Progressions: The Art of Jon Foster

Rating:
Summary: A "must-have" for artists and art enthusiasts!
Review: I've been waiting for this book for quite some time now and was finally able to get my copy! I've been a fan of Jon Foster's work after seeing it in the Spectrum illustration annuals and Progressions does not disappoint. Not only is the content of the book exciting and thought provoking, the actual layout lends itself perfectly to his work. Progressions is an interesting combination of sketches, paintings, and reflection which I highly recommend!

Rating:
Summary: Very good, but not great, YET!
Review: I've really enjoyed and admired Jon Foster's illustrations in the "SPECTRUM: The Best of Contemporary Fantastic Art" books and when I saw his illustrations of retro robots; sword, light saber and blaster wielding combatants and surreal horrors (paintings, some digitally manipulated; drawings and purely digital) had been collected by Cartouche Press I was delighted and couldn't wait to get a copy. His marvelous style utilizes energetic opposing diagonals and figures in high contrast lighting. His illustrations possess a muscular sense of movement and a moody almost gothic atmosphere. Many of the artist's sketchbook drawings are included in the book-always nice to see. Now for the bad news: the collection as a whole is, slightly, less impressive than the individual works. When seen as a group, a sense of illustrating by formula increases. Many works rely the old illustrators' stand-by of a figure, or figures, centerally posed in front of a two dimensional background and those vigorous diagonals become, possibly, a quick and easy solution to composition. Still, mighty impressive work and it definitely deserves 4 stars. I give this book 3 stars because of the production on the book itself. It's not a clothbound hardback book with a dust jacket. It has a laminated cardboard cover. I don't know how well it'll hold up over time. Also, the interior lay-out of the book is oddly arranged. There are pages crowded with many, many little reproductions, pages that have only one tiny reproduction on them and pages which have the images bleeding to one edge of the page or another. I found this confusing and irritating. All in all, a solid 4 stars for the artwork and a low 3 stars for the books production. Still, I DO recommend getting this book, because it presents the work of a a very talented illustrator's early work. He's only going to get better and then WATCH OUT!

Rating:
Summary: Very good, but not great, YET!
Review: I've really enjoyed and admired Jon Foster's illustrations in the "SPECTRUM: The Best of Contemporary Fantastic Art" books and when I saw his illustrations of retro robots; sword, light saber and blaster wielding combatants and surreal horrors (paintings, some digitally manipulated; drawings and purely digital) had been collected by Cartouche Press I was delighted and couldn't wait to get a copy. His marvelous style utilizes energetic opposing diagonals and figures in high contrast lighting. His illustrations possess a muscular sense of movement and a moody almost gothic atmosphere. Many of the artist's sketchbook drawings are included in the book-always nice to see. Now for the bad news: the collection as a whole is, slightly, less impressive than the individual works. When seen as a group, a sense of illustrating by formula increases. Many works rely the old illustrators' stand-by of a figure, or figures, centerally posed in front of a two dimensional background and those vigorous diagonals become, possibly, a quick and easy solution to composition. Still, mighty impressive work and it definitely deserves 4 stars. I give this book 3 stars because of the production on the book itself. It's not a clothbound hardback book with a dust jacket. It has a laminated cardboard cover. I don't know how well it'll hold up over time. Also, the interior lay-out of the book is oddly arranged. There are pages crowded with many, many little reproductions, pages that have only one tiny reproduction on them and pages which have the images bleeding to one edge of the page or another. I found this confusing and irritating. All in all, a solid 4 stars for the artwork and a low 3 stars for the books production. Still, I DO recommend getting this book, because it presents the work of a a very talented illustrator's early work. He's only going to get better and then WATCH OUT!

Rating:
Summary: NO! Do listen to the Nay-sayer.
Review: Jon's skills as a painter are good, but having asked him myself why he imitates Phil Hale, he just looked at me and said, well I don't, I used to paint in the same studio as his but I don't understand what you mean. The book is fun to look at, but why not just go to the source? The laman may not understand but Hales work is as far above Fosters as Frazetta's is Ken Kelly's. The thing that bothered me most about the book is that Fosters seems to have gotten lazy and is finishing decent traditional paintings off by going in and doing digitally what it seems it to difficult(i know, its just time consuming)with the paint.