Let us all take a moment to appreciate the art of Greg Hildebrandt.

I learned that last week, the artist Greg Hildebrandt passed away. When I first heard of the "Brothers Hildebrandt" I felt that their surnames were certainly meant for great artists. It's the kind of name that you'd expect to see on an oils and acrylics line of paint in your local art store. Certainly Star Wars fans are familiar with their work from a painting of Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia. It's notable that they did this project without even having seen the movie. I read somewhere that Lucas had promised them that they'd only have their art on a few promo materials, but then it just got slapped on everything until they finally had to sue to get paid (and I think it was only for like $2,000). Hildebrandt was also the guy that gave Luke Skywalker abs that Luke never had.

Every fantasy reader, even those not familiar with them, has probably seen elements and themes of their work popularized in other materials and art. Here (for example) is the Balrog from Fellowship of the Ring. 

And then there's the depiction that Hildebrandt did of the Argonath (Lord of the Rings), which was a monument of two enormous statues carved in the likenesses of Isildur and Anárion standing on either side of the River Anduin at the northern entrance to Nen Hithoel. It marked the northern border of Gondor, and nearby to the south were previous outposts, Amon Hen and Amon Lhaw.

For me, I think the one thing that always drew my eye (about their work) was their use of light and shadow. Many of their paintings have this high contrast to them to really sharpen features while adding a kind of magic to the whole mix. Oftentimes, the shadows in their landscapes feel cool to me (low temperature as opposed to "awesome"). Maybe it's because they would oftentimes drench their shadowy landscapes with a kind of blue tone. The Hildebrandt's dabbled in just about anything that would take their art. Here's a picture from a Superman comic book that was illustrated by Greg Hildebrandt:

And they also lovingly illustrated the Sword of Shannara by Terry Brooks, basically turning his first outing as an author into an illustrated edition. I don't know any authors who get this kind of treatment so early in their careers. From what I've read, Random House was just really trying to mine the market of people who wanted "something else" after consuming The Lord of the Rings.

No matter what their assignment was to illustrate, I feel like the Hildebrandt brothers showed up to paint something as realistic as it could be portrayed, given the many fantastic elements of their overall portfolio. With Greg's passing, there aren't too many artists of this era that are left. I can think of a handful: Boris Vallejo, Julie Bell, and Michael Whelan (I'll be really sad when Whelan passes on). Michael Whelan actually retired until Brandon Sanderson showed up with a truckload of money and dumped it on him to illustrate his books. I can't blame Sanderson. Whelan (in my opinion) was the best in the business, and it was probably every artist's dream to get a Whelan cover. Since people were/are just throwing millions of dollars at Sanderson, I think the money came so easy that he could just feel free to splurge on whatever his heart desired. Sanderson could have diamond studded window wipers if he wanted. Anyway, I'll leave you with this movie poster for Clash of the Titans that I really liked (illustrated by Greg Hildebrandt). It's weird to think that this era of art is gone, but as I've often said, "Everything in life is temporary. Even us."