The Road to Amber (86 page)

T
he first part of any illustration commission for me is the reading. As soon as David Grubbs began to send the stories to me, I started reading them through. Some of them I had read previously, but quite a few of the stories were new to me as well.
Lord of Light
has always been one of my favorite books, so I read that one again just to add to my sense of immersion in Roger’s universes.

David had sent a list of elements summarizing themes and motifs in Roger’s writings for me to consider. “A Word from Zelazny” and the Notes after each entry were very helpful as well.

The more I read, the more I became aware of how vast and all-encompassing Roger’s writing is. Initially I felt overwhelmed by it all: there was simply too much to try to do a fair job of capturing it all. Upon reflection I settled on a blend of 1) managing elements of Roger Zelazny’s stories that may apply to tales within a particular volume, and 2) adding things “on the fly”, as a part of the process of doing the painting, using connections that popped up while adding details to the composition. I’d be less than honest to say it didn’t occur to me that I could paint just about anything at random, knowing that a connection could be found between what I had depicted and some narrative or thematic element in one or more of Zelazny’s writings.

That was liberating. I felt free to develop the composition from a “big design” standpoint since there was such a wealth of potential material to draw on to “populate” the image areas with.

The idea of running one image across the spines of the six books was part of David’s plan for the series. Alice Lewis turned that into some proposed jacket designs using a stock image and presented the idea to me. Very early on, we discussed the idea among the three of us and planned how to put it together.

The challenge of trying to make it work seemed exciting to me, so I was drawn to that approach right away. Once the reading was complete, I began to experiment with different conceptual frameworks within which to place the elements, working very loosely on small panels in monochrome acrylic paints. Right away I decided that the composition would best be done on a diagonal, to negate the enforced verticality of the edges ofthe volumes. A series of angled columns would serve as elements cutting across those verticals as well as carrying the main design from one spine to the next. I liked the idea of columns and their suggestion of old classical cultures in desolation. I can’t explain why it seemed fitting to me.

So once that provided the framework for me, I was ready to work with and around those shapes.

I made a compositional sketch with the edges of the different volumes marked off, trying my best to arrange the salient elements to work both on the spines and in the image as a whole. I felt the columns alone would be too linear so I added the curving shapes of the fabrics on top to provide a contrast for the type destined to go there and to give some relief from the linear repetition of the columns.

Some columns are intact but others are broken. An interrupted pattern, I thought, is more interesting than rigid regularity and conformity.

I usually work from background to foreground, and this painting was no exception. In spite of my best efforts to be methodical in my approach, however, there is always some back-and-forth when I adjust the relative contrast between the foreground and background. It usually involves some seesawing until the balance feels right.

I was too impatient to get going on the image to wait to have all the various elements ironed out in advance, so once I had the essential foreground/background areas defined, I went to work, trusting myself to find the shapes within the image as I worked on it. I was aiming more for a feel of the essence of Roger’s stories rather than slavishly shoehorning a set number of pictorial pieces into the image.

The fallen building, angled columns, broken landscape and post-apocalyptic feel were created to supply a framework in which to contain and support the other elements. The specific items gave me a sense of antiquiry and lost empire, set on a foundation of nature, and this was a subjective reflection of Roger’s writing to a certain degree…though I can’t point to a specific narrative. Rocks, of course, can be found directly in “Collector’s Fever,” but that’s incidental.

The framework might also be thought of as Zelazny’s subconscious…a landscape of Byzantine/Greek architecture and other mythic elements, filled with images from all corners of his imagination—I did title the painting “Z-World”.

The diagonals, an obvious feature of the painting, were purely a design consideration, though the feeling of “disorientation” does feature prominently in some of Roger’s stories, and so can be seen as a contributing factor. Roger had an interesting way of looking at things and one could point to the skewed horizon line as a reflection of this, metaphorically speaking.

I chose one mountain to place in the background as a symbol for all Zelazny’s mountains. The shapes of Mt. Fuji, Amber’s Kolvir (inspired by the Sangre de Cristo mountains visible from Zelazny’s home in Sante Fe), Saint Stephen’s Range (from “This Moment of the Storm”), and “The Gray Sister” (the 40-mile-high peak that reached above the atmosphere in “This Mortal Mountain”) are at such odds with one another that there’s no way to make one stand for all, so I didn’t try. I was conscious of the title of the third volume being
This Mortal Mountain
, and it was my hope the mountain would fall on the spine of the jacket on that volume.

The
balding man
wearing a brown shirt with an x-like pattern is meant to suggest Roger Zelazny. His head is simply too small on the 15” by 30” painting to do a real portrait of him. I wish I had done the painting larger.

The red cord wrapped around his left wrist is the Thread worn by the title character in “Kalifriki of the Thread.” He is holding the egg-shaped mechanical device that replaced Victor Corgo’s heart in “The Furies.”

The
figure in leathers
, wearing a sword and carrying a spear/pike, is a stand-in for all of Zelazny’s heroic characters, including Corwin, Dilvish, Lancelot and Shadowjack. The spear itself is a design element used only for its shape, a line to run counter to the tilt of the columns.

The
figure made of metal
was originally to be Roger himself, hanging out with Corwin of Amber or Shadowjack. But after trying, I just couldn’t do an acceptably recognizable portrait of a person when the head is ¼” tall. So the figure became a robot. After all, robots, cyborgs and intelligent machines figure in many Zelazny stories. There are robots in “For A Breath I Tarry”—though none that seem to be humanoid in shape. Still, Frost desires to become human, so…

The
woman with red/brown hair
, wearing shorts, hiking boots and a travel sack is obviously Mari from “24 Views ofMt. Fuji, by Hokusai.”

Saturn and Some of Its Moons

The last line of “The Doors of His Face, the Lamps of His Mouth” is “No one is born a baitman, I don’t think, but the rings of Saturn sing epithalamium the sea-beast’s dower.”

It can also be viewed as an astronomical reference, a planetary theme. [Volume 5 contains two stories specifically about Saturn: “Dreadsong” (partly science fact) and “The Bands ofTitan.” —EDS.]