TODAY'S FEATURED POST

Interior Illustrations – To Green Angel Tower

Donato Giancola

These past few years I have had the honor to interpret a classic fantasy trilogy from the 1990's, Tad William's Memory, Sorrow and Thorn series for Grim Oak Press. This trilogy culminates in the final massive tome To Green Angel Tower, and is so large it has historically been published as two volumes due to issues around binding that many pages in one book. Luckily for me as an illustrator tackling this project, it meant…

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EVERYDAY ORIGINAL

Roaring Lion Totem

YESTERDAY’S POST

Image

Rückenfigur

Lauren Panepinto

September 4, 2025 - I didn't know there was a word for this until recently, but of course there is, and of course it's German. Rückenfigur (literally "back-figure") is a compositional device in painting, graphic art, photography, and film. A person is seen from behind in the foreground of the image, contemplating the view before them, and is a means by which the viewer can identify with the image's figure and then recreate the space to be conveyed. (from Wikipedia) The textbook example of this is this image is Caspar David Friedrich's Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog: And in fact, I only heard the term Rückenfigur at all because there was just a Caspar David Friedrich exhibit at The Met. He loved this device and it shows up in his work a number of times:   Obviously Friedrich…

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