Dark Fantasy Art

The intensely disturbing and dramatic Dark Fantasy Art Image above has been created by an artist that I do not know...

Wikipedia.com describes Dark Fantasy Art as follows:

"Primarily a product of the 20th Century, dark art is an art style defined as that being "dark" or unsettling in nature. Called and classified under many names such as gothic, horror, metaphysical, nightmarish, and disturbing, it is actually a culmination of techniques and styles. It has been presented in many forms by many artists, illustrators and film-makers. It continues to grow in popularity as a part of the horror genre and gothic, music and publishing culture. Today, it is a part of our mainstream culture, crossing over into multiple mediums including advertising, television, film, and marketing. While it has roots in horror, it has been presented in collage, surrealism, abstract, motion graphics, grunge, expressionism, and largely digital art"

As for me...well...frankly, I am mostly interested in dark fantasy art, when a beautiful woman forms part of the picture, and as far as I am concerned, dark art, or dark fantasy art, is an image ( with a lovely girl in it, of course...)which creates a sense and mood, of Mystery, Mysticism, and Wonder, and which is at the same time...also a little bit Scary and Unsettling...

The 3 images below have been created by Hein Lass, a Photographer that lives not far from me...in my hometown actually...

The following extract is from Hein's site 'Southern Light': The link is at the end of this page...

"Southern Light is my Internet photography home. I use the natural Southern African light for most of my photographs and hence the name.'My studio is all around me. I have the biggest studio in the world'.Sometimes nature throws misfits into the system. I am one of those, born into the heart of darkness, into the old day apartheid and puritan South Africa with nowhere else to go. I was a real royal pain in the ass, too clever for my own good and questioning everything on display, the governement, the church, the entire system (and we had quite a system). I considered myself to be one of the very few sane human beings and most of the others around me to be Aliens."

Maybe there are some of you who can (in some way or another...) associate with these words. (To some extent, I certainly can)It is almost as if artists throughout history, constantly experiences a divide between themselves, and the rest of society...almost as if they live in the wrong time...on the wrong planet...(Wimma)

The master of Dark Fantasy Art (and Fantasy Art in general) and my favorite artist, Luis Royo, created the fantastic and horrific image above, as well as the amazingly erotic painting below

'FANTASTIC ART' is Royo's major compilation to date. Published in May 2004 it brings together the most complete collection of illustrations by the artist. Published in two high quality formats, the limited deluxe edition is a good example of the importance of the compilation. Fantasy and reality come together through images in which Royo presents his own particular view of the world, of the myths and legends which have shaped it over time. It is a cosmogonist vision of reality where the future has to assume its own challenges.

'THE LABYRINTH': TAROT is the first completely unpublished work by Luis Royo, where not one of the images had been previously published.It was published in December 2004 in two formats: an exclusive pack of cards and a book including all the illustrations together with explanatory texts, written by the artist himself, on the hidden meaning of each card and their power over people's destiny.

There is a HUGE demand for fantasy art, and more specifically for so called 'dark fantasy art', and 'gothic fantasy art'.Unfortunately there are not enough TALENTED artists active in these genres, and therefor the demand for dark fantasy art, outstrips the supply, completely.As with all forms of art, many try, but few succeed...but the "Luis Royos" of this planet, are a rare breed indeed.

Hein Lass is one exception...I have seen many efforts by many photographers, in their quest to create Dark Fantasy art (photographically), and Hein Lass is among the best I have seen...his work is awesome!...

One would think that much more GREAT ART would be created nowadays, because of the incredible modern-day digital tools, software, and powerful desktop computers, which are freely (and relatively unexpensively) available, but no...exactly the opposite seems to be the case...less and less great art, seems to be created...why this is so, I don't know...(Maybe it is exactly because everything has now become too easy?...maybe we should all go back to film-cameras, or paints and brushes?)

As an after-thought, I must say that the art of creating special effects in motion pictures, is one field that has defenitely improved tremendously i.m.h.o, but the guys and girls creating those amazing effects, have not aquired their skills overnight, that's for sure...

It would be really nice if the art style of dark fantasy art can achieve the same...

Hein's image of Hel, the 'North Germanic ruler of the Underworld of the same name' (above) is a great example of what dark fantasy art, should be all about...I think...(and the actual story behind this work is as thought-provoking as the image Hein created here) Check it out on his site.

The Dark Fantasy Art of Gerald Brom is impressive and his style is totally unique. The extracts below are from www.bromart.com (Check it out...it is amazing)

"Born in the deep dark south in 1965. Brom, an Army brat, spent his entire youth on the move and unabashedly blames living in such places as Japan, Hawaii, Germany, and Alabama for all his afflictions. From his earliest memories Brom has been obsessed with the creation of the weird, the monstrous, and the beautiful.Brom is currently kept in a dank cellar somewhere in the drizzly Northwest. There he subsists on poison spiders, centipedes, and bad kung-fu flicks. When not eating bugs, he is ever writing, painting, and trying to reach a happy sing-a-long with the many demons dancing about in his head."

I feel like I was born drawing -- it seems as far back as I can remember I had a crayon in my hand, so I do not feel I ever made a conscious decision to be an artist. I truly believe I was born with this affliction. As far as making a living at it is concerned: Oddly I couldn't imagine myself doinganything else -- not because I had great confidence in my abilities, there just wasn't anything else I could do. So I ploughed ahead blindly and was fortunate enough to land a rep right out of art school at age 20. I've been working full-time ever since."

ABBREVIATED BIOGRAPHY (from www.hrgiger.com)The thought-provoking (disturbing?) image below, has been created by Giger.

H. R. Giger is recognized as one of the world’s foremost artists of Fantastic Realism. Born in 1940 to a chemist’s family in Chur, Switzerland, he moved in 1962 to Zurich, where he studied architecture and industrial design at the School of Applied Arts. By 1964 he was producing his first artworks, mostly ink drawings and oil paintings, resulting in his first solo exhibition in 1966, followed by the publication and world-wide distribution of his first poster edition in 1969. Shortly after, he discovered the airbrush and, along with it, his own unique freehand painting style, leading to the creation of many of his most well known works, the surrealistic Biomechanical dreamscapes, which formed the cornerstone of his fame. To date, 20 books have been published about Giger’s art.

Giger’s third and most famous book, Necronomicon, published in 1977, served as the visual inspiration for director Ridley Scott’s film Alien, Giger's first film assignment, which earned him the 1980 Oscar for the Best Achievement in Visual Effects for his designs of the film's title character and the stages of its lifecycle, plus the film’s the otherworldly environments. Giger's other film works include Poltergeist II, Alien3 and Species.

To learn more about the Giger and his current projects, visit his primary official websites, www.HRGiger.com, www.HRGigerMuseum.com, and www.giger.com.

Soon there'll be a page on the Dark Fantasy Art of the Spanish Painter, Luis Royo... But until then...check this out...

You can see a lot more of the amazing work of Hein Lass on his website HERE...