Barlowe's Inferno

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Our Gryphons Are Different: In Barlowe's Guide to Fantasy, griffins are fancifully portrayed as a species of real, albeit extinct, creatures native to Central Asia, which endured until at least the first century AD before dying out for unknown causes. In a nod to speculation that the griffon myth arose from early discovery of Protoceratops fossils, they are portrayed as literally being descended from a mutant strain of the actual dinosaurs, and consequently depicted as Protoceratops with avian wings and long, feather-tipped tails. Female griffins excavated extensive tunnel systems in which to brood their eggs, often bringing gold to the surface as they did, but only a very brave or very foolish person would have risked delving into a griffin's nest to get it. The Examination– (from Barlowe’s Inferno– acrylic on ragboard) – While souls are treated as a resource by demons in an unthinkable number of ways in Hell, a true understanding of them as once-living organisms on a physical level is absent. The fact that Lucifer went to war in large part because of them has created a curiosity that many demons find irresistible.

Wayne Barlowe https://www.illustrationhistory.org/illustrations/lucifuge-rofocale Additional Resources I first saw Barlowe's Guide To Extra-Terrestrials when I was a kid," says Jonathan Knight, the project lead on the Dante's Inferno game. Realising what he's just implied, he turns to his colleague and adds: "You were practically a kid drawing them; I don't want to age you too much!" (Barlowe was 21 when the book was published in 1979. He's now 51.) Years later, thinking about this game, we came upon Barlowe's Inferno - a series of paintings, really his own unique take on hell. The visual style of them is just so amazing, bold. Exactly what we were looking for. I kept going home every night to my wife saying, 'I can't get any drawings that are as good as this guy Wayne Barlowe'. She said, 'Why don't you just call him and have him do the game for you?'."The architecture, however, is grand. His notion that the buildings of hell are built from the bodies of the damned is a brilliant idea, and the form of the architecture (which he terms archiorganic) do, indeed, seem to belong in a literal Hell. After painting numerous book covers--many of them in the heroic fantasy category--Barlowe hit it big in 1979 with Barlowe's Guide to Extraterrestrials. The book featured numerous aliens from various SF authors, each with a Barlowe illo alongside it. The book sold well and won a Locus Award for Best Illustrated Book. The Horned Dinosaurs (1996): Another collaboration with Peter Dodson, this one focused on ceratopsian biology and evolution.

The notion of a pre-existing fauna indigenous to Hell before the demons arrived opens up a whole line of conjecture. What would their evolutionary course be? What new life-forms could we find? While this painting represents a semi-intelligent individual, there must be countless Abyssals that are mere animals. Much as I did with EXPEDITION, I plan to do a series of wildlife paintings focusing on the fauna of Hell. One is underway as I write this. I read Paradise Lost a number of years ago - probably nearly 20 years ago now - and it got under my skin, and has provided me in my own personal work with the sensibility and underpinnings that appealed to me."The Streets of Dis– (from Barlowe’s Inferno– acrylic on ragboard) Hell’s capital is a teeming metropolis of many millions. A tangle of streets beyond count, the city’s arteries are clogged with work-gangs of souls and demons of every description. Barlowe's Inferno (1998): An illustrated book depicting Barlowe's vision of Hell. Inspired by Dante Alighieri's The Divine Comedy. We're sitting in the Milton room by the way," Wayne Barlowe confides, with a twinkle in his eye. We've just been talking about Paradise Lost, the English writer's 17th-century epic poem, and the defining literary influence on Barlowe's artistic life. Sargatanas before the Behemoths– (from BRUSHFIRE: Illuminations from the Inferno, acrylic on ragboard) – Created primarily as siege weapons, the Behemoths can prove to be potent weapons upon the battlefield as well. Equipped with two massive bone-hammers and a heavy chin-blade these greatly enlarged souls are the once-cruel rulers of Asian empires transformed by the Demon Major Yen Wang to suit his needs. Donated to the Rebellion, they proved to be an invaluable military asset to Sargatanas. Dante I read in college; that had a completely different feel to it, and I loved it for what it was, but something about Milton's anti-heroics and all of that was very appealing," he reveals. The filename for this is "tameable beast", so here's hoping.