Faerie and Folklore progress update
For fans of Liminal and those who enjoy following its progress, I wanted to share an update on the Faerie and Folklore supplement.
For the past month I’ve been sharing daily progress shots (wips) on bluesky. Paul and I wanted it to be completed by end of July, but it’s just not there yet. We thought it might be possible since this was the first time I was able to fully focus on it (meaning I hit a dry spell and had no other work coming in), and I had figured something out in my process on another assignment that helped me work a lot faster than before. I got a couple commercial jobs around mid-July which forced me to juggle things a bit, and currently I have a couple more to work on, but essentially I’m committed to not letting a day go by without posting some kind of progress shot for Faerie and Folklore.
So that is the idea. Post something each day until the book is near enough to completion that we can comfortably declare an actual release date. I hope that sharing this work each day will help ease the pain of waiting for the book to be released.
In this image you can see that the shots I posted over the last couple weeks are actually part of a single chapter splash painting. Time consuming, yes, but not nearly as much as it used to be in my earlier work. Basically, on a recent commercial assignment I forced myself to be a lot looser in the overpainting stage due to an extremely tight deadline. When it was finished, I was kind of amazed at what came out of me. I made the deadline which honestly was its own success, but more critically I saw a painting that looked like the kind of work I’ve been wanting to do my whole career. I finally, finally nailed it, and it took a rush job to force it out of me. “Need is the tincture that loosens the hardened clay.” as someone says in Tales of Piecora - The Haunted Fortress.
I have this excruciating habit of needing to put paint everywhere, and I hate that about almost all of my own work. I don’t like paintings that are too polished… always feels insincere to me, like you’re covering up mistakes or trying to sell something. Over-rendering feels self-indulgent to me, like you have something to prove. The kind of work I love is when you can see the sketch, the stain, the medium and all the raw stuff underneath the paint. Don’t hide that! Celebrate it! It proves a human created it, especially the faults. Takes so much confidence to just let it breathe and leave it alone. It’s ok if it’s not perfect. Tightly rendered polish in carefully selected focal areas to guide the eye, but loose everywhere else. Sustenance for my soul. But somehow I’ve never been able to do this. Always overwork everything. Imagine if I gave myself only a month to do Faerie and Folklore… this is what I’m trying to do now - force myself out of overworking it and taking forever. I don’t think I had the confidence then to do what I’m doing now.
So you might notice that things might feel a little looser, more intentional and freer, less polished, softer, and more confident and genuine, with my current work. Maybe some blemishes here and there. This is how I love to paint, and what I love to look at. In the image depicted here, you’ll notice the sketch and the stain showing along the bottom. The painting is vertical like all the other chapter splashes, so this is the very top of it. It’s just like working in oils. I’m working my way down from the top, slowly going from face to face, blocking things in, adding color and being fast and loose with the opaque overpainting. Having a ball. Feels like something broke free that I’ve been dragging around for decades.
So this is my commitment - keeping at this everyday regardless of any other work on my desk, driven by the need to post a wip each day until the book is done just so that both you and I can see that work is being done, and using that as rocket fuel. Then onto Novocastria which is all about vampires. Be nice if I can get that done this Fall.
