The Art Of Fairy presented by David Riche
pub: Paper Tiger. 112 page hardback. Price: £20.00 (UK). ISBN: 1-84340-095-2 .

check out website: www.papertiger.co.uk

All right, so just why is a die-hard SF reader like me doing enjoying a book about the little folk that live at the bottom of the garden, meadowland and forests? In 1978, I picked up the Brian Froud and Alan Lee book 'Faeries' and fell in love with the art.

So did other people and it was a major influence on the film 'Labyrinth' as I recall at the time. Froud and Lee presented the book as more a bestiary than just a series of paintings. When any reality is presented as consistent to itself, it tends to move from fantasy to SF.

Although that is probably why the book is still in my own collection, I have a suspicion that the reason why everyone else has picked up on this book is because they just like faeries.

With one exception and that was largely cos her art appeared 50 years before Froud, all the other 20 artists here cite the influence of the Froud/Lee book as part of the reason they painted faeries and indeed, Brian Froud gives an introduction to this world here as well and then you open up into a world of delightful paintings.

One thing I noticed from the start that most of these artists opted for water-colour to achieve their paintings and even when acrylic was used, it was watered down. These creatures, like the image they present, require an ethereal look that oils would be hard to match.

It was also interesting to see a variety of dark and light elves, although none did any real abominations. Then again, no one really sees faeries in that light either. The few interior pages included with this review should give some representation but this doesn't match the variety you're going to see here.

This book will endear your tastes and won't look out of place on your shelf and one can only hope that Paper Tiger will do a second volume.

GF Willmetts

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