It reminds me somewhat of this passage from Richard II:

“… let us sit upon the ground

And tell sad stories of the death of kings;

How some have been deposed; some slain in war,

Some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed;

Some poison’d by their wives: some sleeping kill’d;

All murder’d: for within the hollow crown

That rounds the mortal temples of a king

Keeps Death his court and there the antic sits,

Scoffing his state and grinning at his pomp, …”

The two moral pillars of today are “follow your heart” and “thou shalt not judge.”  If you happen to think these are ridiculous precepts, you will have very little cultural support.  For the past 20 years “follow your heart” has been the golden rule of pop cultural ethics, and for many people it is a magic phrase that not only describes the theme of almost every romantic comedy, but more conveniently (when used self-righteously by a husband who sleeps with his secretary) it exempts one from moral scrutiny.  I think these two precepts reveal a blind spot of our era.  We notice this blindspot when we read older works that are not of our era.

This week for the first time, I read a Norse story (not of our era) that dwells very creatively on the destructive force of evil passions.  It is called “Loki and the Witch’s Heart.”

I’ll give you the highlights:

Gulveig is a witch that comes to Asgard.  She is wicked.  She smiles at things in Asgard, and, wherever she casts her smile, feelings of dread grow.  Furthermore, the witch’s presence starts to create treacherous feelings in Asgard.  Odin commands her death, which turns out to be a bit of a chore.  Then he commands that her body be burned and the flames be fanned by Hraesvelgur (a giant in the shape of an eagle whose wings cause wind to blow).  Loki comes back to Asgard from a trip and finds Gulveig has been killed and her body burned.  He goes to the place where her ashes lay and discovers that her heart was so evil the flames could not consume it.  Not to be outdone by flames, Loki then eats her heart.  Loki’s own heart is now treacherous, his passions are evil, and his sense of the beautiful is perverted.  We know this because in the stories that follow, he is attracted to ugly evil giantesses, and in time Loki marries a witch who then gives birth to creepy monster children.

The story is countercultural to us because it assumes that some pleasures are evil.  The witch’s smile, not her frown cause foreboding.  The story also suggests that evil passions aren’t purified by their intensity or authenticity.  It is popular to speak of evil as though it is a management problem.  People “act up” because their circumstances haven’t been properly arranged.  The assumption is that evil is external not internal.  This story ignores that idea.  Almost like Adam and Eve who ingest their disobedience and it becomes a part of them, Loki eats wickedness and it becomes him.

Loki’s treachery results in the exchange of truth for a lie, the exchange of beauty for ugliness, and the exchange of goodness for evil.  If Loki were to appear on daytime television it might go something like this:

Host: Today we have Loki, traitor to the gods, with us in the studio.

(round of applause).

Host: Let me start by asking a question that must be in the minds of our studio audience.  Why did you do it?  Why did you eat the witch’s heart and provoke a chain of events that will lead to the destruction of the world?

Loki: I had to follow my heart.

Host: You’re basically saying you did it because you wanted to, but when you use the phrase “follow your heart” it sounds noble.

Loki: I had to be true to myself.  I’m a mischief-maker.

Host: Had you ever considered not being a mischief–

Loki: You mean be fake?  Be inauthentic?

Host: I quite see what you mean.  Unless one does whatever they want, whenever they want, they’re fake and inauthentic.  That sounds right.  Still, you are married to a remarkably unattractive and evil woman, who bore you three vicious monster children that will play a pretty big part in the destruction of the world.  Are you satisfied with that situation?

Loki: You sound pretty judgmental to me.

Host: Aren’t all moral judgements judgmental?

Loki: I said you were judgmental first … so I get to make the moral judgements.

Host:  Well I can’t argue with that.  We’re going to a commercial break and when we comeback, our next guest, Hitler will teach us a lesson about believing in yourself and following your dreams.  Stay with us.

  I sort of like the idea that the guy was tangled up in the thing he was spreading.

This is a quick sketch I made of him a few years ago while he slept in his chair.

And here is a postcard that he sent my grandmother while in the Army during the Second World War.

Every time I’m in the bookstore I look through children’s picture books.  I try to compare them with books I would have enjoyed as a kid.  The books that receive popular acclaim are clever and well designed and perhaps funnier than books used to be.  However, I feel like the books even ten years ago had more atmosphere than the ones that are popular today.  Is this the case?  My favorite book to leaf through as a kid was the beautifully illustrated adaptation of Pilgrim’s Progress, A Dangerous Journey.  At any rate, it may be ill-advised or an affront to the collective wisdom of children’s literature, but I wanted to do a picture book for my younger self, who is a great deal like my present self.  Here’s a sneak peak.

The brief said the publisher needed “a high-brow political cartoon-style commissioned illustration of the author ‘taking aim at everyone’ (re: the subtitle).”

From a client/expectations management perspective, I’ve never really been satisfied with the way I handle the rough drawing stage.  If any illustrators out there have ideas how best to handle this stage, let me know.

Here’s the dilemma: Roughs that are too polished compete with the final, but roughs that are too rough make the client nervous.

Furthermore, when likenesses are involved, they attract analysis even at the early conceptual stages.  This is a problem when the discussions veer toward how the person might be made to look better instead of if the pose is working.

This time I decided to try the roughs with faces that are obviously incomplete.  I had zero problems.  The likeness didn’t even come up.  I tend to think this has more to do with the client’s general coolness and less to do with any strategizing on my part, but the job went so smoothly, that I think I might try this in the future.

Frequently, the client will choose the concept I’m least excited about, but in this case the author chose the bottom ‘duelist’ concept.  This is the one I most wanted to do.

Here’s the final drawing with the likeness:

I affixed the drawing to mdf with a couple layers of matte medium, and painted it.

The tree in the background is the result of looking at a lot of old Collier’s Weekly covers and Maxfield Parish paintings.

And here’s the final, tweaked a bit in photoshop.

I did the illustration on Carl Trueman’s upcoming book, Fools Rush In Where Monkeys Fear to Tread | P & R Publishing.  I painted the donkeyphant illustration for the author’s earlier book Republocrat and was excited to work on this new one.  Dawn Premako, the art director at P&R, is a joy to work with (she even provided reference for the likeness), and the whole job went swimmingly.

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