Mani and Mia weren’t awake when the asteroid struck Indiana. Not that many people were: the three-kilometer-wide mass, moving at speeds and a trajectory that pointed to an extrasolar origin, hit shortly after 3 in the morning local time, and … Continue reading →

The saga of the Harkun, one of the five earliest sentient species to evolve on Earth, has been told elsewhere. What is less well-known is that even after the rest of the species evacuated the planet after its famed and … Continue reading →

Onibaba (1964)
Director: Kaneto Shindô
Stars: Nobuko Otowa, Jitsuko Yoshimura, Kei Satô |
Two women kill samurai and sell their belongings for a living. While one of them is having an affair with their neighbor, the other woman meets a mysterious samurai wearing a bizarre mask.
















House of Usher (1960)Director: Roger CormanStars: Vincent Price, Mark Damon, Myrna Fahey Upon entering his fiancée's family mansion, a man discovers a savage family curse and fears that his future brother-in-law has entombed his bride-to-be prematurely.Vincent Price with painting by Burt Shonberg

Virgin Witch (1972)Director: Ray AustinStars: Ann Michelle, Vicki Michelle, Keith Buckley |Christine gets her big chance at modeling when she applies at Sybil Waite's agency. Together with Christine's sister Betty they go to a house in the country for the weekend for a photo shoot. Sybil has lured Christine to the castle for more than modeling: she is recruiting a virgin for induction into a witch's coven, led by the owner of the castle, Gerald. To their surprise, Christine is more than eager to join the coven, but begins her own secret battle for control.











Suspiria (1977)Director: Dario ArgentoStars: Jessica Harper, Stefania Casini, Flavio BucciAn American newcomer to a prestigious German ballet academy comes to realize that the school is a front for something sinister amid a series of grisly murders.




Phantom of the Paradise (1974)
Director: Brian De Palma
Stars: Paul Williams, William Finley, Jessica Harper
A disfigured composer sells his soul for the woman he loves so that she will perform his music. However, an evil record tycoon betrays him and steals his music to open his rock palace, The Paradise.





Häxan (1922)Director: Benjamin ChristensenStars: Benjamin Christensen, Elisabeth Christensen, Maren PedersenFictionalized documentary showing the evolution of witchcraft, from its pagan roots to its confusion with hysteria in modern Europe.

Simon, King of the Witches (1971)
Director: Bruce Kessler
Stars: Andrew Prine, Brenda Scott, George Paulsin
Simon, a young man with magic powers, invokes the help of the evil forces in order to take revenge on a man who cheated him with a bad cheque.
















La Papesse (original title)
A Woman Possessed (1975)
Director: Mario Mercier
Stars: Lisa Livane, Erika Maaz, Jean-François Delacour
Laurent, a seemingly normal young man, is looking to join a witches' sect that resides in a forest near his house. The only thing is Laurent's wife Aline also needs to join the sect in order to complete his initiation. Aline is understandably reluctant, so the sect heads design a series of events designed to break her down.





























La Goulve (original title)
Erotic Witchcraft (1972)
Directors: Mario Mercier, Bepi Fontana (co-director)
Stars: Hervé Hendrickx, César Torres, Anne Varèze
Axel, the magician, raises a boy into adulthood. When Axel dies, it's the young man - son of a murderer, and well tutored by a magician - to keep on the tradition of guarding the Daughter of the Golem.








The Demons (1973)
Director: Jesús Franco (as Clifford Brown)
Stars: Anne Libert, Carmen Yazalde, Doris Thomas
A group of nuns become possessed by demons and are then tortured in a dungeon of horrors during the inquisition.






Voodoo Devil Drums (1944)



She Demons (1958)Director: Richard E. CunhaStars: Irish McCalla, Tod Griffin, Victor Sen Yung Heroic, but dull, Fred Maklin and beautiful, but spoiled, Jerrie Turner wash up on an uncharted tropical island. They are soon captured by ex-Nazi Colonel Osler, who also has imprisoned a bevy of beauty contest winners whom he allows to be whipped by his slavering Nazi storm troopers. 



about Stephen Romano

On the tail of the Old School Renaissance has come another movement—the rise of the fanzine. Although the fanzine—a nonprofessional and nonofficial publication produced by fans of a particular cultural phenomenon, got its start in Science Fiction fandom, in the gaming hobby it first started with Chess and Diplomacy fanzines before finding fertile ground in the roleplaying hobby in the 1970s. Here these amateurish publications allowed the hobby a public space for two things. First, they were somewhere that the hobby could voice opinions and ideas that lay outside those of a game’s publisher. Second, in the Golden Age of roleplaying when the Dungeon Masters were expected to create their own settings and adventures, they also provided a rough and ready source of support for the game of your choice. Many also served as vehicles for the fanzine editor’s house campaign and thus they showed another DM and group played said game. This would often change over time if a fanzine accepted submissions. Initially, fanzines were primarily dedicated to the big three RPGs of the 1970s—Dungeons & Dragons, RuneQuest, and Traveller—but fanzines have appeared dedicated to other RPGs since, some of which helped keep a game popular in the face of no official support.

Since 2008 with the publication of Fight On #1, the Old School Renaissance has had its own fanzines. The advantage of the Old School Renaissance is that the various Retroclones draw from the same source and thus one Dungeons & Dragons-style RPG is compatible with another. This means that the contents of one fanzine will be compatible with the Retroclone that you already run and play even if not specifically written for it. Labyrinth Lord and  Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay have proved to be popular choices to base fanzines around, as has Swords & Wizardry. 

Delayed Blast Gamemaster is a fanzine of a different stripe. Published by Philip Reed Games following successful Kickstarter campaigns, Delayed Blast Gamemaster is a fanzine dedicated to supporting roleplaying fantasy games, but a particular style of fantasy roleplaying games—Dungeons & Dragons. Yet the issues are entirely systemless, which means that their contents can be used in Dungeons & Dragons, any of the fantasy roleplaying retroclones you care to name, and most fantasy roleplaying games with a little effort. Published following a successful Kickstarter campaign as part of the inaugural Zine Quest, the first issue of Delayed Blast Gamemaster was published in  September, 2019.

What strikes you first about Delayed Blast Gamemaster #1 is its graphical design. It is all white art and text on matt black pages. Now before anyone complains that this might be ink heavy when comes to the printing out of the PDF, the fanzine is sold in both heavy and light ink formats. The effect though is striking, almost jauntily creepy and oppressive in its artwork’s depiction of skeletal archers, oozes, and overly ocular creatures. The text is both heavy and large, so is a lot easier to read than it otherwise might have been.

As to the concept behind Delayed Blast Gamemaster it is simply that of inspiration scattered subject by subject across nine tables. So ‘OneDTen Urban Locations’, ‘OneDSix Forgotten Spellbooks’, FiveDSix Unusual Treasures’, ‘OneDEight Dungeon Oddities’, ‘OneDSix Magic Shields’, ‘TwoDSix Potions’, ‘OneDSix Warped Monsters’, ‘OneDTwelve Adventure Hooks’, and ‘OneDFour Dungeon Doors’. So all that the Game Master has to do is pick a table or subject, roll the die, check the relevant entry, and use it as inspiration to create something of her or adapt the entry to the roleplaying game of her choice. The most obvious choice to adapt the entry to, is of course, Dungeons & Dragons, due to the similarities in language, but other roleplaying games would work too.

For example, roll a three on ‘OneDEight Dungeon Oddities’ and you get a Necromancer’s Chest, a combination trap-monster. It is simply a necromancer’s chest which he has trapped with several ghosts. Disarm the trap or use the key and of course, a Thief opens the chest without any problems; fail and two or more ghosts are unleashed to hunt the Thief and alert the chest’s owner! Roll a four on the ‘OneDSix Warped Monsters’ and the result is the Skeletal Mage, which simply suggests giving a standard skeleton monster a spell or two or more, all to add a simple twist on a classic monster. Roll a seven on ‘OneDTen Urban Locations’ and you have found yourself at Pies (and Lies) which describes a pie shop which sells cheap, moderately tasty, meat pies. The shop also does a nice sideline in rumours and secrets, which its owner and his family either sells off to the underworld or uses to blackmail the subject of those rumours and secrets.

Now there are a lot of entries and ideas in Delayed Blast Gamemaster #1, which is the point. Perhaps though, the design of the oddities and monsters dwell a little upon Oozes and monsters like the Mimic, with entries such as the Mimicspawn, Oozegoblin, and Weremimic, but the author at least is upfront about his fascination with such creatures. The main issue is that there no index, either of the entries or the tables. Otherwise, the fanzine is well written, easy to ready, and easy to use. Physically, there is a certain heft to it both in terms of production values—which are high for a fanzine—and its feel in the hand.


Delayed Blast Gamemaster #1 is simply lots of ideas a Game Master can bring to her game. She will need to do some work to bring them into her campaign, but the ideas will work with Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition as much as they would with Old School Essentials Classic Fantasy , and whatever your choice of fantasy roleplaying game, further inspiration is never unwanted.

In advance of this Sunday’s Mother’s Day Flash Sale, reminders of when it was quiet.

"..and so pass through the matrix of memory and throughThe archetype that defined the first vision and set our ParametersTo an inner meaning without external references,
THE THIRD.DOOR
Witches?Poor DevilsEach of the paintings has a true circumstance…and the result of my ‘being there’
My general observation of my contribution was, as I wrote at the time‘When reason sleeps in the minds of the wiseWitches burn and demons rise’
THE ART OF RAY ROBINSON: THE THIRD DOORby Charlotte Rodgers, October 6 2016
‘NO ONE CAN MAKE A JAPANESE TEA CEREMONY BOWL..THEY GROW FROM THE HANDS OF THE MASTER AND THE NEEDS OF THE CLAY…THE MASTER ALLOW"
Ray Robinson
History is littered with visionaries who change our perception, Often, in these people’s lifetime their work, their art is only glimpsed out of the corner of an eye and whilst it changes you, the change isn’t necessarily acknowledged at source.
It usually takes another visionary to stop, pause and recognise the impact. Rarely is the originator of the change of awareness still alive at this moment of recognition.
I often wondered what it would be like to communicate with one of these iconoclasts. If I met Austin Osman Spare for instance, would I have the ability to recognise him, to pause, and open myself up to a different way of seeing?
I first encountered Ray Robinson’s work when I was interviewing Gallery Owner and Art Dealer Stephen Romano, and I found it to be some of the most powerful art I’ve come across.
Stephen suggested I contact Ray, and thus started one of the most magical mystery tours of an interview I’ve ever done.
Now I’ve interviewed many artists and spiritual teachers, but this particular conversation fell into neither camp and was in a league apart from both.
A good interviewer adapts themselves to the individual rhythm and dance of those they are conversing with and there can be a huge variation in movement.
In this particular instance I have been challenged, insulted, taken on mystical journeys, had the most incredible dreams, but never, NEVER had a question directly answered.
Truth to tell I loved the process, infuriating as it was at points.
The following relates portions of conversations with a great artist who will change you. Recognise it, allow it, and for gods sakes try and see Ray Robinson’s work in actuality.
Ray, I’m not a formally trained art critic so this discussion won’t be focused on academic interpretation of your work. Hopefully you wont be insulted by any ignorance on my part but instead regard it as way to communicate as freely as you want without having to adhere to any particular approach.I’ve read your ‘Grandmother Chronicles’ which perhaps gives an insight into your structuring of reality and art.Words are often so limited but this is an astounding piece of writing.The trauma of leaving your home in WW2 London, going to stay at your grandmother’s and undergoing an initiation of sorts into different perceptions of vision and interpretation is wonderful, as is the way you describe the re-presentation of perceptions of light, time and space.Now it would be easy for me to turn this into a conversation where I grill you about aspects of your work that I’m personally fascinated by, constantly interrupting you with my irritating over enthusiastic asides, but I won’t. I am an untrained artist who has written a few books and my personal creative interests, what I focus on and what I often write about, are spirituality and power that are contained within objects and art. The older I get the more I realise that the line between art and magic is so fine as to be non existent.
So who are you?
Very brave (I am not sure whether Ray is referring to himself or me for approaching him in that statement) Stephen Romano can cover the exterior for the last 40 years. (follow below link) I live in Nova Scotia but am originally from London, England. I am a very trained artist who has also written a few books. I have lived a life with the fact that there is no line at all.Nothing has ever inspired me. Mine has been a search for ‘why’ I do not know. I know that I do not know, but why the great gaps in a humans basic understanding? The senses to not sense but, still, humans survive.Inspiration surely is the source of the creative process and if creativity doesn’t exist, then what is an artist and who and what are you? What are the images you produce? Premeditated? Actual?No not premeditated.No not actual.No not channelledAllowed
Allowed by who or what?By the subject.At the beginning of the ‘Grandmother Chronicles’ you use a quote by Magnus Roundtree ‘how you see the world shows how it behaves, change how you see the world, and the world changes’And that leads into the memory of a child leaving the grey chaos of London to a world ordered by nature and a near crystalline perception that is the antithesis of before, but makes complete sense and is very real and actual.
In a memo to Stephen Romano you said that,’ sculpture as a pure visual art form cannot and does not exist, Form has measurable three dimensions but is not to human vision, three dimensional. Human vision can only see half of any form. A simple glass globe described visually is half convex and half concave! Multiple views of a single object do not give an experience of the whole.’ This is fascinating – and challenging for the artist.
This is developing into a conversation, which at the moment I cannot support. I know Stephen has a good reason for suggesting you talk to me. His project at the moment required that he asked me for some comments on my art…I suggested that this was not really a good idea given his understanding of my basic views. I sent him a quick and short sample of what my replies to his questions might be, in this case my basic view of my sculpture. His reply was to send you to me???
Ray and I worked through this and I began to realise that Ray was a visionary who communicates through his art. Interpretations of his work are incredibly important to him, and are something he wants translated properly and accurately. I also needed to try not to get too absorbed in Ray’s fascinating philosophies, and retain a degree of distance and professionalism. So we continued the dance…‘Humans have two ways to understand reality, each world taken to the logical conclusion of living. First a world of conception and secondly a world seen with perception. However only if you understand these words and without the ‘isms’ of art doctrine you do not need to question me, however even after that there are still much to be learned.’ Ray Robinson
Tell me about the series of paintings Sleep of Reason and Sleep of Reason II
Stephen was mounting many shows on the subjects of witches. To me the basic truth of this was totally unreasonable until I thought of the sleep of reason in the midst of these people and after that, total empathy. As with all art, total empathy between artists, materials and subject.These works are not some airy fairy illustration; they are real. Real in fact, real in space, real in time. All I did was write it all down. All that is except the hanging…I could not write down the smell and the visual truth was more than my brush could summon.
Witches?Poor DevilsEach of the paintings has a true circumstance…and the result of my ‘being there’My general observation of my contribution was, as I wrote at the time‘When reason sleeps in the minds of the wiseWitches burn and demons rise’
 "Vision After The Sermon, The Gift" 2015 Acrylic on Board 24 x 32 inches

"Samboism Fire in the Shadow of Dolbadarn Castle" 2015 - Acrylic on Board 26 x 32 inches

 "Birth of a Witch" 2016 Acrylic on Board 24 x 32 inches

 "Beltane, Now It Begins" 2015 Acrylic on Board 24 x 32 inches

"Janey Horne 1727" 2015 - Acrylic on Board 26 x 32 inches

"The Day the Witch Lya Burchett was Given Short Shift and Hanged. Her Body Burned in the Grounds of Dolbadarn Castle" 2015 - Acrylic on Board 26 x 32 inches
"Battleground" 2015 - Acrylic on Board 26 x 32 inches

"The Scrying Pool"  2016 Acrylic on board 24 wide x 32 inches high


 Ray Robinson - "The Sleep of Reason, Witch and her Dog Executed on the Same Day" (Dog was shown Mercy and was Strangled before Burned) 2015

Acrylic on Board 24 x 32 inches



As you may have seen from my words I have rendered a much sanitized version of the hanging; they were in fact all hung from a single tree branch, this being parallel to the road. They were swung out into space from a plodding horse and cart. I have tried to give back some dignity…but perhaps it is all the more terrifying for being just a road side event.

True horror. The old, the deformed..tortured and murdered. Your being within this process via the creation of the work must have been akin to bring in Hell…did the painting of the series affect you terribly?

They were not old. No different in any way to their accusers.

Did the work (Sleep of Reason) affect me? If you mean adversely, then no, they ascended the grim subject matter to become as I needed them to

Do you believe in reincarnation? Or fluid time?
No I do not believe in reincarnation. I do not believe in the existence of time.
I have walked a long road, with many road side attractions. There is a dark side but beauty is ever to be sought for

Why did you move your profession from mathematics to art?
One quick answer- probability management.
I worked in Mayfair London on Brooke Street…the head offices of a multi billion dollar corporation, Allied Iron Founders, I was one of two advisers to the board of directors. My predictions were sound and I rose..the usual bonuses’, car, house in the suburbs etc. Then two things coincided to blight my brilliant career. The director who had the most faith in my predictions was killed in a car crash and I was told my eye sight was failing and that if I continued to work as I did (this was the days before computers, just slide rule and paper) I just had a couple of years left of vision.
I resigned.
What to do? My wife suggested the furthest thing imaginable from practical. Why not do what I always dreamed of doing, go to art school!
I did and all else followed, place at Slade and the Rome prize (declined)
Why did you decline the Rome prize?
My new wife was pregnant with the twins.

Did changing your life path to become an artist, make you happy?

At the time, yes and no. After Slade I had the proverbial plum job, teaching at The Bath Academy. It lasted four years, and ended with a trial, as my teaching was considered to be a destructive influence. The college lost said trial and I moved to Canada. It was all rubbish of course. I said then, pretty much what I say now but really it was my insistence of working from the figure, which was being dropped, that was the cause of the conflict. My trial was followed by student riots nationwide, which perhaps proved the argument for the prosecution!

During my trial I had a letter from Queens University in Canada, offering me the job of heading the Department of Sculpture in their New Department of Art Education. After the trial I accepted the offer but has misread the letter and arrived a year too early to take up the position. To fill in the year I was asst. curator of the Gallery in Sania, a year at Queens but did not like Kingston, offered sculpture at H.B.Beale Secondary School and I loved it. Great kids, and what an amazing idea, a High School that offered a major in art!!! It was then that Jake Moore (Canadian Billionaire) offered me patronage. All I needed was a three day a week job, so on to Fanshawe. While at Fanshawe I had the offer to head up the Department of Art at Lambton. After my interview I met Bill Arnold, we talked…here we had all the makings of a Department of Art at Lambton. I said that I would stay for two years; I stayed for eighteen! We turned it into a great art department. Within a couple of years our Arts Fundamentals Students were offered a place in second year University and we attracted students from as far away as China. My teaching methods had been justified.

I retired and Bill took early retirement. The Department closed behind us.


‘..and so pass through the matrix of memory and through
The archetype that defined the first vision and set our
Parameters
To an inner meaning without external references,
THE THIRD.DOOR’

Ray Robinson

A tiny portion of an exchange that hurtled me through time, change, light, reality and the nature of art. At the centre of this is a man who lives in Nova Scotia, ‘a beautiful place’ with, I imagine a clarity of space that works well with Ray Robinson’s vision.

Ray Robinson "The Beginnings of Religion, Leaping the Betane Fire" 2015 Acrylic on Board 32 x 24 inches

"Two Witches Burned In Madson Heath, March 22nd" Acrylic on Board 26 x 32 inches
"Chose - Left or Right" 2015 - Acrylic on Board 26 x 32 inches

 "The Beginning of Religion, Ogham Script" 2015 - Acrylic on Board 26 x 32 inches


"When Witches Burn and Demons Rise" 2015 - Acrylic on Board 26 x 32 inches

I moved closerThe twigs were catchingThe wind across the moorBlowing red into orangeThen the screamThe womanThe windThey screamed higherOn and onI ran.."July 1692" 2015 Acrylic on Board 24 x 32 inches

Hanging
We arrived early
The old horse was still going
Forward under the scaffold
I heard her feet scrape as she
Reach the end of the cart
She rung into space to join the
Other four
Women strangling…animal sounds
Bit I remember the smell
Deaths discharge…their skirts,
Their feet, the road
Everywhere



about Stephen Romano

Babylon

MONSTER BRAINS - Stephen Romano Curator in Residence - Luciana Lupe Vasconcelos

Luciana Lupe Vasconcelos (b.1982) is a Brazilian artist whose work explores the realms of the mythic, the mystical and the occult through the use of traditional techniques, with a particular focus on the exploration of automatism in water based media. Her very distinctive style alludes to influences from symbolism and surrealism and marks a continuation of the tradition of women artists working with the subjects of magic and the occult. She has illustrated numerous book both in english and in Portuguese, including a Brazilian edition of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven. Her work has been exhibited internationally and was featured across online and printed media alike. She works and lives in Teresópolis, Brazil."
"What is the secret of the sphinx? Mystery of mysteries, art is a domain still not entirely conquered by the rational mind. Few are the artists who dare to explore the uncharted territories. The ones who do, however, return forever changed. Those are the torch bearers, able to see what others can’t.

It can be said that Lupe Vasconcelos is such an artist. Her work is marked by a disturbing beauty that can only be conceived under a crepuscular light. Mysterious women, horned priestess, demons, ancient goddesses, chimeras. All these beings come unto light by the work of her insight. Strange ceremonies take place under the thread of brush and ink lines. Images of primordial chaos are born among ruins of black and red.

Possessing the power of an ancient enigma, the art of Lupe Vasconcelos fatally captures the imagination of the onlooker. The singularity of the artist’s vision and the fierceness of her technique set her art apart from the rest. It’s a journey to the underworld, and one cannot help but come back completely transformed."

Luciana Lupe Vasconcelos
Interview with Luciana Lupe Vasconcelos and lexiconmag.
Why do you think there is a revival in interest in all thing occult and esoteric in the arts?
LLV: It seems to me that western civilization is going through a very disenchanted moment not only in culture but in general. This could help explain the resumption of the interest for anything that might offer a relief from this state of dismay that seems so ubiquitous these days. Occulture and the esoteric offer a different point of view from the one we been having since rationalism and scientificism took over. Of course the occult has been around for a long time, regardless of what mainstream culture makes of it, but now it seems to be one of those times when conditions are just right for a big comeback. And in addition to that there is, of course, the dissatisfaction of young artists with the insipidity of current art trends. Many artists are engaged in creating art that has soul, in opposition to the sterility of traditional contemporary and conceptual art and mass culture. This growing interest in the occult and esoteric is above all a reaction. I see it as a good thing.


Do your position yourself as a shamanic presence within the culture?  Are the art objects you make functional as healing devices?
LLV: Like most artists I'm an essentially self-centered person, so my motivation for creating art is first and foremost an externalizing effort. But I'm aware of the fact that once that it's given materiality, a piece of art becomes an entity let loose. So it can function as a healing device too, as I notice it does sometimes. This fact could position me as a shamanic presence within the culture, yes, but I'm definitely not actively pursuing such outcome. To me his healing effect seems to be more of a "side effect" of all art that is imbued with meaning and soul. 


To what extent does the artist bear any responsibility for adverse responses to the works?  Bad memories that are unearthed?  Ordeals or trauma? Suppressed memories?
LLV: Well, I particularly believe that art should never be subject of neither inner nor outer censorship. One can't possibly predict possible reactions each viewer might have, be they good or bad. But it's exactly this potential for causing a reaction that can turn art into an instrument for healing. Feeling uncomfortable about a piece of art can point to some internal issue the person might have and didn't know about, for example. Of course this goes way beyond "uncomfortable" to people who can be triggered because of trauma. But this aspect is absolutely out of the artist's control, each person should be informed of what they might be seeing in a show and choose to go or not.   


Do you have any concern about being persecuted because of your subject matter and materials, particularly in a socio political environment whereby evangelicals and puritans seem to have such enormous influence? 
LLV: Yes, I do. Unfortunately. Like in the US, there is a heated political and cultural debate going on in Brazil right now, and conservatism is making a huge comeback. Brazilians were never as tolerant and friendly as the world usually thinks. Being different here was always difficult. Brazilians are conservative by default. But for a brief time it seemed that this was finally starting to change, until economic and political crisis hit and put everything to waste. There's a hunt for scapegoats, and they have chosen the same targets they always do: artists, thinkers, human rights activists and such. Recently a queer art show was cancelled after aggressive right-wing protests, and the curator is now being prosecuted for "promoting pedophilia". Something similar happened after a nude performance in the Museum of Modern Art of São Paulo. The theorist Judith Butler was here last week to take part on a symposium, and protesters gathered in front of the building, setting a big puppet of her on fire to the screams of "burn the witch". She was also aggressively harassed at the airport. Those are just the most prominent recent incidents. It's a worrying situation. Even if my work is very under the radar here, I still feel far from safe because of the general climate of intolerance. It's starting to spread fast, and everything points to a turn for the worse.
Elixir

What drives you?  Is it inspiration?  A calling?  Something you were born with?
LLV: I would say it's a calling, a continuous one that has been within me since I can remember. I enjoy immensely the simple act of drawing, and as an introvert I always take refuge in doing it whenever I can. One can conjure things into existence by putting them into a surface as a two-dimensional image. It's a source of power, so to say. And it's something that's out of my control, this need to draw. 


Can you explain the path you have walked to become the artist you are?  Who were your inspirations and influences when you began your journey as an artists and what other artists have you discovered along the way?
LLV: It's a long path! I was very into illustrated books and comics as a kid, so I began to draw my own little illustrated stories at a very early age. As I grew I got acquainted with a variety of brazilian comic book artists who would inspire me to make my own zines. In my late teens I produced a lot of stuff, although most of it is now lost. But the style was very different, more to do with the comics of Peter Bagge, for example, than with what I do now. I also loved (still do!) the Love & Rockets series, it was a huge early influence on the way I draw. I love working on black and white, and this is something I think comes from comics. Also, it's important to consider is that I had little contact with "high art" during my formative years. It was mostly illustrated books and comics. So my basic visual education happened via graphic arts. So I decided to go to graphic design school and worked with that for a couple of years, which I didn't enjoy at all. After another couple of years dabbling with tattooing, I got a job as an illustrator a local newspaper. This was 2006. It was an important move for me, because it was when I really got to be paid to drawn. And it was when I learned to work under pressure and in less than ideal conditions. But my style was still completely different of what is now. After a year and half I got out of the newspaper and began illustrating children's books as a freelancer. During this time I became increasingly interested in developing my skills beyond my then limited cartoonish style. So I started reading books and frequenting workshops and courses to learn more about different techniques. And as the internet got "bigger", so did the availability of images. At this point my main influences were illustrators such as Ronald Searle, Aubrey Beardsley, Edward Gorey, Harry Clarke, Arthur Rackham and John Bauer. I was already giving my first steps into the "art world", having participated in a couple of group shows and making mural paintings. My interest in "dark" things, that had always been there, began to show in my work at this point. Then the big change happened: I moved out of my parent's house and to another town, in another state. It was the turning point. Teresópolis is a small mountain town famous for its beautiful rock formations, mild climate and insane mist. It was in this new magical setting that I began exploring my inner world through meditation and the use of psychedelic drugs. At the same time I was getting more and more acquainted with occulture. Having been a wiccan in my teens, the occult wasn't completely alien to me. One day during my explorations on the internet I stumbled upon the work of Cameron. I was deeply impressed by her amazing ink drawings and paintings, and I felt an immediate connexion. It was a very powerful encounter and it changed the way I make art. I got to know the work of lesser known artists who would become part of my personal pantheon, like Leonor Fini, Austin Osman Spare, Leonora Carrington, Remedios Varo and Rosaleen Norton. Recently I was also introduced to a virtually unknown brazilian artist, Darcílio Lima, and it was a revelation. I've been obsessed with him ever since. Another big source of inspiration to me is music. Some of my pieces were literally inspired by songs I like.






Beast of Deep Desire
The Awakening of the Will
Mystery
The Origin of Being
Untitled
Ainigma
Alchemical Wedding (detail)
Vanitas MMXIV
May This Evil Abide
FurFur
The artist’s studio
Sketchbook drawing
Poster for the book Zon
Sketchbook drawing
Green Man
The Ancestors
Flight to the Sabbath (sketchbook drawing)
Drawing in progress
Sketchbook drawingRed Star
Anima
Nemesis
Vanitas MMXV
Witch KingGrey Days
Embrace
Embrace
Vociferous
Diverse linoleum prints
Oraculum
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Agnosco Veteris Vestigia Flammae
Babylon
The Soul of the Enchantress
Sketchbook drawing
Wip photo
Untitled
Capricorn Sun
Sphinx
Heka
Untitled
Vanitas MMXVI
Evil Eye
Spirit Dagger (in progress detail)
Spirit Dagger (detail)
Spirit Dagger (detail)
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
The artist’s studioDiverse works
XV
Ophidian Cup
Wildcat
Sketchbook drawing
The Love Witch (sketchbook drawing)
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Nocturna (sketchbook drawing)
The artist
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Orpheus
Untitled
Sketchbook drawing
- Alchemical Talisman (in progress)
Pomba Gira (sketchbook drawing)
Sketchbook drawing
Suscitate
Djinn

Abrahadabra

Dark Vision (for William Mortensen)
Sketchbook drawing
Untitled
The artist
The Minotaur
The Red River Spring
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Universal Key
Transformation
The Wailing
Cat Creature
- Sketchbook drawing
The Werewolf
Night is a Black Cow
Ascension

Psyche
Untitled
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Goure
Sketchbook drawing
Sketchbook drawing
Morning Star
Illustration for the book The Raven
The artist
Capricorn Sun
Lunar Kala
The Great Chimera
Katabasis
Katabasis (detail)
Untitled
Lucifer Lux Mundi
Lucifer Lux Mundi
Demons
The Huntress
Untitled
Katadesmos I


Katadesmos II
Iblis
Luna
Sketchbook drawing
Priestess and Idol
Sketchbook drawing
White Chimera
Ascension
Albedo
Khaire
White Ceremony (detail)
Aequilibrium
Fire Walk With Me
Sketchbook drawing
Destruction Falls on All that Remains
Work in progress
Collage
Untitled (detail)
Kiss
The Unfolding of Vision
Cruel Bird (detail)
Sketchbook drawing
Oil painting in progress
Oil painting in progress
Sketchbook drawing
The artist
Sketchbook drawing
Death and the Maiden (detail)
Sketchbook drawing
painting in progress
Green man (detail)
Sword
Voodoo in my Blood
Ave, Babylon!
Anatomy of Madness
Avis Rara
Pink Sphinx
Djinn
Eros Vessel
Keryx
Spiral
Untitled
Hex
Praeses
Untitled
Alchemical Talisman
The Cup of Suspicion
The Soul of the Enchantress
Undulatio
Sketchbook drawing
Untitled
Desert Spirit




about Stephen Romano

It's been a while since I did one of these, but I just discovered that the entire seasons of Carmilla have now been collected into single videos, so I thought it might be a good time to revisit some old friends.

Outfits based on this picture.
Characters created with ePic Character Generator
I think for these versions I am going to set it a little after the Carmilla movie and long after the end of Season 3. So I guess three years now.  Wow.

In a Mutants & Masterminds game, Laura is now a world-renown reporter in the Lois Lane mold, with a knack of uncovering supernatural goings-on.  Carm is still living on a fortune that has also collected 340+ years of compound interest. And of course, helping Laura, because she knows that in true Lois Lane fashion, Laura is going to get herself into trouble.

Given the number of adaptations of Carmilla over the years I might even riff on that with one of her less than savory relatives show up.  Maybe an older brother. Someone who is evil, threatens her fortune and whom Carmilla would hesitate to kill outright at first.  That is till he puts the moves on Laura.

For these builds, I am going to rely heavily on the Mutants & Masterminds Deluxe Hero's Handbook,
Power Profiles, and of course the Supernatural Handbook.

I figure that Laura is a bit higher in PL than your average reporter.  She has saved the world and she knows Krav Maga.   Carmilla is a very, very old vampire (340 years old!) and she has seen a lot in her years.  She was alive for a while thanks to a "gift" from Inanna and is a vampire again.

Laura Hollis
Creampuff

Strength 1, Stamina 2, Agility 2, Dexterity 1, Fighting 1, Intellect 3, Awareness 1, Presence 1

Advantages
Krav Maga (Accurate Attack, Agile Feint, All-out Attack,  Close Attack, Contacts, Defensive Attack, Improved Disarm, Inspire,  Power Attack, Precise Attack (Close, Concealment), Prone Fighting)
Attractive, Languages 2, Skill Mastery: Expertise: Journalism

Skills
Acrobatics 1 (+3), Athletics 5 (+6), Close Combat: Unarmed 6 (+7), Deception 1 (+2), Expertise: Journalism 5 (+8), Insight 5 (+6), Investigation 5 (+8), Perception 5 (+6), Persuasion 1 (+2), Stealth 1 (+3)

Offense
Initiative +2
Grab, +2 (DC Spec 11)
Throw, +1 (DC 16)
Unarmed, +7 (DC 16)

Complications
Obsession: Find the truth!
Relationship: Carmilla

Languages
English, French, German

Defense
Dodge 3, Parry 2, Fortitude 3, Toughness 2, Will 1

Power Points
Abilities 24 + Powers 0 + Advantages 15 + Skills 18 (35 ranks) + Defenses 3 = 60

Validation: Unarmed: Attack Bonus exceeds Power Level limit by 1

Height: 5'2"
Weight: 119 lbs
Hair Color: Brown/Blonde
Eye Color: Brown
Age: 25

Carmilla, aka Mircalla, Countess Karnstein
Useless Vampire

Abilities
Strength 5, Stamina -, Agility 2, Dexterity 3, Fighting 5, Intellect 2, Awareness 2, Presence 4

Advantages
All-out Attack, Animal Empathy, Attractive, Fascinate (Deception), Improved Critical 3: Vampire Bite: Weaken 9, Improved Hold, Improved Initiative 3, Languages 4, Power Attack

Skills
Acrobatics 2 (+4), Athletics 2 (+7), Close Combat: Unarmed 3 (+8), Deception 5 (+9), Expertise: Languages 6 (+8), Insight 6 (+8), Intimidation 4 (+8), Investigation 1 (+3), Perception 8 (+10), Persuasion 2 (+6), Ranged Combat: ???? 3 (+6), Stealth 10 (+12)

Powers
Alternate Form (Moonlight) (Activation: Move Action)
   Flight: Flight 1 (Speed: 4 miles/hour, 60 feet/round)
   Immunity: Immunity 0
   Insubstantial: Insubstantial 2 (light, Gaseous; Absent Strength)
Cat form: Variable Attack 2 (animal, DC 12, Advantages: All-out Attack; Action: move, Attack: Dodge)
Spider-Climb: Movement 1 (Wall-crawling 1: -1 speed rank)
Undead Invulnerability
   Immortality: Immortality 5 (Return after 1 day; Limited: Not when staked or beheaded [0 ranks only])
   Immunity: Immunity 30 (undead, Fortitude Effects)
   Regeneration: Regeneration 8 (undead, Every 1.25 rounds)
   Vampiric Protection: Protection 9 (+9 Toughness; Limited 2: Not against Holy or Magic)
Vampire Bite: Weaken 9 (undead, Affects: Weaken Stamina, Resisted by: Will, DC 19)
Vampiric Senses: Senses 3 (Acute (Type): smell, Detect: smell (blood) 1)

Offense
Initiative +14
Grab, +5 (DC Spec 15)
Throw, +3 (DC 20)
Unarmed, +8 (DC 20)
Vampire Bite: Weaken 9, +5 (DC Will 19)

Complications
Blood Dependence: Needs blood to live
Relationship: Laura
Weakness: Can't use vampire powers in sunlight.

Languages
Ancient Sumerian, English, French, Hungarian, Latin, Romanian

Defense
Dodge 2, Parry 5, Fortitude None, Toughness 0, Will 2

Power Points
Abilities 36 + Powers 74 + Advantages 15 + Skills 26 (52 ranks) + Defenses 0 = 151

Height: 5'3"
Weight: 121 lbs
Hair Color: Black
Eye Color: Brown (red when enraged or feeding)
Age: 340

Links

• Hero Lab is a Registered Trademarks of LWD Technology, Inc. Free download at https://www.wolflair.com
• Character images created with ePic Character Generator
  
• Carmilla Season One, Complete (2:26:10)
• Carmilla Season Two, Complete (3:01:37)
• Carmilla Season Three, Complete (3:36:06)

On the tail of the Old School Renaissance has come another movement—the rise of the fanzine. Although the fanzine—a nonprofessional and nonofficial publication produced by fans of a particular cultural phenomenon, got its start in Science Fiction fandom, in the gaming hobby it first started with Chess and Diplomacy fanzines before finding fertile ground in the roleplaying hobby in the 1970s. Here these amateurish publications allowed the hobby a public space for two things. First, they were somewhere that the hobby could voice opinions and ideas that lay outside those of a game’s publisher. Second, in the Golden Age of roleplaying when the Dungeon Masters were expected to create their own settings and adventures, they also provided a rough and ready source of support for the game of your choice. Many also served as vehicles for the fanzine editor’s house campaign and thus they showed another DM and group played said game. This would often change over time if a fanzine accepted submissions. Initially, fanzines were primarily dedicated to the big three RPGs of the 1970s—Dungeons & Dragons, RuneQuest, an Traveller—but fanzines have appeared dedicated to other RPGs since, some of which helped keep a game popular in the face of no official support.

Since 2008 with the publication of Fight On #1, the Old School Renaissance has had its own fanzines. The advantage of the Old School Renaissance is that the various Retroclones draw from the same source and thus one Dungeons & Dragons-style RPG is compatible with another. This means that the contents of one fanzine will compatible with the Retroclone that you already run and play even if not specifically written for it. Labyrinth Lord and Lamentations of the Flame Princess Weird Fantasy Roleplay have proved to be popular choices to base fanzines around, as has Swords & Wizardry. Another choice is Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game.

Published by Straycouches Press, Crawl! is one such fanzine dedicated to the Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game. Since Crawl! No. 1 was published in March, 2012 has not only provided ongoing support for the roleplaying game, but also been kept in print by Goodman Games. Now because of online printing sources like Lulu.com, it is no longer as difficult to keep fanzines from going out of print, so it is not that much of a surprise that issues of Crawl! remain in print. It is though, pleasing to see a publisher like Goodman Games support fan efforts like this fanzine by keeping them in print and selling them directly.

Where Crawl! No. 1 was something of a mixed bag, Crawl! #2 was a surprisingly focused, exploring the role of loot in the Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game and describing various pieces of treasure and items of equipment that the Player Characters might find and use. The good news is that Crawl! #3 is just as focused, but the subject of its focus is not loot or treasure. Instead, it is magic, for the issue’s subtitle is ‘The Magic Issue!’. Published in February, 2013, Crawl! #3 includes new spell systems, new spells, a new old creature, and more. It is a serviceable rather than a good issue and for one particular reason may not be of interest who are coming to issues of Crawl! fanzine for the first time.

There can be no denying that the magic system in Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game is fun and flavoursome, but it can be cumbersome. The issue is that because every spell has its own page and its own table, the play of the game is slowed whenever spells are cast, whether by the Player Characters or NPCs. So, ‘NPC Magic and Spellcasting’ offers a more streamlined means of handling spells. The Judge still rolls for the NPC spellcaster, but rather than doing this against the standard table, the Judge is given three results—either a Fumble, a Standard, or a Critical result. For example, on a Fumble, the classic spell Magic Missile inflicts damage on the caster, hurls between one and four missiles at a target on a Standard result, and on a Critical result, the caster can target multiple opponents. The piece includes a couple of offensive spells, several defensive spells, and several spells which fall into the category of ‘Other’. Rounded out with a pair of cultists as sample NPCs given these streamlined spells, this is a fantastic option to help the Judge run her game.

Sean Ellis’ ‘Consider the Kobold: A different take on the traditional kobold’ presents a traditional take upon the Kobold. Not the tradition of Dungeons & Dragons-style roleplaying games, but that of traditional folklore. Here the Kobold is a household fairy who carries out domestic chores as long as the family respects him, although an alternative has it working the mines. The write-up includes full stats as well as various pranks—or cantrips—which the Kobold may play upon those who do not pay it enough respect.

Brett Miller’s ‘Patron Spells of the Supernal Archmage’ presents the patron spells for ‘Van den Danderclanden: A Patron from the Imminent Future’, the Supernal Archmage of Empyreal Aptitude in a distant, but parallel future. Previously detailed in Crawl! No. 1, here his favourite chaotic effects of Spellburn are detailed as Van den Danderclanden’s Hateful Blemish, Snafufubar, and Elastic Reality. The first inflicts the corruption of heavy magic use upon a target, the second focuses and inflicts bad luck upon the target of the spell, and the third can change aspects of a target or an item. There is no denying that these are fun spells to play around with and inflict some chaos upon a campaign, but problematically if the reader has already got the Special Edition of Crawl! No. 1 which collects both patron and patron spells, which makes their inclusion in either redundant.

‘Magic Wand – A 4th-level Wizard Spell’ by Daniel J. Bishop introduces the spell, Raven Crawking’s Magic Wand. This provides a means for a wizard to store spell effects in a wand of the wizard’s choosing, typically one spell, but at higher castings of the spell, up to three spells as well as granting a bonus when casting the spells from the wand. What in effect it allows a wizard to do is cast the spell worked into the wand a second time each day, but always at the Level at which the spell was worked into the wand. This means that the wizard can cast Raven Crawking’s Magic Wand again and again as he gains Levels to improve the ability of the wand. Of course, a wizard cannot simply create wand after wand for all of his spells, but a few spells it expands his arcane arsenal.

‘The Talismans of Anti-Magic – Anti-Magic Items’ by Jon Wilson details items which can prevent magic being cast upon the wearer. Whether they take the form of rings or amulets, totems or fetishes, and whomever has hold of them, they are always linked to spellcasters. They take an action to charge, but when charged they inflict a penalty equal to that given for the anti-magic talisman upon the spellcaster targeting the holder, so reducing their ability to successfully cast a spell. Unfortunately, this is not without repercussions in that the spellcaster linked to the anti-magic talisman must suffer the same effect when next casting a spell before the talisman can be sued again. This is a powerful item, but one that pleasing comes with a price which to paid by someone in the party… Lastly, Colin Chapman’s ‘Let’s Get Familiar: Expanded Familiar Entries’ simply expands the ‘Familiar Confrontation Configuration’ tables to be found in the Dungeon Crawl Classics Roleplaying Game rulebook. It does this for the Lawful, Neutral, and Chaotic tables and enables the player to roll on a table of twenty options rather than fourteen.

Physically, Crawl! #3 is clean and tidy, uncluttered and easy to read, much like Crawl! No. 2. However, there is less art and its look is all the poorer for it. Unfortunately how good Crawl! #3 is depends on which edition of Crawl! No. 1 the reader has. If it is the Special Edition which combines ‘Van den Danderclanden: A Patron from the Imminent Future’ with ‘Patron Spells of the Supernal Archmage’, then not so much and not so useful. Which to be fair is more than likely if the reader is picking the issue up since their original publication. If it is not the Special Edition, then Crawl! #3 will be more useful as its inclusion of ‘Patron Spells of the Supernal Archmage’ readily supports ‘Van den Danderclanden: A Patron from the Imminent Future’. Overall, Crawl! #3 provides solid content, but the repeated content means it is just not as useful.

(Background: this essay was one of several columns commissioned for the magazine Gothic Beauty between 2009 and 2011. Since the magazine hasn’t published a new issue in years, it’s time to drag up a few of these old columns so … Continue reading →

Matthew Dutton is a multidisciplinary artist whose dark yet satirical works offer interesting commentary and insight about self, experimentation, and current events, .  Dutton received a BFA from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.  His work has been exhibited across the United States and internationally at art fairs and galleries such as The Blooom Art Fair in Cologne Germany, The Morbid Anatomy Museum in NY, the Wunderkrammer exhibit at The Bell House in Brooklyn, and published in the New York Times, Hi-Fructose magazine and many other notable exhibits and publications. 
Dutton keeps a studio in Chattanooga Tn.




















































MIDNIGHT PARACOSM
full gallery installation at Stephen Romano Gallery, Brooklyn
March - June 2016.

"My studio work aims to consolidate opposites.  Balancing the duality of attraction and repulsion, the work tends to lean heavily towards attempting to strike harmony between beautiful and horrible moments.

I have noticed a few recurring principles that have adhered to my art making practices. Try something new when the opportunity arises; find a place for things once forgotten; explore relationships where surfaces, ideas, and techniques intersect.

A lot of what I do in the studio is driven by experimentation. I am very interested in exploring the limitations of the materials and techniques I use.  Having an understanding of material basics allows me to persuade them into non-traditional outcomes. Within each project I try to incorporate a new material or new technique to test. New things that are successful become part of my visual lexicon to call upon as needed.  Stumbling upon a studio discovery is what tests aim for.

Harnessing the power of charged objects into my work is another desire I covet.  I try to keep my aesthetic antennas tuned to receive hints from whatever the universe sends across my path.  I often take notice of random object that catch my attention, old and discarded things that once had a life but are now forgotten call to me to become reborn into a new form.  An insatiable compulsion to collect and reassign has always permeated my practice and life.  Restoring desire to things considered to be waste is a staple in my practice.

Surface intersections are important to my work.  As my material usage varies so greatly, confronting the relationships they create when combining has to be considered.  Extruding hand colored silicone combined with borax grown crystals might nest against felted dryer lint patches and 1970s gaudy trophy parts.  This approach to my additive building process allows me to consider the whole world as a source for art supplies! Alongside material variety, I’m interested in subtle idea projection, current political climate, and satirical irony.  A kind of whimsical horror often comes across through my work which seems inescapable considering the world around us these days.  It’s hard not to trend toward a darker shade of subject matter as a reflection of the craziness we are bombarded with daily.

Juggling work and home life often leaves me with a limited amount of time for my studio sessions.  This forces me to work very spontaneously and viscerally at times.  I’ll simmer all day (sometimes dreaming of it at night) on how to address a particular solution for a work, once I am in the studio I get into an automatic state of creating to maximize efficient time wrangling.  Drawing from mountains of collected materials, my ‘fine art’ practice serves to fulfill my personal art making cravings but there’s more.  I take on a lot of commercial art projects that call upon a whole different approach to creating.  Way more planning, budgeting, communicating, and calculating take place. Studio works are championed to let most all of those things go to the way side. "   

Matthew Dutton.
































































MIDNIGHT PARACOSM, second version






















about Stephen Romano

(Background: this essay was one of several columns commissioned for the magazine Gothic Beauty between 2009 and 2011. Since the magazine hasn’t published a new issue in years, it’s time to drag up a few of these old columns so … Continue reading →

It took a bit, but last weekend’s flash sale worked out quite well. Between folks stopping by (including a pair of dear friends) and deliveries, sitting outside in what was quite honestly stunning weather was oh, such a chore. So … Continue reading →

"Mors sceptra ligonibus aequat. ""Death confounds the sceptre with the spade." 

The Dance Macabre consists of the dead or a personification of death summoning representatives from all walks of life to dance along to the grave, typically with a pope, emperor, king, child, and laborer. It was produced as memento mori, to remind people of the fragility of their lives and how vain were the glories of earthly life. Its origins are postulated from illustrated sermon texts; the earliest recorded visual scheme was a now-lost mural at Holy Innocents' Cemetery in Paris dating from 1424 to 1425. 
"The dances of death, through the various stages of human life: wherein the capriciousness of that tyrant is exhibited: in the forty-six copper-plates". David Deuchar 1788.Collection of Stephen Romano, Brooklyn.each plate is approximately 2 x 3 inches.
David Deuchar (1743-1808) had his dance of death published  in London 1788 .

Hollar's plates were much inspired by Arnold Birckmann's interpretation of Holbein's work, Deuchar has chosen the exact same variants that Hollar had chosen.

Deuchar's plates are signed HB i for "Holbein invenit" and DD f for "David Deuchar fecit" (i.e.: Holbein has invented the design, Deuchar has executed it). At the bottom of the frames it says "David Deuchar fecit".
The full story here.
















































































































about Stephen Romano

Das Kloster, weltlich und geistlich; meist aus der ältern deutschen Volks-,Wunder-, Curiositäten-, und vorzugsweise komischen Literatur Wunder-, Curiositäten-, und vorzugsweise komischen Literatur

The monastery, secular and spiritual; mostly from the older German folk, miracle, curios, and preferably comic literature miracle, curios, and preferably comic literature.


Publisher Johannes ScheiblePseudonyms: Willibald Cornelius; Democritus1809 - August 15, 1866
Johann Scheible specialized in books on mysticism and magic which he published under the general series title of "Bibliothek der Zauber-, Geheimniss- und Offenbarungs-Bücher und der Wunder-Hausschatz-Literatur aller Nationen in allen ihren Raritäten und Kuriositäten" ("Library of magic, mystery and revelation books and the miracle house treasure literature of all nations in all their rarities and curiosities”).
also published Doktor Johannes Faust's Magia naturalis et innaturalis oder Dreifacher Höllenzwang, letztes Testament und Siegelkunst. Nach einer kostbar ausgestatteten Handschrift in der Herzoglichen Bibliothek zu Koburg herausgegeben in 5 Abtheilungen. Stuttgart 1849. 

Das Kloster ("The Cloister"; full title Das Kloster. Weltlich und geistlich. Meist aus der ältern deutschen Volks-, Wunder-, Curiositäten-, und vorzugsweise komischen Literatur "The Cloister. Profane and sacred. Mostly from older German Popular, Miraculous, Curious and especially Comical Literature") is a collection of magical and occult texts, chapbooks, folklore, popular superstition and fairy tales of the German Renaissance compiled by Stuttgart antiquarian Johann Scheible in 12 volumes, 1845-1849. Vols. 3, 5 and 11 are dedicated to the Faust legend. Vols. 7, 9 and 12 dealing with topics of folklore and ethnography were written by F. Nork (pseudonym of Friedrich Korn, 1803–1850).

Germany is a land of fascinating customs and traditions. Through the work of the many authors, its folk and fairy tales have become widely read around the world. German folklore has also inspired numerous literary, artistic, and musical works. This collection is an accessible introduction to German folklore. It provides numerous examples of German folkways and presents a wide ranging selection of texts. This collection provides insight into the pervasive influence of German folklore on literature and popular culture. Das Kloster ("The Cloister"; full title Das Kloster. Weltlich und geistlich. Meist aus der ältern deutschen Volks-, Wunder-, Curiositäten-, und vorzugsweise komischen Literatur, or in English—"The Cloister. Profane and sacred. Mostly from older German Popular, Miraculous, Curious and especially Comical Literature") is a collection of magical and occult texts, chapbooks, folklore, popular superstition and fairy tales of the German Renaissance compiled by Stuttgart antiquarian Johann Scheible between 1845 and 1849. In addition to the Das Kloster volumes, this collection provides additional 94-volumes of unique perspectives on Central European culture and tradition. Included are texts essential for the study of German folk traditions, the Reformation, wit and humor and 19th-century literature.

Collection of Stephen Romano, Brooklyn


Volume One(1845), 840 pp, ch. 1-4 Volksprediger, Moralisten und frommer Unsinn(Popular preachers, moralists and pious nonsense: Sebastian Brand's ship of fools with Geilers von Kaisersberg sermons about it and Thomas Murner's prankster, completely based on the old prints and their pictorial representations)full illustrationsfull volume






















Volume 2(1846), 1074 pp, ch. 5-8, Doctor Johann Faust(Doctor Johann Faust. 1: I. Faust and his predecessors (Theophilus, Gerbert, Virgil etc.); II. Georg Rudolf Widman's major work on Faust; III. Faust's compulsion to hell; IV. Verbatim copy of the first edition of the first book on Faust, from 1587. (Previously drawn in doubt, now found) full illustrationsfull volume







































Volume 3(1846), 1065 pp, ch. 9-12, Christoph Wagner, Don Juan Tenorio und verschiedene Schwarzkünstler und Beschwörer.  (or Christoph Wagner, Don Juan Tenorio and various black artists and conjurers (or pacts with the devil or the black artists of different nations and the summoners of hell and heaven for wealth, power, wisdom and lust)full illustrationsfull volume






























Volume Four(1846), 840 pp, Der Theuerdank by Thomas Murner (The Thanksgiving or Thomas Murner's writings and his life, along with his fooling and the mockery: whether the king of England is a liar or Luther.)full illustrationsfull volume












Volume Five(1847), 1160 pp, Die Sage vom Faust bis zum Erscheinen des ersten Volksbuches,mit Literatur und Vergleichung aller folgenden(The saga from Faust to the publication of the first folk book, with literature and comparison of all the following or Doctor Johann Faust. 3: The saga from Faust to the publication of the first folk book, with literature and comparison of all subsequent ones; Faust on the Volksbühne, in the puppet or puppet shows; Spell library of the magician: compulsion to hell. - Triple and quadruple compulsion to hell. - The great sea spirit. - Wonder book. - The black raven. - Ghost Commando.– Practice magica. - Treasure trove, etc.)full illustrationsfull volume

























































Volume Six(1847), 1106 pp, ch. 21-24 Die gute alte Zeit, after the manuscript collection of Wilhelm von Reinöhl(The good old days. 1: On the history mainly of city life, traditional costumes, housekeeping, children's games, dancing, jugglers, banquets, women's shelters, magical means, church festivals, pilgrimages etc. From Wilhelm von Reinöhl's handwritten and artistic collections)full illustrationsfull volume
















Volume Seven(1847), 1120 pp, F. Nork, Der Festkalender, enthaltend die Sinndeute der Monatszeichen, die Entstehungs- und Umbildungsgeschichte von Naturfesten in Kirchenfeste (The festival calendar, which contains the meaning of the monthly signs, the origins and transformation history of natural festivals in church festivals)(on the liturgical year and its evolution out of pagan festivals)orThe festival calendar: containing: the meaning of the month's signs, the origins and changes in the history of natural festivals in church festivals, description of the uses that occur in them and the interpretation of their symbols; Characteristics of martyrs and heroes of faith worshiped with words and swords on the 366 days of the leap year; Interpretation of many miracle stories, etc full illustrationsfull volume




















Volume 10(1848) 1184 pp, ch. 37-40, Johann Fischart's Flöhhatz, Weibertratz, Ehezuchtbüchlein, podagrammisch Trostbüchlein etc.(Johann Fischart's Flöhhatz, Weibertratz, Marriage book, podagrammatic consolation book etc.)or(10: Johann Fischarts Flöhhatz, Weibertratz, marriage breeding booklet, podagrammatic consolation booklet collects toes smaller writings; Thomas Murners From the Lutheran fool, church thief and heretic calendar, and seven satyrs against him: Karsthans, Murnarus, Leviathan, etc)full illustrationsfull volume






















Volume 13also known as"The Flying Leaves of the XVI. and XVII. Century, in so-called one-sheet prints with copper engravings and woodcuts, initially from the area of ​​political and religious caricature."or(The flying leaves of the XVI. and XVII. Century: in so-called one-sheet prints, with copper engravings and woodcuts; initially from the area of ​​political and religious caricature. From the treasures of the Ulm city library. Stuttgart)
full illustrationsfull volume
























about Stephen Romano

Doesn't quite roll off the tongue like "Which Witch is Which?" does it.

My new Warlock book is out for Old-School Essentials and it is natural to want to know what is in the book.  More to the point do you need this book if you already own my The Warlock for Swords & Wizardry OR The Craft of the Wise: The Pagan Witch Tradition for OSE.

Very valid questions.

Let's go over the Warlocks first.



The classes are the same XP, HP progression wise save for where B/X and S&W differ.

• There are few overlapping spells, but I wanted to go with new spells for the book.
• There are few overlapping Invocations, again plenty of new and a couple revised ones here.  For example, both books have an Arcane Blast, the bread-and-butter attack of all warlocks.
• There are no overlapping Patrons or Pacts. If you play OSE and use this Warlock book, but want a demon pact you can import it from the S&W book with no changes needed.  Same if you play S&W and want a Dragon pact.
• There are no overlapping lodges.  I wanted to include the Masters of the Invisible College warlocks from S&W for the OSE book, but space ran out.  Instead, I am going to the Masters here at a later date with the text that was going into the book on how you play them with OSE and these Pacts. The Masters also take Cosmic Warlocks.

I wanted both books to complement each other.  I am very keen on people not thinking "hey, I already bought this book two years ago!"

For the two Old-School Essentials books, the biggest potential overlap was the spells.


I mention in the Warlock book that witches can take warlock spells and the other way around.  That is depending on your Referee. There is the subtle notion that the witches of the Pagan Tradition are at odds with warlocks.  Granted this idea works best with the demonic pacts, but it is there for players to use.  This can limit access to spells the others might "steal".

In both books, I also add new spells for Clerics, Druids, Magic-users, and Illusionists.  How they get those spells is of course up to the Referees.

I have made all the spell names and levels available for you to see in this Google Sheet.
Spell names in Red are from the OSE Warlock.  Blue links take you the book the spells appear in.



You can also link to it here:  Old-School Essentials Spells.
This sheet has ALL the Old-School Essentials spells, not just mine.

I guess the question of "why is there any overlap at all?"  Well, some spells are so ubiquitous to witches that not including them would be strange. A good example is Bestow Curse, which interestingly enough is not in these two books.

So here is a break down of all 1,078 spells I have used and 229 monsters.  Again spell names in Red are brand new to the OSE Warlock book. This sheet helps you see the spell overlap.

Witch Books - Google Sheets



My goal is always to give you something new with each book while making it playable.
So any book can be your "first" witch book and it will work AND be 100% compatible with your "second" or "third" book.

I am currently drafting my next book which will be all monsters.  After that, the plan is to do what I am now calling my last witch book, the High Secret Order Tradition.

Wolfgang Grasse (1930 - 2008) "The Throne of Death" (The Merry Go Round) Detail, 1999


Wolfgang Grasse (1930 - 2008)








Wolfgang Grasse was born Dresden, Germany in 1930. At the age of 14 Wolfgang Grasse saw firsthand the hell and horror unleashed during the British and American bombing of the city of Dresden. This event traumatized him for the rest of his life.

Afterwards, he left Germany for Italy to study art under his grandfather, Friedrich Grasse. In 1948 Grasse was arrested by Soviet authorities for an anti-Soviet cartoon of Stalin hanging from the gallows. First sentenced to death, his sentence was reduced to 25 years at hard labor in a gulag in Poland, where he said there were 12,000 other male prisoners. He spent eight years in prison, and says that the only way he survived was by his art. Grasse would bribe the guards with drawings of erotic images or portraits of their family in exchange for food and protection. Once released, he resumed his artistic career in Berlin working as an illustrator, and continuing his own art practice of painting and drawing.In 1968, Wolfgang Grasse joined an exodus from Germany to Australia. After living in Sidney for a year, he relocated to Penguin Tasmania, where he was a freelance illustrator for The Bulletin. He had several exhibitions and swiftly settled into the Australian art scene, writing and illustrating children’s books and even making a feature-length film.

Grasse has stated that even while living in the bucolic beauty and tranquility of Tasmania, he still suffered from terrifying vivid nightmares, in particular about his time in the gulag, which led him to become a devout Christian. Grasse stated that he wasn't certain if he was actually living a life in Tasmania and having nightmares about prison, or if he was really still in the Gulag, and only dreaming there about having a tranquil life.

"I paint objective, figurative art with high technical perfection to create beautiful, valuable and qualitative works with interesting visions. My art is called Fantastic Realism (Vienese School) influenced also by French surreal and Japanese art (Hokusai, Kunisada, Hiroshige)."

Fantastical and metaphysical; such is the art of Wolfgang Grasse. Some called him a “wise old magician who through his paintings casts a spell on the viewer.” Some compare him with Bosch, Bruegel and Max Beckman.

Much of his art has a gruesome edge, often dwelling on death and sometimes even on apocalyptic events which reflect the ordeals of his experiences in Germany.

Then again, it can be limpid and dreamlike, lavish and mischievous. HIs themes are many, his ability undisputed. It is incredibly intricate and technically skilled.

His work has been categorized as surrealist and also as fantastic realism. The latter was how he liked to be described. Grasse died in 2008, four days after his muse and wife tragically drowned.

He is a stand-alone artist in our culture - and, perhaps, even in our times.



"The Throne of Death" (The Merry Go Round) 1999
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"Kingdom of Death", Acrylic on Panel, 2000
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Wolfgang Grasse (1930 - 2008) "The Temptation of Saint Anthony" 1983Collection of Damian Michaels, Australia
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"Ein gewissen Dr. Ming" (A Certain Dr. Ming), Ink on paper, 1962

"Ein gewissen Dr. Ming" (A Certain Dr. Ming), Ink on paper, 1962

"Ein gewissen Dr. Ming" (A Certain Dr. Ming), Ink on paper, 1962

"Ein gewissen Dr. Ming" (A Certain Dr. Ming), Ink on paper, 1962

"Ein gewissen Dr. Ming" (A Certain Dr. Ming), Ink on paper, 1962



"Firestone" Acrylic on panel, 2004
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"Gustrow" Acrylic on panel, 1977
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“Der Wahnsinn” (The Madness), ink on paper, 1958
“Der Selbstmorder Vorm Spiegel” (The Suicide in Front of the Mirror), Ink and acrylic on paper, 1959
"Der Flotenspieler" (The Flute Player), Ink on paper, 1960
"Der Baum" (The Tree), Ink on Paper, 1961
Untitled, Ink and acrylic on paper, 1960
"Selbstbildnis Mit Tod" (Self-Portrait with Death),  Ink on paper, 1957 
"Luna", Ink on paper, circa 1980

"Dresden", Acrylic on Panel, 1977
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"Death's Victory" Acrylic on panel, 1960
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"The Broom" Ink on paper, 1981
www.wolfganggrasse.com



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Looking to do something a little different this time for my Featured Artist post.

Pamela Colman Smith, aka "Pixie", might the most recognized artist you have never heard of.  Recognized in the sense that you know her work, even if you don't know it belongs to her and she certainly was not recognized in her time for it.

Born February 16, 1878, and died September 18, 1951, at the age of 73 Pixie spent her time among all sorts of artists, Bohemians, Suffragettes, and occultists including members of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn which she would later join.

She produced art for William Butler Yeats and Bram Stoker.

It was while she was a member of the Order of the Golden Dawn she would meet Arthur Edward Waite.  He commissioned her to produce art for a Tarot deck.   Not just the Major Arcana, but all the Lesser Arcana cards as well.

This deck became known as the Rider-Waite Tarot deck after the publisher and the A.E. White.

Pixie's name was never associated with it, until very recently, and she was only paid a flat fee for her work.


In fact, these days many Tarot aficionados who like Pixie's art will opt for the Smith-Waite Tarot deck instead.

Much of her art reflects the esoteric lifestyle she lived. All of it feels like an Art Noveau fever dream from an Authrurian age, or Pagan age, mixed with what Middle Earth must have looked like in Tolkien's minds eye.






She would often do her art while listening to music, allowing her to create without other outside distractions.






And she did covers for Bram Stoker.



Links
The Divine Mystery of Pamela Colman Smith
Reviving a Forgotten Artist of the Occult

The Devil Our Lord, 2013


Barry William Hale is a Sydney based artist whose work over the past 20 years has included painting, drawing, installation, video, sound and performance. He is considered one of the key exponents of esoteric art, specifically creating work which responds to concepts of western spirituality, philosophy and ritual.

“My work is a synthesis of Art and Magick, and the residue of my esoteric endeavors. It is essential for me to forge a magical link to the metaphysical subject matter. There is great power in the things people are afraid of. The Devil is the name some new regime gives to the God[s] of those whom they oppress. These repressed forces become the locus of forbidden power imprisoned by the walls of taboo. For me, these Crowned Anarchies become the agencies of liberation. My work is Gnostic in the sense that it gives primacy to direct experience with the divine. In the spirit of the Rebellious Promethean spark of the Luciferian fire." - Barry William Hale

Artist Barry William Hale, New York City 2017.  Photograph by Stephen Romano
Baphomet Rex Mundi, 2015
Japanese Devil Boy, 2013Hell Attendant II, 2014

Hell Attendant I, 2014
Hell Attendant III, 2014

IO:EVOE: The Transvocatory Media of Barry William Hale, Robert Fitzgerald for ABRAXAS Journal, Fulgur"

Barry William Hale: folding darkness, intersecting shadows & opening the Book of Spirits

The intolerable formlessness must be named, a name that struggles to contain the idea of the Devil and Legion in one composite figure: At best these provide a borderline or isthmus of transformational exchange between the horde and the sorcerer. Legion 49 ,BWH, Fulgur 2009

I have spoken elsewhere of the specificities that wove themselves into the thread whose knots captured my inspiration, that lead to the production of the primary artistic series of Beelzebub and the 49 Servitor. From the cthonic pantheon of the Mexican Amerindian paper-cut tradition which was fused with Spanish Inquisitional demonology. To the Servitors of Beelzebub from the Book Abramelin and following the result of the clairvoyance of a ‘prominent’ Irish psychic, at a sitting of the Ghost Club. Which were included in Crowley’s book of homoerotic poetry ‘The Scented Garden...’ otherwise known as the ‘Bagh-i-muattar’.

Staring into the face of which another knoweth their Devil
Through the darkling speculum myriad manifestations,
terrible and strange, monsterous and fantastic,
the Devil may be known. BWH

To give some insights into my artistic practise which can be seen as a series of different ongoing magical explorations, that I continually return to time and time again. To develop through aesthetic elaboration and further magical research. Adding to an existing corpus of knowledge which continues to grow and inform itself. The Resultant artistic residue of this process is expressed through a number of creative disciplines with a variety of artistic outcomes.

Speaking specifically about the magical source of current works in question, which emerged form a magical operation to Beelzebub. Of my own method and construction based upon personal knowledge of a variety of traditions of spirit conjuration and evocatory arts with particular reference to those that have Beelzebub within there register of spirits2.

My own magical operation endured for the span of eleven months, and was in conjunction with the writing and completion of LEGION 493. By which time the devils where bound and an irrevocable link with that mighty Devil forged. The very process of the Art Magical serves as a veritable Liber Spirituum which captures the spirits and binds their essence within the body of the work which is its pages. For the devils live in the residue of the entire magical artistic process. Therefore we are to conceptualize the entire body of work as a magical talisman dedicated to Beelzebub and Legion.

Once the magical link has been forged, and the Devil and Legion bound to the Book of Spirits sealed within the pages. The essential requirements of the magical operation -like those found within the old grimoires- are dispensed with.

It is not my purpose to expound the revelations and the full extent of the knowledge and experiences had during the course of the magical working with Beelzebub. That Mighty Devil without Solomon’s Temple would not have been built, who was at the side of Jesus as he was upon the Cross. Beelzebub is both the mortar of God’s Temple and its corrosion, eternally in flux and transition as an essential embodiment of the forces of Chaos and multiplicity. .

























































Drawing from this rich source, artist-practitioner Barry William Hale has produced a series of eleven symbolic images based upon an alternative form – a sigillic wheel – once described by Crowley himself. Around this wheel are interlocked figures that ‘symbolise the ordeal of the Adept, upon the soul’s journey.’ As author Robert Fitzgerald cites in his introduction to the work;

“The eleven compositions of CODEX 231 center around twin wheels that house the branches of two trees – the Domes and Prisons of LIBER CCXXXI and their respective sigils. The interlocked figures comprise a chimeric embodiment of these trees, and fulfill the literal ordalium of the Sorcerer, Mystic, Adept and Magician as they struggle with the demons and angels within both Tree and Self. These entities are thus portrayed in Hale’s CODEX 231 are united, both in nature and composition, and held together by each other’s feet and hands, yet ultimately by the Wheels themselves. This unity represents primordial Opposition and Integration, Control and Constraint, of the forces within both the living Adepti and their symbolic representations.”
























H&H 231 #3, 2000-2001
H&H 231 #8 upright, 2000-2001H&H 231 #8 averse, 2000-2001
H&H 231 #5


about Stephen Romano

Josh Stebbins at "No Stars: A Twin Peaks Tribute Exhibition" curated by Stephen Romano October 2019.  

JOSH STEBBINS

Josh Stebbins is a native of Enid Oklahoma. Josh works predominantly with pen and ink (which he is certainly not limited to). He has been doing art, drawing and illustration since he was very young. With only basic art courses in school and college, he is able to foster his pursuit for progression while expanding his own creative horizons. He is very thankful these days to be recognized for all the work he has produced on his journey in life thus far.

Josh tries to convey in his style and subject matter a sense of duality, strengthened by his choice to work mainly in black and white. His subject matter presents undertones of beauty in darkness. These subjects can run the spectrum from religion to horror, often looking at the human experience, mostly from a darker side. Josh says of his work, “People generally realize it’s there [the darker side], but don’t want to face it…for me the garden of Eden has long since had a ‘Sorry, We’re Closed’ sign on its gate.”





Josh Stebbins in Queens New York October 2019. photo by Stephen Romano

SLASH on stage wearing Josh Stebbins' designed shirt from Black Market Art.



















































































about Stephen Romano