Master of Reality by Nicola Testoni

Master of Reality, exclusive print by Nicola Testoni. Info: contact the artist.

Painter and sculptor NICOLA TESTONI, who illustrated the Italian edition of The Mindscape of Alan Moore, has created an extra portrait of Alan Moore (above): titled Master of Reality, it's available as a limited edition print directly from the artist. 

You can contact him HERE: he will add a touch of colour and sign it.

Alan Moore on The Prisoner

The Prisoner

Excerpt from Part one of the interview published on Paley Matters in August: Moore talks about The Prisoner and its huge impact on him and his work.

The complete interview is available here. Part 2, here. 

Alan Moore: [...] one of the things I learned was that one should preferably craft narratives that move towards a satisfying and meaningful conclusion. Another thing I learned was that it was possible to write stories that affected the audience on other levels than just the simple resolution of their plot elements; that there were levels of symbolism and association and self-reflexivity which could be built into a narrative that would enable the viewer or reader to enjoy the experience in a more intense and multileveled way. Perhaps most importantly, it taught me that a creator should never be afraid to pitch their work high, without worrying about it going over the heads of the audience: in my experience, work that the audience already understands and is comfortable with will not teach them anything, and thus deprives them of that thrill-of-the-new that is, for me, the central pleasure and purpose of all art. I believe that art only happens at the interface of the artist and the audience, which is to say the work itself, and I further believe that if they don’t have to do any of that work, if they don’t have to stretch themselves a little in order to metabolise what they’re reading or watching, then the audience will not find the work as enjoyable as they might have done. So, The Prisoner taught me not to condescend to my audience or assume that they were any less intelligent than I was. It taught me to dare to be difficult, and eventually led me to a position where I feel that the most precious thing about art is its difficulty, and that difficulty’s overcoming.

[...] While all my work probably has the influence of The Prisoner in it somewhere, this would be entirely in how the story is told, rather than in its content or thematic elements. Practically every intelligent or informed person during that decade would have been expressing opinions about technology and nursing nuclear anxieties that were identical to McGoohan’s, and given that the 1980s were an even more perilous stretch of the Cold War than the 1960s had been, then it seemed an appropriate issue to make a part of Watchmen. I can’t think of any direct or indirect influence beyond that."

The complete Part 1 is available here. Part 2, here.

Halo Jones in colour

Halo Jones: Alan Moore (writer), Ian Gibson (artist), Barbara Nosenzo (colorist).

Excerpt from an article published in 2000 AD site, here.

2018 sees a 2000 AD classic remastered and in colour for the very first time.

[...] Originally published in black and white, the re-releases will feature extensively remastered artwork and, for the very first time, will be published in colour. Italian newcomer Barbara Nosenzo is responsible for bringing colour to the world of Halo Jones. [...] 

Barbara Nosenzo: Halo is a perfect example of black & white balance, and I constantly felt the responsibility of adding colours where there was no need for them!
[...] While reading the books for the first time, I started imagining atmospheres and details, and tried to put those on paper. I used some covers as reference, and then I worked on my own palette to bring Halo's world to life. I focused on creating colors for atmosphere, and I decided with my editor (Matt Smith) to choose different background tones for each book, to help define the three different stages of Halo's life (the Hoop, the Clara Pandy and the War).

Book one has a green, dirty background color to give you a feeling of uselessness and deterioration, that perfectly matches life on Hoop. Book two has a pale yellow tone, because its Clara Pandy time, apparently an age of luxury surrounding Halo. And finally, red tones for book three because it's all about the war. To obtain these effects, I used background layers, with a wrinkled paper texture turned in three different colours, each one for the specific book I was working on.

I think that colour is like soundtrack in a movie: it should enhance the feelings and underline particular moments. That's how I tried to use my palette, often using weird colours to define feelings (blue for sadness, green or purple for fear.)

The complete article is available here.

Dark King Moore by Paolo Massagli

Art by Paolo Massagli.

Above, a powerful, dark Alan Moore portrait - with a bit of HPL in - by Italian artist PAOLO MASSAGLI. 

Paolo Massagli is known for his indie works which combines horror with sensuality; his most recent comics have been published by Hollow Press (here).

Melinda Gebbie's memoirs

From left to right: Lucia Joyce, Melinda Gebbie and Alan Moore. Art by Melinda Gebbie.

Excerpt from The NeneQuirer interview with Melinda Gebbie. 

The complete article is available here.

Melinda Gebbie: "I started writing a diary in my twenties. I thought if I write about my life it will get more interesting. And it did. [...]

This has been a very long project. I transcribed everything by hand then realised that was stupid but I always had something against typing so I couldn’t make myself type. I had four different typists. It’s been edited by a really hot pro, Donna Bond, she did a spiffing job. [...]

There was 1300 pages of pure transcription, I whacked off (edited away) 800 of them. The format I think is going to be two books of about 300 pages each. The first one will be about my life in San Francisco until I left it in 1984 and the next will be about the weird land of England up until Alan and I met and started working together.

[...] The book is the main thing. If you live with a champion swimmer and every day you go out to the paddling pool and try to get a little better at frog kicking… I can only get with my own language if I am isolated from the undertow of a certain culturally-valuable husband. It’s not his fault but still…"

The complete article is available here. 

Melinda Gebbie's site, HERE.

The Mindscape of Alan Moore: Italian book edition

Nella mente di Alan Moore (Oblò APS) - Art by Nicola Testoni.

Coming out at the end of September, Oblò APS (an Italian association aiming at promoting Comic Art), will publish an Italian book transcribing Alan Moore's narration from The Mindscape of Alan Moore documentary, written and directed by DeZ Vylenz.

The book, translated and edited by smoky man, includes 14 brand new illustrations by Italian painter and sculptor NICOLA TESTONI who also painted an amazing oil portrait of Moore used as cover. Testoni's art combines realism with a touch of surrealism providing an intriguing visual comment and counterpoint to Moore's words.

For more info and requests:
Oblò site (HERE) - Oblò Facebook page (HERE)
Nicola Testoni's site

Mental Magic Marble Moore. Art by Nicola Testoni. Oil on canvas.

Nella mente di Alan Moore, page 28 and 29. Words: Moore; illustration: Nicola Testoni.

Book backcover.

Alan Moore Pandemonium by Benjamin Vareille

Art by Benjamin Vareille.

Above, Alan Moore Pandemonium by French artist Benjamin Vareille.
In 2016 the illustration has been used as cover for issue n.18 of Gonzaï magazine.

Silkscreen poster available to purchase HERE.

Moore in the Eighties

From left to right: Ian Gibson and Alan Moore (November 1986).

Above, from The Forbidden Planet Archive, a fantastic photo of Alan Moore with Ian Gibson, dated 1986.

This year Forbidden Planet celebrates its 40th anniversary. The original Forbidden Planet opened at 23 Denmark Street, (the famous ‘Tin Pan Alley’) in the heart of London's West End on July 22nd 1978.

You can enjoy the complete FB archive HERE. Eighties archive: here.

• 2000AD The 1983 Judge Dredd Annual signing, 21 August 1982

• 2000AD The 1985 Judge Dredd Annual signing, 18 August 1985

• 2000AD Mega-signing, 16 August 1986

• Alan Moore and Ian Gibson signing Halo Jones Book 3, 22 November 1986

• Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons signing Watchmen, 24 October 1987

• Heartbreak Hotel signing, 16 April 1988

• Moore & Bolland signing Killing Joke, 21 May 1988

• Aargh! signing, 15 October 1988

Search for Moore, here.

2000AD Mega-signing.

Moore Against da System by Officina Infernale

Art by Officina Infernale (a.k.a. Andrea Mozzato)

Above a very intense, punk version of Alan Moore drawn by Italian über artist OFFICINA INFERNALE (a.k.a. Andrea Mozzato).

"Without any planning, he turned out the Moore version who's fucking angry at the comics majors... And obviously Moore is 100% right in his attitude!", Officina Infernale said.

More info regarding Officina Infernal: Tumblr page - Big Cartel.

Writing Watchmen in 1985!

Excerpt from comic book store zine Telegraph Wire which included a long interview from SDCC 1985 with... Alan Moore! The complete interview is available HERE.

Alan Moore: [...] WATCHMEN is my first project to actually use what I’ve learned. WATCHMEN is very, very structured. It’s twelve issues long.

I know exactly what the image in the last panel is going to be. I can see it as a whole from beginning to end. I’m really pleased with the way it’s working.

I’ve been working closely with Dave Gibbons on the project. Dave’s putting so much into it. It’s not just the writing; we’re coming together on a level of pure story-telling. I mean, the way Dave’s drawing things affects the way I’m writing it. The way he’s laying out pages is affecting the way I’m writing it.

It’s a really amazing experience. I’m enjoying it immensely. [...]

We’re trying to step back from the superhero a little bit; we want to take a fresh look at the idea of being a superhero. Joe Schuster and Jerry Siegel brought out SUPERMAN in 1939. There were no other superheroes and I think that for us today, it’s very difficult to imagine what the impact of that character was; since Superman in comics, the sky is full of flying men. It’s not quite the same. The whole superhero idea has grown up with cliches around it and that has smothered it in a way. You can no longer see the woods for the trees.

What me and Dave have tried to do with WATCHMEN is to somehow get back to that point where we stepped away from the conventional idea of superheroes. I wanted to do something that used the superhero in a very, very different way to the way it’s been used before: psychologically.

One of the main things is to see what effect a superhero would have upon the world. In the DC and Marvel universes, they don’t have any effect. They’re all extraordinary beings, but the world they live in is very much the same as ours.

In WATCHMEN, we try to think it through politically and socially. We’ve got a character called Mr. Manhattan who is the only actual superhero in the book.

He’s the only actual one with powers. He emerges about 1965 and from that point on, the world is different forever. Since he’s strongly aligned to the American military, obviously, he’s like a step beyond the neutron bomb. Instantly, the balance of world power changes.

I think if the American government had found a superhero, they would have been a little bit more adventuresome in their foreign policy whereas the Russians would most certainly have been a little more timid.

In the world we’re dealing with, America won the Vietnamese war. The Russians have not invaded Afghanistan. Basically, they’re in the Kremlin under the table with their fingers in their ears. They’re terrified and the only option that they have left is mutually assured destruction. Their backs are against the wall.

You’ve reached a point where the doomsday clock is seconds away from midnight. It’s closer to disaster than our own world is. That is one of the main themes of the book: it’s this paranoid, frightening world that’s just getting closer and closer to Armageddon.

And it’s all because of this one superhero.

There are other costumed heroes in the book, but most of them are retired because I don’t think that the American legal system, or any legal system, would support superheroes. It would just cause so many problems. If you allow one guy in a mask to go around beating people up, anyone in a mask can beat people up. It just wouldn’t work. So most of the superheroes have been forced into retirement – apart from those who are valuable to the military, which includes Dr. Manhattan. That is where it all begins.

There’s a lot of different threads in it. One of the things that ties the entire story together is a murder mystery that runs all the way through the plot.

I can’t tell you an awful lot without giving away the plot.

We’ve got some interesting characters. There’s Rorschach who’s a really psychotic vigilante. Whereas in most comic books the psychopath will get angry, a real psychopath doesn’t get angry. A psychopath will break your arm and smile… or never react at all. [...]

The complete interview is available HERE.

Extraordinary Gentlemen by David Hitchcock

Art by David Hitchcock.

Above, a stunning commission piece by great British comic book artist and illustrator DAVID HITCHCOCK portraying The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

(Grazie David for sending me the picture!)

For more info about David Hitchcock: Blog - Twitter page