This is just one brief comment among many interesting and often insightful ones in an interview with Larry Elmore by the Chattanooga Times Free Press. It's well worth your time, even if, like me, your artistic tastes tend toward Trampier and Otus rather than the "fantastic realism" of Elmore and Parkinson.We knew we were lucky. The only downside was that TSR wouldn't be around for long as it was. We had the feeling we were riding a wave, and we knew it. The company was always badly mismanaged, and there were a lot of fights among the management and a lot of wasted money. The company would take hit after hit, and you'd wonder, "How can they go on?" You felt like it was going to sink, and sink some day soon.
There was a lot of money there, and the owners and partial owners were all fighting over it, and it was hurting the company. All the creative people wanted to do was just have fun and make thing we would like. They fought the creative people a lot. The management had their own ideas, which usually sucked.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Before the Fall
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As someone who enjoys quite a bit of the art that came from that time, it was interesting to actually read straight from Elmore his commitment to creating a certain level of realism in his work.
ReplyDeleteThat and his facination with the "witchy woman". I wondered where that lady came from!
The management had their own ideas, which usually sucked.
ReplyDeleteIf only this were restricted to just TSR. If only.
That was a great read - thanks for sharing that, James.
ReplyDeleteWord verification was "Vilanti", which I find disturbingly close to Vilani, of course. It suggests connections that first human interstellar empire, long replaced by the Third Imperium (and whose skitterbuggers Elmore illustrated on the dover of Dragon #59. Shame Larry didn't mention Trav ... )
I love Erol Otus and I love Larry Elmore. I also love Keith Parkinson. From the other side of the Atlantic John Blanche also blew my puny little mind.
ReplyDeleteAs they say in the classics: It's all good.
Larry Elmore rocks. I have the iconic image he did from basic D&D, the red dragon one, on my wall at home, signed as well. His art was inspirational in helping me and my friends define what D&D was all about.
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