Edgar Allan Poe Comes to the Big Screen Twice

Two new films featuring Poe are now in post production. One with John Cusack as Poe in a fictionalized version of Poe's last days as he is in pursuit of a serial killer that is murdering in a fashion that mirrors Poe's stories entitled The Raven.




The other is entitled Twixt Now and Sunrise and is directed by Francis Ford Coppola and stars Ben Chapman as Poe. Coppola stated that the genesis of the film began with a nightmare, "But as I was having it I realized perhaps it was a gift, as I could make it as a story, perhaps a scary film, I thought even as I was dreaming. But then some loud noise outside woke me up, and I wanted to go back to the dream and get an ending. But I couldn't fall back asleep so I recorded what I remembered right there and then on my phone. I realized that it was a gothic romance setting, so in fact I'd be able to do it all around my home base, rather than have to go to a distant country." No plot or summary has been released yet but the cast will also include Val Kilmer.

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The Church of Bones

Below is an interactive 3D tour of the Sedlec Ossuary also known as the Church of Bones located in the Czech Republic. In 1870, František Rint, a woodcarver, was employed by the Schwarzenberg family to put the bone heaps of somewhere between 40,000 to 70,000 people into order. Below are examples of the results.



Sedlec Ossuary - Kutna Hora - The Bone Church in Czech Republic

Below is a video of the Chruch of Bones with haunting music

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Magnus Somnus

I have recently finished this piece and then decided to add some gray scale tones via Photoshop. Ever since I read the first two books of Anne Rice's Vampire series (I stopped after Queen of the Damned) I was always intrigued by the fact that sometimes Vampires would bury themselves for long periods, even centuries. This was purely for fun and perhaps a bit of Gorey inspired vision of a vampire locking himself away in his coffin for "the big sleep".


Magnus Somnus Redux by *PoeticCrow on deviantART

Photo prints and post cards are available on Deviant and soon will be available on Zazzle and Cafepress.

Edgar Allan Poe the next new TV Detective?

ABC has picked up a pilot that has Edgar Allan Poe playing detective. Now before I go any further I have to say the concept is not as far fetched as it sounds. After all Poe is recognized not only as the father of the short story but also detective fiction. C. Auguste Dupin first appeared in Poe's Murders in the Rue Morgue and later appears in The Mystery of Marie Roget and the Purloined Letter. Dupin even predated Doyle's Sherlock Holmes and it has been speculated that he was inspiration for the Victorian Sleuth.

But even with that clout behind him, can television effectively depict Poe with his addiction to opium and alcohol? Will they even touch upon his marriage to his cousin Virginia Eliza Clemm? I am a huge fan of Poe's work but I will be the first to admit that Poe's life was complex and disturbed and is hardly prime time fare. Yet even with my doubts I will tune in. Perhaps I will be pleasantly surprised.

Witch Hunters, Robert E. Howard and a bit of self promotion

I have recently finished digitally coloring the piece below. It is another Warhammer inspired piece of the Witch Hunter. An interesting note is that the Witch Hunter was actually based on Robert E. Howard's character Solomon Kane, a Puritan demon slayer. Howard is also known for his more famous creation, Conan.

Howard lived a very robust but in the end tragic life than ceased with his suicide. Athletic and much like his characters, Howard was a self made man that made a meager living writing pulps in the '30's as did his close correspondent friend, H.P. Lovecraft. Both writers created a mythology all their own and Howard's world that Conan dwelt is almost as expansive as Tolkien's. Sadly though most of Howard's vision of Conan in the public eye is that of Arnold wielding a sword against a giant rubber snake. In truth, Howard's world was much more elaborate with wizards, mystics, dreaming gods and forgotten races.

The Conan legacy was rescued from obscurity by Lancer Books in the '60's with primal covers by Frank Frazetta, the master of fantasy. Soon after Marvel would bring Conan to more attention with stories by Roy Thomas and artwork by Barry Windsor-Smith who grew with each story changing mere comic layout to masterful graphic story telling. In fact it was Barry Windsor-Smith's art that inspired much of my style, he, like Frazetta, were my childhood idols.





Witch Hunter Portrait Color by *PoeticCrow on deviantART

I went for an old world theme inspired by one of my other idols, Durer. I hope you enjoy.

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On another note and perhaps a tad self promotion...

I have opened a zazzle account to promote a line of greeting cards and postcards with my artwork. I will expand this line soon with more art, mostly black and white Gothic themed art.


make custom gifts at Zazzle

I Have Been Absent of Late

I apologize for my absence of late. Due to holiday mayhem, numerous projects in the fire and also a bought of melancholy that led to some creative blockage I am now on the mend and am eager to get back to work creatively.

I do have some surprises that will appear in the next couple of weeks as well as more subjects to blog about.

Thanks for your patience. =)

Neil Gaiman's Price coming to film

The Price, by Neil Gaiman is one of my favorite short stories that the author has penned is actually being made into an independent film by Christopher Salmon. This apparently is a one man show, Salmon is doing all the production of this CGI short.

"The Price" Kickstarter project pitch from Christopher Salmon on Vimeo.

Mr. Salmon has the full support of Neil Gaiman on this project and is asking for fan support since this is a private project and does not have the backing of any studios. The material, the short story The Price (which I have mentioned in a blog before) is one of my favorite short stories and if you get the chance I recommend it as well as the graphic novel, Creatures of the Night, done by Gaiman and one of my personal favorite artists, Michael Zulli.

The Price is a story of the devotion of an animal, a black cat (which I have extreme fondness for the inky alien four legged slinky things)and how guardians can come in the most unexpected forms. I highly recommend it.

You can follow Mr. Salmon's progress here on his production blog.

Neil Gaiman has also given his blessing to this project and talks a little more in depth about it here on his blog.

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Recommendations:

Creatures of the Night by Neil Gaiman and Michael Zulli




Smoke and Mirrors by Neil Gaiman

The Mortician

I am still learning my way about digital painting and digital coloring. Digital coloring is when I take a pencil or pen drawing and color it in Adobe, digital painting is when I do a painting usually from scratch or a rough sketch as I did with The Mortician.



I decided to do this piece in black and white, working with only grays as I would a pencil drawing. I wanted to create a type of vignette almost like one of the old daguerreotype photographs. The border I created by combining symbols that come with Adobe and decided to go with the oval because it lent to that antique feel I was looking for.

I suppose there is a story in this picture, as soon as it tells it to me I am sure that I will include it and the picture in The October Book which has become my year long project.

Prints are of course for sale on Deviantart here.

The Elegant Skull

La Calavera Catrina (the elegant skull) was popularized in 1913 with an etching done by artist José Guadalupe Posada. Since then, Catrina has been the rendition for the Mexican Day of the Dead, symbolizing the goddess Lady of the Dead, that dates back to the ancient Aztecs. Catrinas are very popular during the Mexican Day of the Dead which in fact is two days, not one. One day to honor and remember infants and the following to honor and remember adults. During these days the spirits of dead loved ones are lured by items such as flowers of the dead, usually marigolds, sugar skulls, tequila for adults, toys for children and religious icons such as crosses and Madonnas.

Much of the ceremonies include enticing the spirits of the departed back for a day so the souls can hear the prayers and stories their relatives offer them in remembrance and often these tales take a humorous tone as stories about the departed are shared. Often shrines are built in homes in memorandum with pictures of the deceased and these shrines often appear at local schools and government buildings. It is obvious that Mexican culture has a deep respect for mortality as mirrored in their parades on the Day of the Dead and their iconography.

When one considers that Fall, which brings about the deep sleep and death of nature with the coming of winter as well as harvest that it would follow that it be linked to human mortality and the spirit realm as echoed in our own holiday Halloween and religious days such as All Saint's Day, All Soul's Day and the Day of the Dead.

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I find much of the artwork and iconography of this heritage very fascinating and often mirrored in work by artists such as Daniel Martin Diaz and Madame Talbot. Diaz incorporates much of his Latin American heritage with Catholic imagery that forms a sort of esoteric vision while Madame Talbot's death dolls and her posters with the various renditions of death conjure an otherworldliness with a macabre sense of humor. Both are artists I respect, not only because they are traditionalists in their medium but also their creative imagination. Both artists seem to dance in between worlds and their works seem to bring about a sense of the surreal and that everyday occurrences maybe rooted in some deeper meaning or purpose whether it be with a morbid tongue in cheek or Jungarian images that drift below the subconscious. I would hesitate to lump these two artists together because their approaches are miles apart, one with almost prophetic vision and the other in a humorous danse macabre. But to be sure, both are inspiring and both deal with mortality.