COLOURED! The Royal Statue

It's finished! Every illustration from last year's Fantasy Week has been coloured and I'm ending it the same way I did back then: with this scene of a traveler standing before a statue of a kneeling king.


I was going to end with a short story about the traveler finding the statue and describing what he thought about it. But when I posted this in May 2013, I said the point was to arouse questions in the viewer's mind, not give them answers. So I'll stick with that. Still, maybe I shouldn't assume people have the same interest in my scribbles that I do.

I do want to say that the reason I decided to have the statue bowing is because that's not something statues do. They're usually standing tall and firm, for worship. I wanted something different, a King who remembers that worship should only come if you serve the people well.

There's other possibilities for why he's in that position though. Maybe he's bowing because the traveler is the next King. Or maybe he's bowing because he died of stomach cramps. Either way, it's probably written on that gold plaque, in that language I enjoyed making up.

I may do a new Fantasy Week before this year is out, with new illustrations!

Fantasy Week, Part 7: The Royal Monument

For the final day I decided not to draw a character, but a scene. A little event. What do you see here? I'm asking because I didn't want to draw something definitive, I wanted something the viewer could ponder over... and there's no point telling if I haven't got you doing that! But then there's no point having a blog if I'm not gonna tell you things, so here we go:

I went back to my thinking at the park: what would I want to see? Adventure isn't just about discovering people and creatures, it's about discovering things. Things such as... monuments. Big looming structures, beautiful and terrifying. Signs of a civilisation paying tribute to something important. I like the questions all that raises. Who were the civilisation? What's the monument meant to be? Why was it built?

So that's what this is. A traveller facing a statue, a scene to put those questions and more in the viewer's mind: it's a statue of a king, so why is he bowing? Shouldn't he be standing tall and regal? The traveller was only there to represent this idea of discovery, but ends becomes part of the possibilities. Where did he come from, and did he come looking for the statue? I was going to list the other ideas I had, but I don't want to take over.

I suppose this is almost a cumulative event of a lot of what I like in fantasy. A journey, exploration, discovery, mystery... however, I also answers. And action. Although I did give the traveller a sword, so it's kind of represented there. But really, that's why I said 'a lot of what I like in fantasy' but not 'everything'. I could probably have done a Fantasy Year.