The Word and The Void
This piece is apparently the first (I could swear that it was something else, but hey) that was directly inspired by one particular media source, unlike most of my works. In this case, and a few others, I drew directly from images and concepts that popped into mind while reading from my favorite fantasy/sci-fi author Terry Brooks. The series that I draw most from is Shannara, a series of epic tales chronicling the rise; the fall; and seeming rebirth of the human race through essentially World War 3; a nuclear winter; the resurgence of man's status on the developmental food chain; arcane creatures and powers; mutations into new races; a new dark age; and the blending of magic into new kinds of technology, among other things. The stories are well-constructed with a heavy focus on characters of all sorts with a plethora of motivations and moral/ethical perspectives that address the scope of the narrative and the implications on how the inexorable development of the macro universe both influences - and is influenced by - the past and future generations of families, dynasties, and political and social structures that populate the world known here as the Four Lands.
In more recent years, Terry Brooks has developed the story of the early and pre-war eras to illustrate in greater detail how the world we know today can be morphed into the twisted, and [largely] unrecognizable world of the Four Lands. In these relatively early days, the warriors against the forces of evil and the demonic forces are known as the Knights of the Word, staff bearing wanderers tasked by the entity known as The Lady who provides the Knights with special rune-carved staves of power that augment them with magic energies and protection to battle the Demons of the Void, who seek to subvert, corrupt and ultimately destroy mankind. There is more to it all, but I would recommend reading something from the author to get a proper sense of the story in action.
I wanted to make a show of how light and dark should play through the characters here. The Knight of the Word, a bright and serene presence exuding balance and stability; and the Demon, a Once-Man given over to an impossible chaotic force of unstable, all-consuming darkness and violence raging through the world. It's a terribly simple visual device, and I figured that it'd be difficult to really screw up, so I flew with it.
The characters are heavily informed by actual characters in the Shannara mythos, as I believe I had just completed reading the associated series, The Legends of Shannara [Bearers of the Black Staff and The Measure of the Magic] The named characters are Panterra Qu - the Knight, and The Ragpicker - the Demon. They are deliberate imitations, but I did not take the time to develop their appearance to adequately inform their roles in the world (especially Panterra, who is a tracker).
I always felt that this image would have made for a great piece of cover art of some sort, with some more care taken and time put in. But I've always been happy with it regardless.
The general Shannara universe is about the only franchise that I really care to draw/paint anything from, because it takes place almost entirely in text, and this is the first franchise that really pulled me into the realm of fantasy fiction - a thing that I love dearly. Ultimately, this is really my version of a love-letter to Terry brooks for giving me such a wonderful world for my imagination to grow into.
