Boris Vallejo and Julie Bell: The Ultimate Collection Paperback – 25 Oct. 2009

Boris Vallejo and his current wife Julie Bell are two of the most successful fantasy artists in the world. This book is a collection of some of their best work over nearly three decades, from the late seventies to the year the book came out which was 2005.Both of them paint in a variety of styles but it usually includes a powerful mix of strange and impossible fantasy worlds with highly detailed and realistic portrayals of almost perfect human anatomy painted directly from live models (usually, I understand, with the aid of extensive photographs.)The models who Boris and Julie use, including themselves, are usually bodybuilders with very clearly defined muscle tone: their bodies are usually almost - but not quite - impossibly beautiful but their faces are sometimes depicted in a way which, rather than being idealised, concentrate on bringing out the character of a real human being. I have no doubt from some of the images in this book that either could have made a living as a portrait painter rather than a fantasy artist.Some of these works focus on human or humanoid figures - men, women, fairies, mer-people, angels gods and goddesses - while others have a mix of human figures and real or fantasy animals - lions, tigers, horses, birds, fish, dragons, unicorns.Boris's work in particular often displays a dry humour, particularly apparent when you look at the faces of the human or non-human characters.The title of this book is now a little out of date - both artists are still going strong as of 2019 and they have since brought out a number of other books such as Dreamland (2014) which included pictures painted after the date of this book. So it is no longer "Ultimate" in the sense of "last" and I would not agree that everything either of them have produced since 2005 should be excluded from a book which was ultimate in the sense of "best."Nevertheless this is certainly an excellent collection of their work and if you like fantasy art you will probably also like this.

One of the best art books there is

Good collection of fantasy work with detailed explanation of the time line.

this is a fantastic fantasy art book, I have been a massive fan of both of these artists for more years than I am going to confess to. this book will not disappointRic

Thank you!

nice product

V good