Category Archives: Lovecraftian arts

New books: Kosmofobi & Kadath

13 Sunday Jun 2021

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You’re likely to need a tongue like an eel, to do justice to reading aloud Lovecraft’s poetry translated into Swedish. But it’s good to know such a book exists.

Kosmofobi : Dikter om varldar bortom was new from Aleph Bokforlag in 2020, with 176 pages and 10 illustrations…

The book collects all the author’s surviving horror and fantasy poems. These are published in the original side-by-side with Swedish interpretations in free verse. There is also an essay by the prominent Lovecraft expert Robert M. Price, written especially for this Swedish edition.

Also from the same publisher, Jens Heimdahl’s illustrated “Dream Quest”, Soekandet efter det droemda Kadath (2020, 2nd edition). According to the publisher…

Something of an art book, solidly illustrated by Jens Heimdahl, who also has a section on the author and analyzes the story.

They’ve saddled it with a cover with poor ‘shovelware’ typography, but here are some samples of the art…

‘Picture postals’ from Lovecraft – Lovecraft

11 Friday Jun 2021

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This week on ‘picture postals’, the man himself. As seen on a series of postcards issued in France under the ‘Dessin Jullian’ imprint, by artist Bernard Jullian and presumably self-published. I’ve been unable to discover dates or any biographical data on Jullian, but the cards appear to be classed as vintage — so perhaps before 2000. These are part of a colour postcard series that included portraits-from-photos of Bram Stoker, Arthur C. Clarke, Poe and other famous writers of the imagination. I’m usually averse to portraits-from-photos, which are nearly always so obviously portraits-from-photos, but here the artist has evoked something of Lovecraft’s arch intelligence.

Also R.E. Howard, from the same series…

Lovecraft on the stage in 1983

09 Wednesday Jun 2021

Posted by in Lovecraft as character, Lovecraftian arts

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Hijos de Cthulhu digs up another entry for the hypothetical ‘Lovecraft as character’ encyclopedia.

In June 1983 a theatre show called ‘Lovecraft’ premiered at the University of Seville [in Spain]. The show was presented by the University Theater Group “Puppets”, founded in 1979 by various students and professors of the aforementioned University. It was described as…

“A deep and serene music announces that the show begins. Mad and tortured Lovecraft, mysterious and human Lovecraft appears on stage. “We do not intend to do a biographical work on Lovecraft, we have simply been impressed by some visual features of this character that appears to us full of contradictions.”

I wonder if the script and staging directions are still available? They might make for an interesting translation in the Lovecraft Annual 2022, or one of Joshi’s other journals?

Cthulhu in Skyrim

02 Wednesday Jun 2021

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“Here There Be Monsters” – The Call Of Cthulhu for Elder Scrolls: Skyrim. As a mega-mod for this famous videogame, unofficial of course…

Strange things have begun to happen across Tamriel. Barbaric cults have begun to practice ancient rites in the dark places of Skyrim. Monsters have grown huge and terrible in the ashes of Red Mountain. And there are whispers across Solstheim of an ancient city name R’lyeh…

Looks great and weighs in at over 700mb, and is now reasonably mature after six years of work. A new major version was just released, the first in a year.

Cuttings from Kadath

30 Sunday May 2021

Posted by in Lovecraft as character, Lovecraftian arts, New books

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New to me, Kadath, or, The dream quest of Randolph Carter from Sloth Comics of London, 2014. Creator Charles Cutting is an illustrator from Oxford, in the UK. I like the style, and it’s probably even better on paper. There’s lots of it too, with over 100 pages of detailed art.

The first quarter of the adaptation was a webcomic originally on The Illustrated Ape website, then the first issue appeared in 2012 — but a crowd-funder for the rest of the issues is said to have failed. Congratulations to Cutting for getting the book finished and published regardless, especially in the context of the difficult UK scene. One review lamented that…

work of this calibre seems to slip ‘under the radar’ in the comics community

It certainly slipped under my radar, and yet Lovecraft + comics is on the radar for me. But then it’s always been a problem finding out about entertaining completed-story graphic novels for over-18 readers, unless they’re mass-market superhero fare or the sort of angsty politically-correct wrist-slashers that the reviewers flock to.

Anyway, get Kadath for £11.99 (about $17 U.S.) as a new paperback via Sloth (appears to be still in print, delivered by Amazon) and help support Charles with royalties. Or get it used on Amazon for (currently) a little less inc. postage.

Call: Lovecraftian maps

11 Tuesday May 2021

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The next issue of Digital Art Live will be themed “Maps” (June 2021). As editor I’d welcome, ideally as digital art, such things as…

* A general map of the Dreamlands, or Carter’s routes, or Ulthar (ideally with kitties).

* Curious cross-sectional Lovecraftian diagram-maps, such a hill showing tunnels etc.

* Map of Innsmouth, Dunwich etc.

* ‘Genre map’ of the original Lovecraft + circle tales (as opposed to the Derlethian and later expansions). Might be done as an isometric view of a large haunted colonial mansion and estate. Can go a little beyond Lovecraft’s death and the actual mythos (e.g. “F.B. Long’s Greenhouse of Dangerous Plants”, referencing Long’s wartime ‘alien plant’ stories).

* Guidebook map of an imaginary Lovecraft library/museum in Providence, with suitably whimsical touches.

* Condensed four-page timeline-map of Lovecraft’s life, or a two-page chart of his immediate circle and their connections.

* Map of Lovecraft’s ‘interests and fascinations’ as they waxed and waned during his life.

* A diagram-map of Lovecraft’s science as presented in the fiction, poems and essays.

* Maps relating to the work of his circle, if out-of-copyright. e.g. a ‘purist’ original Conan world map (albeit omitting items that may still be contested by copyright trolls).

* Reworked original public domain maps from the 1920s and 30s, given a Lovecraftian makeover.

* General ‘genre map’ of weird pulp themes and settings before 1950, showing connections and intertwinglings.

And any other artistic maps or timelines you may have to hand and think suitable re: science-fiction, weird fantasy, steampunk, for worlds now in the public domain.

Maps should work as a 4,000 pixel double-page landscape spread, when viewed whole on a widescreen monitor with a height of 1200 pixels.

Good news for del Toro

10 Monday May 2021

Posted by in Censorship, Lovecraftian arts

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Good news for movie director, writer and collector Guillermo del Toro. His acclaimed ‘not-Lovecraft but still fish people’ movie The Shape of Water had been hit, soon after its success, with a rather shaky-sounding plagiarism claim. This related to a 1969 U.S. Flipper-tastic TV movie in which a woman ‘bonded’ with a dolphin. Such things were hot, back then when dolphin language decoding seemed a real possibility.

Entertainment Weekly now reports that the legal challenge has finally dragged through the courts and come to a result — the U.S. Ninth Circuit federal court has definitively ruled there was no plagiarism.