Posts Tagged ‘Painter’
Portrait of John Howe
John Howe is a Vancouver born illustrator, now living in Switzerland, known widely for his renderings of the Lord of The Rings canon and movie trilogy series. He also happens to be my favourite artist. Born in 1957, Howe attended primary and high school in Vancouver, but one year after graduation, he enrolled at the Ecoledes Arts Décoratifs in France.
For years, Howe had been drawing and painting scenes from J.R.R. Tolkien’s epic history of Middle-earth. Most of these can be found in his online portfolio categorized into The Silmarillion, The Hobbit, and The Lord of The Rings books. Other works can also be found online as well, including cover art for books and novels, rough sketches, unpublished work, and loads more. Howe’s website also contains a few tutorials, such as how to paint grass, what kinds of brushes to use to achieve a desired outcome, and how having drawers full of rocks is a good thing for any illustrator.
Gandalf outside Bag End by John Howe
Going beyond art, Howe puts some serious thought into his paintings, as can be seen and read on his website, and even in the special feature DVD’s of The Lord of The Rings. On his website, Howe tries to render many medieval objects that do not necessarily exist today as part of his artistic planning process. He recreates many artifacts, such as a sword, to understand the weight, motion of the swing, the muscles needed to swing it, etc. Only after this can one properly understand how to render it. As a result, there are photos found on his website of Howe wearing suits of armour and wielding swords.
I felt kind of guilty by not posting this before with my Mary Anne Barkhouse posting on February 12th. At the time, I didn’t even know Dean Francis was also having a show on the same night. Well, no problem – you might have missed out on the reception but his work is still being displayed until April 1st, 2009.
Light Magic - Dean Francis, 2009 - Photography via the Esplande
His work involves very technical, almost photo realistic oil paintings about wildlife, nature, and the open landscape. In some instances his brush strokes appear to be looser on some paintings, especially when painting grass and tree branches, but in other cases, when he is painting clouds and animals, they seem very detailed and the brush strokes are not as apparent. I believe all the paintings he has in the Esplande are new works from 2008 and 2009.
Dean Francis has been painting for over 30 years, being outside recording and analyzing the landscape, nature and the animals in the outdoors. His paintings are very vibrant which is odd considering much of the subject matter that some would consider “the boring prairies”, but I think he captures the settings in his own “light” and conveys their real beauty without being over the top.