In the world of painting, there are creators who do not expect museum acclaims and sugary admirers of critics. In a way, Boris Vallejo is an artist of the “applied” genre, and his work falls under a wide range of categories of commercialized art. But why is such a bias multiplied by talent bad?
Fantasy master
In the United States every year and now a huge number of books are published - over 50,000 titles. And each book according to the laws of the genre - whether it's science fiction, a love story or a thriller - must have a thoughtful and attractive dust jacket to make it better bought. In this regard, Boris Vallejo is a recognized master. Which, by the way, has even counterfeit imitators both at home in America and abroad.
Artist Boris Vallejo
Fantasy is a rather original and popular literary genre throughout the world. And in America, the 80-90s - in particular. Born in Peru in 1941, Boris Vallejo (Valeggio, Valeggio - there are different transcriptions of the transfer of the surname Vallejo) in 1964 moved to the states. Already in 1968 it became popular, creating a poster for one of the films in the style of fantasy. Since then, he is in large demand for creating covers and announcements, receiving a lot of money for this. Films of the 90s of the corresponding genre, such as “Knights on Wheels”, “Q”, “Queen of the Barbarians”, comedy “Holidays”, “Holidays in Europe”, “Fast Food Team”, could not do without his brush.
Models for paintings
Boris Vallejo is married to a famous American artist. Julia Bell, whose style of paintings largely coincides with the works of the master, is also a model model for many of her husband’s works. The paintings are distinguished by a large number of nudity (both female and male), but the spouses do not see anything shameful in this. By the way, for paintings, Bell Boris also often poses nakedly. The artist claims in an interview that he simply loves to portray beautiful and strong bodies of people, that exposure is natural for a person. Why is there a lot of eroticism and even sex in the picture? Because without him, none of us would have existed (as Boris says).
Boris Vallejo. Paintings
Such an abundance of "nudity" and frank conventions - nevertheless the genre itself has to this effect - brought the artist widespread fame both in America and abroad. For example, even in the USSR during the years of perestroika, calendars and posters with photocopies of paintings by the maestro began to be sold. But not all art critics took Vallejo positively and seriously. Devastating articles appeared claiming that, supposedly, in such openwork armor, which are painted in the picture, it is impossible not only to fight, but even to pass through the thickets of nettles, for example. Be that as it may, many of the works are literally engraved in memory, and afterwards you recall them repeatedly, but is this an indicator?
Among the artist’s most famous works is one of the first covers he painted: an order for Burroughs' book “I Am Barbarian,” thanks to which Vallejo literally soared to the heights of popularity. And in terms of demand, he got a job at the publishing house for many years to come! As a rule, the master’s paintings have no names, and they depict dragons, warriors, half-naked girls, monsters. A characteristic feature: no matter how fantastic the plot, everything is spelled out very real and to the smallest detail (for example, the muscles of the human body or the dragon's head), a kind of fantastic realism!
Dynasty and transfer of skill
By the way, Vallejo is a whole dynasty of contemporary artists. Firstly, Bell, which in itself is quite famous in the states. Son Dorian also draws in fantasy style and works simultaneously with portraiture. Maya's daughter is an artist and photographer. Stepsons Anthony and David are artists working for galleries in the United States, as well as illustrators of books of the art genre (mostly science fiction and fantasy).