years and years of stop and start work, the limited edition of the third volume of George R. R. Martin’s fantasy epic, A Storm of Swords has finally landed. This rather lengthy gestation can only be blamed on me and my desire to make a beautiful book. Storm is so damn huge (almost a thousand pages in length without the art!) that the publisher decided to divide it into two volumes, each with it’s own dust jacket art and both contained within a lovely foil stamped slipcase. All told, I completed almost 70 b/w illustrations, four interior color plates and the two cover paintings for the project. That’s a lot of drawings!! But It looks great and it feels splendid to at long last hold the book in my hands. Here’s the art for both dust jackets. And here are a few of the black and whites: This is the title page art for the second volume of