Of Time and Planes - Final illustrations for Echoes from a Time Passage

Each piece is executed in pencil -  water soluble graphite and a range of standard graphite pencils with white gouache paint highlights.  The production team at Austin Macauley Publishers suggested that each drawing be placed at the beginning of each chapter to which I happily agreed.

For the most part, I used my own studies of life drawing models except for the ballet dancer pose which is a combination of studies from various images - I only know one ballet dancer!  The woman below is as close as I could get for my inspiration for April, Markas' partner-in-art. My initial inspiration was a wonderful and beautiful ballet dancer I met on a Baroque dance course many years ago.

For the background - more volcanic cones and also NZ mountain ranges.

The final illustration. The seascape - volcanic plugs of course for the coast.  Ginkgo leaves formed the basis of the Fan Trees.  For the sequel I'm digging around for the oddest Earth plants I can find for the illustrations - sorry no red roses and buttercups and daisies!

Of Time and Planes - the characters in Echoes from a Time Passage

I made many sketches and water colour studies and out of these emerged the final illustrations for the book.  I could have made more finished pieces but had to consider whether I was making studies for the final result or a picture book. But the process was interesting in itself - what on Earth did these folks look like.  I was able to depict protagonist Markas' friend somewhat better than Markas himself, shown here with his lute. I took the body of one of my models for the life drawing class I used to run and put another head on him. I was rather pleased with the result.

My students insist on calling them 'horsemen' - well I suppose there is something equine in the appearance of Axzis.

This is a depiction from a chapter in the book - Markas with his poet sister Rieyna on a picnic with the clan.

A sketch in inks of Markas. 

Of Time and Planes illustration process

The process of actualising an imaginary landscapes presented some challenges, but the landscapes in New Zealand - or 'Zealandia' in Echoes from a Time Passage - contain many interesting features, least of all the cones of extinct volcanoes.  Above, I took many photos of volcanic cones  and used them as reference for the water colours.  Even though they were not used in the book itself, who knows how they may come in handy in the future?  This one is based on images from the Waitakere volcanic plateau in West Tamaki Makaurau-Auckland. Then I dropped protagonist Markas in for good measure.

Here, I wanted another view of Markas on one of his riding beasts surveying the landscape of the wilderness from where the great pandemic, a focus in the narrative, was to emerge. 

Here is another variation on the illustration above.  A black and white illustration for the book emerged from this study.

 And again - volcanic deposits formed the  distant view for this piece.

Here, Markas and his friend Axzis look out to the Great Waters which surround their vast lands as the Stars of Day rise.  I played around with yet more variations on volcanic plugs - this one features the plugs of Mt Manaia in Whangarei.  Fascinating and mythological.

Of Time and Planes

Echoes from a Time Passage began life as a long short story then morphed into a book. As for many writers, the plot and events  unfolded in front of me, so I just followed.  The narrative begins on the plane of Eszkiasia, and is told by Markas Xanders, the son of an Inter-plane diplomat.  But Markas does things differently, for in spite of coming from an aristocratic family with a background in the combat arts, his leaning is towards the performing arts and one which is totally foreign to the plane he lives on. As the narrative unfolds we learn that through the inter-plane communications machines, he, as a child, spots dancers on Earth - children - and one girl in particular.  He watches the girl grow from a talented child to a virtuoso dancer, all of this seemingly at odds with his family values, culture and his training as a theologian.

Then things change abruptly as narrative covers his foray to Earth in search of his father and sister who have both disappeared, and his meeting with the now adult dancer.  Events unfold taking him back to his home-plane, a pandemic which has dire consequences, Markas' reunion with his father and the events which eventually lead him back home again.

The basic premises of the story are of the arts being a conduit for right action and leading to spiritual and esoteric understanding and how Markas' art takes him from a dancer to the spiritual leader of his people.

Throughout, it was necessary to make sketches of the people in order to actualise them in my mind - these watercolour sketches are not included in the book, but served as a visual guidelines. Not an easy task - it is one thing to imagine what these almost Egyptian mythological people resemble and quite another to actually draw and paint them.  Life studies of humans helped!

Of Time and Planes

The book cover is executed in watercolour and seen in full is a visualisation of a Time Passage.

This was another study for consideration and the small oil below was a study made while studying for my fine art degree, but which I didn't submit for 'Echoes', though I could well develop it for a later publication.