Michael Whelan has a whole series of paintings called “The End of Nature” in his galleries. These are some of my most favourite paintings of his — partly because I love the green landscapes he paints and partly because I think humanity is a blight upon this world and think that we’ll continue to destroy all that’s beautiful and pure on the planet till it’s too late.…
I distinctly remember being very excited to read Arthur C. Clarke’s “2001: A Space Odyssey” and I also remember that I didn’t read it in English — I read a Sinhalese translation. But I also remember purchasing “2010: Odyssey Two” as an English book, and the amazing cover for it.
At that time, I didn’t know that the cover was drawn by Michael Whelan.…
I don’t think I’ve seen this particular painting by Michael Whelan before. But when I did come across it, it spoke to me 🙂
I think almost as soon as I looked at the painting, I got the first two lines of the poem — my wife and I have this running joke based on the title of a short story by Harlan Ellison, “I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream“.…
I am not familiar with this painting by Michael Whelan — in fact, I’m pretty certain I’d never seen it before I came across it randomly a couple of weeks ago when browsing his galleries 🙂
For some reason, the art called out to me and I thought I needed to write a poem about it.…
I had not seen this artwork by Michael Whelan before. In the explanation for the painting, he says that he sees manmade structures as being part of nature, because we are part of nature.
My immediate impression on seeing the painting was a different one … but then again, it probably stems from the fact that I see humanity as a blight on nature 🙂 We take, destroy, consume, but don’t do a lot to give back or to replenish.…
So far, I’ve mostly written poems about Michael Whelan’s artwork that I was familiar with. It’s been mostly artwork that I knew either from his posts, or from his book covers.
This time, I decided to pick an artwork at random — just because it appealed to me 🙂 And what I ended up picking was “Brightness Reef”.…
This is one of my favourite paintings by Michael Whelan 🙂
I love greenery and the colour green — I can’t tell you why. But I find looking at greenery soothing and when you have golden light running through the green, I find it especially calming/enticing. So, I love how the sunlight plays over the grass in this artwork, and the slight golden edging to the slit in the wall towards the top right seems magical to me.…
I’ve talked often, and in many places, about Michael Whelan and his cover for “Destiny’s Road“.
Larry Niven’s book has had a lasting impact on me because any time I think of wistful, nostalgic science fiction, “Destiny’s Road” is the book that comes to mind. I can feel how I felt when I read it, almost taste the air from back then, each time I think about the book.…
In Efflorescent I wrote about Michael Whelan and his creative writing contest and my submission to the contest.
That poem was the first one I’d penned in 10 or 15 years. The last one I recall writing before that was one in a series that I called something along the lines of the “science of poetry” or the “physics of poetry”.…
Yes, I know, I have not posted here in a long time 🙂
I’ve been doing some writing but that too was in fits and starts. That might be changing again, but there’s a story behind it…
A few weeks back, Michael Whelan posted this.
I can’t believe that there are people who don’t know who Michael Whelan is — well, at least not people I know since most of the people I know tend to be SF/fantasy fans.…