covers- DOING THE ISLANDS WITH BACCHUS

D oing the Islands with Bacchus - Like the 'Immortality' cover I showed on may 21, this is another that I lived with through several variations over a ten year period. In the top two I was stuck at two extremes; one puts the protagonist so far back among the beach girls that we hardly notice him, while the second brings him so far forward that the girls could be in another picture. The lower composition tries to resolve the problem by having a large girl in the foreground and the small group further off , but not too far. I like that I kept the rough painted edge in that second one in my xerox copy. You never see that again after the picture is printed as a cover. I remember visiting Matt Wagner in Portland Oregon around the time I painted the second picture and we discussed the aesthetic of painting up to a straight edge by using masking tape. Collectors apparently like to have a clean edge. Damn them I say; let's see all the workings. The foreground girl in the lower pair is based on a figure from a ladies' underwear catalogue; I was very taken with the arrangement of a strong reflective light thrown up from the hot sand
(1) is an ink drawing intended for the cover of a third issue of the Harrier Bacchus in 1988 if the series hadn't been discontinued (#2 saw Bacchus arrive among the Greek islands to begin his adventures there). I saw a chance to successfully submit it to the Amazing Heroes annual swimsuit special (Fantagraphics) 1991-(third girl back looks out of proportion, and the band of distant figures was added to fill the space that would originally have been taken up by a logo)
(2) Doing the Islands with Bacchus, Dark Horse mini-series 1991, 1 of 3- a xerox of my cover in oils, untrimmed, without logo and title type.
(3) coloured ink drawing, solicitation image for my own 176 page collected Doing the isands With Bacchus 1997, all the girls in this one, (colouring too), by Pete Mullins from photo refs.
(4) chemical proof of my finished cover in oils, 1997, without logo and title type. Note the seated girl in the middle-distance, from a photo, who appears in all three of the colour versions and may even still be sun-baking in my cumbersome file of old reference cuttings, third drawer down in the old metal cabinet..

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coincidentally from comments:
"This next story caught my eye after re-reading 'Doing the Islands with Bacchus' the other night."-Ben Smith
An 89-year-old (british) woman took a £2,000 taxi trip to Greece - because she can't stand waiting in airports.-BBC NEWS-30 May
Taxi driver Mr Delefortrie said: "I like driving and it seemed a good idea. The drive through Austria was spectacular.
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John Coulthart alerts me to a new exhibition opening June 1:
DALí & FILM - A GROUNDBREAKING SHOW AT TATE MODERN. This is from the 24 Hour Museum site:
The dream recounted by Gregory Peck for analysis by Ingrid Bergman (in the Hitchcock movie Spellbound, the dream sequence of which was designed by Dali)– with its distorted perceptions, eerie landscapes and faceless tormentor – remains one of the most powerful depictions of the subconscious ever seen in the medium of film. The image of the eye returns here, again being slashed by a man with a pair of scissors; other disembodied eyes watch the chaotic action from their position on top of plant stalks.
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in other news:
Man falls off balcony in spitting contest