This piece is about
to be retired.
(Run your cursor over the image to see the detail. It may take a moment to load.)
This was done in 1989 as the cover for Wicca, a Guide for the Solitary Practitioner by Scott Cunningham. (It's gotten a new cover since then, of course.)
Llewellyn, who published the book, asked for this cover not to be in my "usual wifty style." I had no idea what they meant by that, so I discussed it with my wonderful art editor, Terry Buske, and we decided they didn't want the Faux Nouveau that I was doing for them at the time. They also wanted the practitioner to be androgynous, so that both men and women would be comfortable seeing themselves in the image.
So I asked a friend of mine to pose, and made her blond (so you could see her head against the dark background) and considerably less feminine than she really looked. Then I sent the picture in, Llewellyn had a meeting, and decided to ask Terry to tell me to put in something that was more like the Art Nouveau stuff that they liked so well. Go figure! So I added the smoke, and I made it wifty. <g>
The print has an image area roughly 7x9 inches and comes matted on a piece of foam-core board. Open edition, signed by the artist. $25 + $7 shipping and handling.
