The Making of The Creative Fire

Over at the collective artists blog, Muddy Colors, John Picacio talks about his inspiration for creating the cover for Brenda Cooper's The Creative Fire (Book One of Ruby's Song). He shows some classic paintings that inspired his piece, as well as rare glimpses into his pencils and early process pieces.

From John's piece:

"All of us are living in a fragile time for our fundamental rights, at least here in America. It seems our news and social feeds are filled with daily attacks on womens' rights. Revolutionary posters have always been rallying cries, and Lou and I felt like we might have a chance to evoke those here, as well as serve the novel's intentions. When I thought about who Ruby was, I thought of the 1940's image of Rosie the Riveter, as imagined by J. Howard Miller and Norman Rockwell (with genius inspiration from Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel). I thought of the grace of Sandro Botticelli's The Birth of Venus, along with Russian revolution posters, and Howard Chandler Christy's 'Fight or Buy Bonds' painting."

Shop Picacio

Today, newly-crowned Hugo-winning artist John Picacio has just unveiled a webstore. Offered for the first time are special, limited-edition prints of all twelve of his pieces from the 2012 Song of Ice and Fire calendar, as well as prints of his work on Elric of Melnibone, and select new and classic covers. I especially love his Elric work, but one of my favorite pieces of all is the print of "Girl with Microphone," which is one of the pieces I art directed and which will be the cover of Brenda Cooper's forthcoming novel, The Creative Fire (Book One of Ruby's Song).