In Search of Moebius

Argento Movie Posters

Here's a variety of high quality scans of movie posters relating to Dario Argento.

Virgil Finlay

I started researching Weird Tales a couple of years ago. The concept of pulp magazines appealed to my whimsical interests in fantasy, sci fi, and horror, and still do. That particular magazine encompassed all those emerging genres and really captured a zeitgeist amongst bedroom writers of the time period trying to eek out a living from their stories. The same was the case for the illustrators. One such artist was Virgil Finlay, who much like my idol Frank Frazetta, was a superb athlete who resigned himself to his striking artistic abilities as he got older. With the scratchboard as his chosen medium, Finlay was definitive with his outlandish style, stretching into avenues of fantasy that were only hinted at previous to his work. Monsters, aliens, and demons were all present in his work, and Virgil was extremely prolific. Like many artists with this type of word-of-mouth cult status, it was not until after his death that his work received a potent revival and collectability. I'd like to share with you now a few of my favorites, and a link to a large number of his works. The collection in the download only represents a fraction of what this man created.

"Virgil Finlay (July 23, 1914 – January 18, 1971) was an American pulp fantasy, science fiction and horror illustrator. While he worked in a range of media, from gouache to oils, Finlay specialized in, and became famous for, detailed pen-and-ink drawings accomplished with abundant stippling, cross-hatching, and scratchboard techniques. Despite the very labor-intensive and time-consuming nature of his specialty, Finlay created more than 2600 works of graphic art in his 35-year career.

Virgil Warden Finlay was born and raised in Rochester, New York; his father, woodworker Warden Hugh Finlay, died at age 40 in the midst of the Great Depression, leaving his family (widow Ruth and two children, Jean and Virgil) in straitened circumstances. By his high school years, Virgil Finlay exercised his passions for art and poetry, and discovered his lifelong subject matter through the pulp magazines of the era--science fiction, via Amazing Stories (1927), and fantasy and horror, via Weird Tales (1928), beginning to exhibit at the age of 16. By age 21 he was confident enough in his art to send six pieces, unsolicited, to editor Farnsworth Wright at Weird Tales. Once Wright determined that such detailed work would transfer successfully to relatively rough paper the magazine used (they were called "pulps" for a reason), he began buying Finlay's work. Finlay's illustrations debuted in the December 1935 issue of WT, and appeared in a total of 62 issues of the magazine, down to the last issue of the classic pulp in Sept. 1954. He also executed 19 color covers for WT, for issues from Feb. 1937 to March 1953.

A late-career Finlay illo published in the Amazing Stories issue of July, 1964.

Finlay quickly branched out to other publications after his 1935 debut; he was an immediate hit. In 1938 he went to work for A. Merritt at The American Weekly, moving from Rochester to New York City. Later the same year, he married Beverly Stiles, whom he had known in childhood in Rochester (Nov. 16, 1938). His adjustment to the city and to his new job was not smooth, however; he was fired and re-hired more than once. Yet during his period on the magazine's staff (1938-43), and later as a freelancer (1946-51), Finlay estimated that he did 845 different images, large and small, for Merritt's magazine.

Finlay served in the U.S. Army during World War II, and saw extensive combat in the South Pacific theatre, notably on Okinawa and did posters and illustrations for the Morale Services during his three years of military service. He resumed his artistic career after demobilization, doing a considerable amount of work for science fiction magazines and books. As the pulp magazine market narrowed through the 1950s, Finlay turned to astrology magazines as a new venue for his art.

Finlay also wrote poetry throughout his adult life. Virtually none was published in his lifetime, though significant samples have been printed posthumously.

Finlay had to undergo major surgery for cancer in early 1969. He recovered enough to go back to work for a time; but the cancer returned, and Virgil Finlay died of the disease early in 1971, aged 56. Ironically, Finlay just missed a resurgence in interest in his artwork from the early 1970s onward." - Wiki

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Diane Arbus

Diane Arbus worked with the fringe. She worked with "deviant and marginal people (dwarfs, giants, transvestites, nudists, circus performers) or else of people whose normality seems ugly or surreal"

I think this is a good place for her.

Edward Weston

Edward Weston was one of the biggest reasons I became interested in photography. I found a book of his work in a library when I was around 13 and have been taking pictures ever since.

One day I'll go to the desert where the man worked and find him.

Gustave Doré

Frazetta, Finlay, Giger, and Doré. They transport me. These artists traveled to other dimensions in their work, enlightening us earthlings of creations we couldn't conceptualize without them. There are lots of artists whose work mystifies me, but the bafflement I experience over Doré's paintings and engravings quite possibly trumps them all. I'm particularly partial to some of the pieces from his "The Raven" set. I really need to locate some Doré prints. Underneath the bio, I'm posting samples of my favorites, and below that there's a link to a 220 MB .rar file with the majority of his work in it in high quality.

"Paul Gustave Doré (January 6, 1832 – January 23, 1883) was a French artist, engraver, illustrator and sculptor. Doré worked primarily with wood engraving and steel engraving. 

Doré was born in Strasbourg and his first illustrated story was published at the age of fifteen. At age five he was a prodigy artist already creating drawings. When he turned 12 he began to carve his art in stone. Doré began work as a literary illustrator in Paris. Doré commissions include works by Rabelais, Balzac, Milton and Dante. In 1853 Doré was asked to illustrate the works of Lord Byron. This commission was followed by additional work for British publishers, including a new illustrated English Bible. In 1863, Doré illustrated a French edition of Cervantes's Don Quixote, and his illustrations of the knight and his squire Sancho Panza have become so famous that they have influenced subsequent readers, artists, and stage and film directors' ideas of the physical "look" of the two characters. Doré also illustrated an oversized edition of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven", an endeavor that earned him 30,000 francs from publisher Harper & Brothers in 1883.

Doré's English Bible (1866) was a great success, and in 1867 Doré had a major exhibition of his work in London. This exhibition led to the foundation of the Doré Gallery in New Bond Street. In 1869, Blanchard Jerrold, the son of Douglas William Jerrold, suggested that they work together to produce a comprehensive portrait of London. Jerrold had gotten the idea from The Microcosm of London produced by Rudolph Ackermann, William Pyne, and Thomas Rowlandson in 1808. Doré signed a five-year project with the publishers Grant & Co that involved his staying in London for three months a year. He was paid the vast sum of £10,000 a year for his work. He was mainly known for his paintings, contrary to popular belief about his wood carvings. His paintings are world renowned, but his woodcuts are where he really excelled.

The book, London: A Pilgrimage, with 180 engravings, was published in 1872. It enjoyed commercial success, but the work was disliked by many contemporary critics. Some critics were concerned with the fact that Doré appeared to focus on poverty that existed in London. Doré was accused by the Art Journal of "inventing rather than copying." The Westminster Review claimed that "Doré gives us sketches in which the commonest, the vulgarest external features are set down." The book was also a financial success, and Doré received commissions from other British publishers. Doré's later works included Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner, Milton's Paradise Lost, Tennyson's The Idylls of the King, The Works of Thomas Hood, and The Divine Comedy. His work also appeared in the Illustrated London News. Doré continued to illustrate books until his death in Paris in 1883. He is buried in the city's Père Lachaise Cemetery."

- Wiki

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Otto Dix

The grimness of Otto Dix's artwork has long been intriguing to me. The new vibe of this blog owes a huge debt to Dix's morose work. I've always felt a kinship with artists like Dix who don't quite fit with any certain movements, but gain cult status from the morbid nature of their work. I couldn't find many resources with high quality scans, so I had to settle for posting what bits and pieces I could find. The most compelling piece of Dix's for me, personally, is his masterpiece War (Triptych). Here's some bio information:

"Otto Dix (1891-1969), the great German Expressionist, was famous for his unique and grotesque style. Although Hitler's Nazi regime destroyed many of Otto Dix's works, the majority of his paintings can still be seen in museums throughout Germany.

Dix was, like many young German men of the time, initially a supporter of the war; so much so that he volunteered in 1915 at the age of 24. He was placed in an artillery regiment based near his hometown of Dresden. The unit was sent to the Western Front, where Dix fought in the Battle of the Somme in 1916. He was wounded several times on the Western Front. In 1917, he was transferred to the Eastern Front until the armistice with Russia later that year. His unit then went back to the Western Front and took part in the German spring offensive. Dix was decorated for his service; but his experiences had affected him deeply.

Those experiences triggered recurring nightmares, which in turn fed into the images he produced in War.

After the war, he flirted with both the German Expressionists and Dadaists; although his desire to use a more realistic style made him a poor fit for those groups. He became known not just as a war artist, but also as a social commentator; pointing out some of the less desirable aspects of life during the Weimar Republic (1919 – 1933). These included paintings and drawings depicting amputee veterans of the war begging on Berlin’s streets.

With the rise of Hitler, Dix was branded as a “degenerate” artist; and some of his works were burned by the Nazis. In 1939, he was arrested on the grounds of being involved in a plot against Hitler. Although he was later released, most commentators concur that Dix was not involved and that the arrest was a fit-up.

Perhaps ironically, Dix was conscripted towards the end of World War II into the Volkssturm (the German equivalent of the Home Guard), was captured by French troops and spent time as a prisoner-of-war before being released in February 1946. He continued to paint, with his allegorical depictions of post-war suffering again prominent; although he also turned to religious themes in his later years. Dix died in the southern town of Singen (then in West Germany) near the shores of Lake Constance in 1969."

Portraits - 

War (Sketches and Paintings) - 

 

War Triptych (High Res Above)