L'Art

Sure have been using a lot of French titles lately. Oh well. Anyhoo, so I came across the painter Abbot Handerson Thayer—he discovered the whole "light belly, dark back" thing with animals, like penguins and whales. But I like his art, i.e. this:Apparently his daughter is the model. Or this:Isn't it awesome? It sorta reminds me of some of the art of Last Exile.

It's undeniable that this'd be a great style for SF art, which reminded me of how people complain of what they call "Floating Head Syndrome", like the Star Wars covers—I guess they just hate Bill Gold. But I say, A) it could be worse, it could have Leia clinging to her twin brother's leg while holding a blaster in what, for lack of a better term, we must call "reverse Sabrina" (it's not actually position sul, the name for the correct way pointing a gun downward). B), a well done Floating Heads cover has a timeless, classic quality (I don't hate Bill Gold, see).

But it occurs to me, there are alternatives—if you don't like Floating Heads, how about Jacques-Louis David-esque ideological Neoclassicism? How about populist realism, like Norman Rockwell (yes, realism, go look at his Rosie the Riveter)? Most SF could thematically go with an Art Nouveau or Art Deco look—hell, I can think of four or five guys whose work is Socialist Realist allegory, and could have art to match (I actually really like Socialist Realism in painting and sculpture). If you can't find a propaganda poster from either World War to get inspiration from, the story probably doesn't even warrant cover art.

Which, is, uh, huh. Not to get post-modern, but that actually makes sense. What is propaganda, after all, but "selling a narrative"? Isn't that literally what book covers are designed to do?

On an unrelated note: dude, Frank Frazetta totally looked like Nathan Fillion.