a Fury in the making

In 2003 Trevor Hairsine contributed with a pencil drawing of The Fury to the Alan Moore: Portrait of an Extraordinary Gentleman tribute book, published by Abiogenesis Press. You can see it in its printed glory at page 150 of the volume. 

In the past weeks I discovered in a box some preliminary sketches Trevor sent me. I completely forgot them! So, you can see them here for the very first time. 

Also included the original piece and the inked version realized by Kevin Nowlan in 2010, as a commission for me.

 The Fury, original pencil drawing. By Trevor Hairsine.

  The Fury, inked version by Kevin Nowlan (2010).

League: Century N.2 - 1969

League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (Vol III): Century #2 - 1969 has finally a release date: July 2011 (co-published by Top Shelf Productions & Knockabout).

CHAPTER TWO takes place almost sixty years later in the psychedelic daze of Swinging London during 1969, a place where Tadukic Acid Diethylamide 26 is the drug of choice, and where different underworlds are starting to overlap dangerously to an accompaniment of sit-ins and sitars.  More here.

Sienkiewicz speaks about Big Numbers N.3

Some days ago, Pádraig Ó Méalóid, posted on his blog an intense piece by Bill Sienkiewicz, one of the most extraordinary Artists in the comics field, about his controversial work on Big Numbers and especially on the legendary "lost" third issue.

Sienkiewicz wrote: "[...] Alan's a genius, an absolute gentleman. Plain and simple. Yes, his scripts are dense. They're brilliant, layered, nuanced, variegated, textural, beautiful and daunting. Simultaneously so. And although Alan is incredibly deferential and generous as to allowances for alterations made by the artist, the scripts veritably beg, no, demand, to be adhered to in their totality. It's practically sacramental.
[...] Working with Alan was like going from the multiplication table to the periodic chart to quantum physics all in the space of one panel border. 

[...] To this day, I've lamented that Alan and I never finished the series. I actually literally can't stomach the thought of it remaining a hole in our creative lives, certainly in mine. And honestly, there's not a week that goes by that I don't think about completing it, about contacting Alan and saying, “Adult here. What say you? Let's kick out the jams!” I understand his great disappointment, though I've no doubt he's moved on. And gotten even more brilliant, if that's possible. I've apologized to Alan personally, and to the others, for my part. And I apologize to you - the readers."

The whole article is here. It's a must-read, nuff said!

Lettering the League

On his blog, Master of Lettering Todd Klein talks about the process behind the upcoming second 80-page issue of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Century (published by Top Shelf).

Klein writes: "Mostly, Alan gives us everything he can think of that might be relevant in the script, then lets us get on with doing the rest of it. So, when Alan does include lettering notes, I try extra hard to come up with something I think he’ll like. There are a couple of examples in this issue."

You can read the whole thing here. A quite interesting and revealing piece.

Images © Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill; Lettering and text © Todd Klein.