Fantasy Visuals: John Blanche - Part III (the '00s)

Follows from Part II.

While the '80s were an age of experimentation and the '90s a time of development of a visual language for a new setting, the following decade saw John Blanche sit back and let the other artists of GW proceed along the route he set.

A turning point of Blanche's influence on Fantasy is probably Mordheim, published in 1999. This is the moment when the Old World stops being anything else than Blanchitsu. It's medieval fantasy Necromunda, on steroids. It has all the elements: deformity, madness, skulls, spikes, scrolls used as garments and oversized weapons. In one word, Grimdark.

After Mordheim the way is finally paved and Warhammer Fantasy's frames are drawn. Not that there isn't space for creativity within the studio, but it is limited, and mostly concentrated in the fields that aren't Blanche's direct interest, namely the forces of good like High and Wood Elves, Bretonnians and Dwarfs. Yet even on those Blanche manages to leave his mark, in the form of ridulously large and elaborate helms and headdresses, elaborate clothing that is either form-fitting or oversized, frequently both on the same figure and, of course, skulls.

WFB 6th edition (2000) has only two tables from Blanche, and there's no contribution of his at all for the Army Books, except for a few small sketches. It is clear that Blanche's interest lies elsewhere and, once the necessary job is done, he returns to work on the things that truly inspire him.

It is in this period that Blanche starts adopting a typical format for his works: single characters concepts, full figure, no background, made on small size sheets (A4 or smaller), in pencils/ink and with occasional watercolour/acrylic ink. Inquisitor (2001) is the perfect example (if you think these look way better than those of Fantasy, you are right but we'll discuss this later).

Completely gone are the large colour paintings of the past, and when colour is used the palette is extremely limited to the main colours brown/vermilion/yellow/off white.

WFB 7th edition (2006) is another perfect example of the new approach: Blanche does not draw any large table for it, but contributes with his sketches, and places a particular care on "evil" factions such as Beastmen, Skaven, Undead and Daemons. He does revisit the old art in his own style, occasionally introducing some new designs and elements, and this becomes the model for all GW's art. It is the triumph of Blanchitsu, elevated to "official" standard, a conscious departure from classic Fantasy tropes to make GW's product unique, but also the death of all other styles that made Warhammer so diverse and interesting.

Rurkhar Festigor, Pleaguebeast of Nurgle (2003)

Don Quixote (2005)

Marauders of the North (2005)

Wood Elf (2005)

Beast of Chaos (2007)

Khorne Juggernaut (2007)

Lord of Change (2007)

Vampire (2008)

Zombie Dragon (2008)

Mounted Skaven (2009)

Skavenblight (2009)

Blanche dedicates many beautiful sketches to Warhammer 40K 5th edition (2008). This is his true barinchild, where he definitely shines without obscuring any other stars. Compare the following works with those before and you see where the passion lies. There is, however, the subtle feeling of a conflict within Games Workshop: whereas Marketing and Sales push the models, Blanche seems more interested in doing his own thing, namely focusing on grotesque characters that really define the feeling of 40K but seem to be unmarketable for an army: almost all of Blanche's most beautiful works are not existing models, and are not used to make new ones.

Arch Deaconne (2004)

Custiden (2004)

Edlar Pirate (2004)

Slanni (2004)

Awreken Cysst Archchemist of Vyre (2005)

Daemonettes (2005)

Tzeench Chaos Thug (2005)

Plague Marines (2007)

Adeptus Mechanicus (2008)

Grey Knights Fortress (2010)

The trend of the '00s continues even into the '10s, with even more weight - something we will see in next post.

GW Lord of the Rings Castellan of Dol Guldur - painted as a Wraith

 

I am not a fan of the later GW Lord of the Rings miniatures. The earlier Citadel release, in the '80s, had a great flavour. The later one, in the 2000s, retained too much of the movie aesthetics (which I generally revile) and could not be redeemed even by the Perry Brothers' sculpting skills. On top of that, the scale does not match figures from any other producer, including other lines of GW.

However, there are a few figures that shine out of the group - almost all of them original GW creations. One of these are the Castellans of Dol Guldur.

They are essentially low-powered Nazgûl, Wraiths that animate empty armours and old rags. The influence of John Howe's style is obvious.

Now, I do like John Howe, I just think some of his stuff - namely the full plate armour - suits better the Warhammer world than Middle-earth. That's why I painted this guy here to be a Wraith in my home-ruled Restless Dead warband for Mordheim.

It fits as a hero into the retinue of Lavinia von Enzebsurg, which we presented here. This is why he sports the colours of the once-Gräfin, rather than the dull black we associate with undead. I think he came out alright.

Size-wise, he's bigger than Oldhammer miniatures but as an evil hero it's not too much out of place.

The Leydenhoven Border Patrol - a Mordheim warband

Since I created the Coldwood Smugglers, I planned on having a nemesis for them, a band of Border Wardens hunting smugglers and, since we are in the Warhammer World, monsters and mutants. But at the same time I didn't want to invest a lot of money in it (too many other projects... ) so I decided to build the new warband with a single set of miniatures: the excellent Empire Archers, in the time of AoS also known as the Freeguild Archers. Created in 2009, this set has been hugely popular because of its quality and modularity (and price point), before being discontinued in 2019.

That's right, I got myself a basic warband for around € 20,00, which is a steal!

The fluff of the warband is simple: the town of Leydenhoven lies along the river Reik, on the southeastern border of the Wasteland, still belonging to Marienburg but a few hours walk away from Middenland and a short boat trip from Reikland. It is a sleepy border town: boats pass by on the great river, and few people walk along the road, mostly peddlers and hunters. The main road to Marienburg also bypass Leydenhoven by cutting from Kalkaat to Klessen anyway. To the east of town the eaves of the Drakwald loom all too close and the summits of the Mirror Moors are clearly visible.

The inhabitants of Leydenhoven are local merchants, hunters, farmers and fishermen. The city maintains a small garrison of guards commanded by a Captain sent from Marienburg, who is also responsible for order within the city, but the main defence are the Wardens of the Border Patrol, a corp of rangers trained to scour the forest, capture smugglers and outlaws and kill beastmen and mutants.

Unlike the guards, who are mostly outsiders, the wardens are all local people - woodsmen recruited and paid by the Burgomeister. Their captain is Rutger Hauer, an middle-aged veteran whose experience and sense of responsibility allowed him to access a position few others would keep, had they his total lack of mesure in talking. Rutger the Outspoken, the Straighforward, the Sincere are just kind names for his inability to hide, or even sweeten, his opinions, which are generally negative or anyway pessimistic. The Burgomeister Cornelis Drebbel can't stand him, but also trusts him to do his job and keep an eye on a group of people who are paid too little to be professional and are very prone to corruption.

Rutger de Stomp - the Blunt - is assisted by three main assistants: Lieven de Schermer, Eddi de Groen and Elke de Bosdochter.

Lieven de Schermer (Leobwin Visser) is the only member of the wardens to have a proper combat training. He is a Marienburger with an obscure past - some say he was a duellist, some say a protagonist, all agree he ran into some trouble connected to a woman, her husband and some murder. He enrolled into the Border Patrol and nobody ever asked him any question. He does not like to talk about his past, anyway, although when drunk he occasionally mutters about some past sorrows he needs to forget.

Eddie de Groen (Eduard van Halen) is the youngest member of the wardens. He joined because he wanted an exciting life of fighting monsters in the woods, rather than fishing like all his family does. Rutger constantly yells at him or berates him for his lack of judgement, but he is actually grooming him since he is one of the few members to actually believe the Wardens have some purpose. Eddi carries a sword, apparently found on a river wreckage when he was little, and is trying to learn how to use it.

Elke de Bosdochter (Adelheid Bosch) is a priestess of Taal and Rhya. While not a member of  the wardens, she is often called upon when the Patrol needs to deal with supernatural threats. Elke agrees to help them if there is indeed a supernatural threat to the population, and expects to receive a donation to the village temple.

The rest of the warband are regular wardens, all armed with a long bow and a dagger.