I'm in a taxi on my way to the hotel! Almost in Riverside Looking forward to tomorrow!!
My flight yesterday out of Newark was cancelled due to the snowstorm. Luckily it got cancelled on Wednesday so I didn't actually have to go to the airport. Unfortunately though my rescheduled flight had two connections instead of one and was about six hours more travel time. Five of those hours was a layover in Charlotte and I used the time to sign up for TSA Pre-check
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Wanted:
Michael Whelan & DT Original Art
Just had coffee with wolfehr. We are excited about this afternoon.
Here is how The Mission Inn looked last night:
hope you guys have a great time. It looks fantastic
The photographer is never in the pics. I'll let wolfher write a narrative and then add some thoughts later. Needless to say we had a great time. The ultra-private tour with Michael was ~40 minutes and there were 12 people total. Very enjoyable.
Good times. I enjoyed it! And it was good to meet fellow forum member Heath for the first time.
I had an amazing time; I think Jerome can attest to me spending most of the night smiling and star struck. It was also great to meet some fellow forum members for the first time! This is the first time I've travelled so far for an event and I'm glad I did.
Jotted down some notes last night about the event and will share them here when I'm at a computer. Also got a video of Michael talking about the palette gremlins and he specifically talked about bone of contention. Will include that with my event notes later
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Wanted:
Michael Whelan & DT Original Art
Glad you guys enjoyed it. I loved hearing Michael talk.
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Insomnia #459
ANY S/L #459
Would love to hear the comments specific to Bone of Contention......
Some notes about the opening...
We arrived a few minutes before 5pm and I think there were 12-14 people waiting outside (including us). Bob opened the door right around 5 and welcomed everyone inside. As soon as you walked in there were free postcards with Ellie's Dream on them. Those who purchased original art were directed upstairs to the roof where tables were setup for a little reception. Those who just purchased a VIP ticket were asked to wait in the lobby. As a purchaser of original art I went upstairs, but shortly after I sat down Jerome's wife came up and told me to go back downstairs for a private tour (thank you!).
The private tour was for those that purchased VIP tickets (~12 total). Michael was in the gallery and we were able to walk around and look at everything without crowds. Jerome pushed me to take a picture with Michael (thank you!) so I have one with him in front of Legends: The Gunslinger and one in front of the piece I purchased, Tripod Walker. Someone was asking Michael a bunch of questions about Legends. He said that it was a challenging piece because the description of the tower in the book was rather bland, so he had to use his imagination. He tried to infuse various culturally important structures into the tower and it took awhile to get it "right".
Then everyone was directed back upstairs for the reception. There was about 10 tables, a serve yourself open bar, and a couple pies of good pizza. It was on the roof and there was beautiful view of the sunset. It had rained earlier in they day so there was a giant rainbow. It was informal and everyone was just mingling and you could just walk over to Michael and say hi. Audrey was also there and VERY personable. She stopped by tables to say hi and chat. Unfortunately it started drizzling again, but I think everyone had enough time by that point. Some fun facts I learned during the reception..
- Went to 11 different schools
- Finds it impossible to draw nylon stockings without them looking "forced"
- Does not have a picutre of his piece I have from babytatooville (asked me to send him one)
When we got back downstairs around 7 there were A LOT more people. Michael worked his way around the room giving some brief commentary on the pieces. Some assorted things I remember.
- The first area had some of his Passage pieces. He explained the bubbles in those pictures represent the soul/consciences/etc. He was inspired by an experience in a sensory deprivation tank which got him thinking about conscientiousness separate from the body.
- He said he moved on from oil (I think) to acrylic when he started doing illustrations because the turnaround time was too fast and the oil wasn't drying in time.
- When he was moving from illustrations to more personal work he had some creative block and painted his way out; he painted a staircase that represented him climbing from illustrations to personal visions. It worked!
- He sometimes has to create a lot of prelims before he's ready to move onto the final product. Every now and then he's not happy with anything and sends them all to the author and/or publisher and lets them decide.
- He has (rarely) asked for finished pieces back to continue working on them.
- Authors have seen the covers he's created and worked new scenes into the book based on what Michael created
- He rarely does self portraits, but has once or twice. One that was on display was painted when he didn't have any projects lined up. He was inspired by a quote that went something like "jump and trust you'll be able to build a parachute in time." The painting is him jumping off a structure with the tools to build a parachute. It was his way of reminding himself that he has the tools and skills to support himself with this art.
- Got the idea for Can I Get A Witness when he saw a sticker peeling off a wall and it looked different as he walked by. He knows what the middle number/letter is, but hasn't and won't tell anyone (including his wife!). After seeing it in person I very much regret not purchasing it :/
Video of Michael talking about the kickstarter pieces (which were mostly pallet gremlins)... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZH_rP_KLYR8
Link if you want to skip directly to Bone of Contention ... https://youtu.be/ZH_rP_KLYR8?t=4m27s
Wanted:
Michael Whelan & DT Original Art
This is great! THANKS MAN!
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Insomnia #459
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Thanks for the write up Heath. It's a neat look into the mind of an artist.
Looks like it was a very fun evening. Thanks for sharing the experience.
My apologies in advance if my narrative isn’t as coherent as Heath’s. Here’s a general recollection of the day of the showing.
I stayed at The Mission Inn. It’s a very cool place with great restaurants, rooms, nooks, and crannies.
Our room opened up to the lunch/dinner plaza below. It felt like being in Italy or Spain. The music and chatter from below was very cool. Heath, me, and the rest of our group sat and enjoyed a libation (or two) prior to heading to the event.
Outside room
As mentioned, we were let in promptly at 5PM and divided into two groups. I wasn’t aware until right then that only the $450 tier of Kickstarter donors was going to receive a private tour with Michael. Those who bought original art went upstairs to have refreshments while the smaller group was going with Whelan. I knew my wife wasn’t nearly as excited about Whelan as Heath was. As Heath said, “I’m start struck”. My wife graciously swapped places with Heath (and went upstairs with her sister in-law). Several pictures up thread show Heath with Michael outside and inside the art room.
After ~40 minutes we all crowded into the elevator with Michael Whelan to head upstairs for the reception. As the doors opened and Michael stepped out, there was a pretty rainbow. The photo doesn’t do it justice, but it was very cool.
Rainbow
We enjoyed food and refreshments as Michael strolled around talking with people. At one point Heath and I were speaking with Michael when Heath showed a picture of an original piece of Whelan art he owns (I believe it’s his current avatar). Evidently the art was from a previous event done with BabyTattoo books where guests made a mark/squiggle on an empty canvas/board, and artists would promptly (perhaps in a day) create a piece using that as the start. Michael mentioned he didn’t even have an image of the art and requested that Heath send him a .jpeg. Michael took an oversized card from his pocket. The card has Michael’s personal email and phone number on it. In the blank area Michael quickly drew an original drawing. Of course I asked Michael if he would do one for me-and that I would auction it for our fundraiser.
Whelan CK doodle
At one point Michael was sitting at our table and he was asked about the piece “Can I Get a Witness”. Sorry about the dark video, and for mispronouncing Audrey’s name.
Can I Get a Witness jpeg
Dark video
Sometime after the doors were opened to the public, Bob Self from BabyTattoo Books called the people who were donors or original art buyers to a private room and we were given a large poster tube containing either one or two prints, and a certificate of authenticity . One of the limited edition prints was from the 2008 BabyTattoo event and featured art from each of the 12 major artists who attended. The donors also picked out a Bowling style shirt from same event.
Several pics of prints, shirts etc,
While milling around the now crowded art room, we ran into a man talking to Audrey Whelan about doing a series of King/Dark Tower t-shirts. The man was kind enough (after I outright asked J ) to provide me with a shirt. His designs were impressive so look for them on sale in the future.
https://www.ka-tet19.net/collections/all
Ka Tet of 19 shirt
Near the end of the event several people started going gaga about some actress who was present. I don’t know her, but purportedly she is on the show Office (I could be wrong).
Various other schwag was given out, so look for an auction for or fundraiser that will have several items from the event (including the Crimson King doodle Michael did for me).
Guess who
Spoke to Audrey at great lengths with David and my wife on the T shirt thing.... I would be blown away if they do any shirts. That's a really cool one RF. The one they were working on was with my ROLAND X and they decided it "cheapened" their brand.... kind of agree and we all said not to do it. Maybe they changed their minds... but I'll be surprised. It sounds like you had a very good time RF as the others too. Wish I could have gone
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Insomnia #459
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Who knows if Whelan will get on board. I only was trying to relate that even at the debut, the Whelan's were getting a "pitch". At least the t-shirt people requested Whelan to approve and participate by allowing, contributing his art..
Most of the shirts I saw actually had cool images that (IMO) would not be a CR/TM issue. Example, one shirt showed a pig standing on it's hind legs. Above the image
it said Dixie Pig.
They weren't for sale. No one was allowed to sell at the event. They were just samples. If you check the link, you can see some of there designs.
https://www.ka-tet19.net/collections/all
Wanted:
Michael Whelan & DT Original Art
"One day you're going to figure out that everything they taught you was a lie."
He really went into depth on this with my wife and I. It was damm amazing to hear. Sometimes Michael can do 4/5 prelims before he does the actual work. For instance, Callahan at the Dixie Pig (AKC has original from book, I have prelim full color and David from Betts has the prelim to mine...) had 4 that I know of! Sometimes he said that when he is sleeping he will dream of something and he will wake up and keeps a sketch pad by his bed and draws his vision in it. He had a finished piece (IT WAS BEAUTIFUL) and it was done he does us... BUT woke up one night and had dreamed about it. Showed us the sketch pad and then proceeded to tell us he was going to totally change the finish piece because after the dream he realized it wasn't right in his eyes.. Took him MONTHS to do this piece and it was huge too. I found that just fascinating!
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Insomnia #459
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First, I know this is the Michael Whelan thread, but I'm just adding to the conversation of how amazing these artist are and what they go through to complete a project. My collaboration with artist Glenn Chadbourne is still priceless to me. Glenn didn't want to read the story during the character creation period. He drew the pictures just from me explaining my story to him and how I think the characters should look. When the prelim drawings started showing up, I was floored. Glenn nailed them. In fact, he added some of his special touches so I obliged and changed the story to incorporate his ideas. A collaboration project I will never forget. It's amazing what these artist go through and come up with.
When I read a story by Stephen King, I let King's imagination run away with my mind. When I see artwork created by an artist based on the same King story, it confirms what my mind was trying to tell me during the read.
Mulleins
I'm the caretaker of Room 217..............I've always been the caretaker of Room 217
I missed the event in February which i'm really bummed about. A little of a double post from pride and joy for my recent CK #19 framed print next to The Long Walk. Added here Trantorian Dream which I acquired/framed last year. I'm sure i'll be adding some more Whelan pieces as I find space to hang in other rooms. I loved my Trantorian Dream when it was done, but wife said it had to be added to my home gym/garage collection which really is only place i've got more room anyway
Wanted:
Wizard & Glass S/L #51 (can trade #229 in plastic)
Song of Susannah S/L #51 (can trade PC or #293)Found 3/12
http://www.thedarktower.org/palaver/...ction-LokiJake