A delightfully insightful and unique interpretation of two key characters in Tolkien's universe, created by comic book artist João M. P. Lemos.
1) How long have you been a LOTR or Hobbit fan?
Since my pre-teens, when a few friends, who were hard-core Tolkien fans, introduced me to the books. I was already an avid reader of folklore and I loved to find how Tolkien echoed and reshaped a lot of mythological themes.
2) What does your artwork depict?
(For the first piece) I went for the Witch-King of Angmar, and some of the other Nâzgul in the background, all riding Fell Beasts in saddleless fashioned plunge.
(For the second piece) This is a take on Radagast, the Brown, one of the ecology-driven characters in Tolkien's work. He's one of the Five Wizards, like Gandalf or Saruman, but one first and foremost bound to the protection of the local fauna and flora. Radagast is described as being of shifting shapes and colors which, in my mind, makes him even more indistinguishable from and linked to the soil and the woods.
3) Why did you choose this particular character?
(First piece) For Tolkien it was paramount to keep a notion of free 'applicability' to the metaphorical potential of his creation. For example, while some people in the UK identified his work as a specific retelling of both World Wars, a lot of the American youth of the 60's embraced Middle-Earth as an ecological saga, and that's the personal way he wanted it to be read. For me, the Nâzgul, in particular, echoes the threat of any established, yet hollow, terror. They are not, by any means, among the strongest creatures of Tolkien's world but they conquer through their ability to create an overwhelming state of fear. The Witch-King strikes me as a rather abysmal illusion (including to himself) that the enlightened and fluid action of Eowin, loftier than the grip the Nazgûl held on men's hearts, is able to dispel.
(Second piece) Tolkien is famous for his exhaustive, bordering on real world encyclopedic, charming descriptions of his world but I keep in mind a wonderful passage where he mentions these distant, eldritch sounds coming from unknown patches of Middle-Earth. Regardless of how interesting a sort of reverential take on his most famous characters and places can be, it is always exciting to depict something that, by absence of locked references, frees you to depict it however you want to. Besides that, I like the potential of an earthier, simpler, almost primitive take on the wizard stereotype and archetype.
Blogs 01/07/2015
