2008-08-07 The Art of Angus McBride

Angus McBride, who died in the summer of 2007, was one of the greatest, if not the greatest historical illustrators of our time. Today he is most famous for his Opsrey Military illustrations, and some of the greatest examples of these are collected for this book.

The book starts with a look at McBride's art, with some analysis and a short interview from Martin Windrow. Windrow discusses all aspects of McBride's art, from his famous illustrations for the Lord of the Rings, his work on children's fairy tale books as well as his unpublished historical artwork. This section provides some terrific 'behind the scenes' look at McBride's art, including some photographs of the artist at work, some preliminary sketches, and some fascinating unpublished work, including a brilliant gouache painting of some 5th century Gothic Warriors. Windrow also discusess McBride's inspirations and his motivations for working in the field.

The main section of the book is a collection of some of McBride's greatest works for Osprey, strecthcing from Ancient Egypt to the Second World War. The illustrations are given one to two pages (depending on their size) as well as another one or two descriptive pages, which gives a historical background to the paintings. Some of these paintings are a matter of taste, as I have seen plenty of brilliant McBride paintings that should have appeared in this book, in place of some of the examples that are included in here.

The Book is divided up into six historical sections. These include: Ancient Warriors, Rome and Her Enemies, the Dark Ages, Medieval Conquest, Warlords and Rebels and Exploration and Invasion. These sections contain a diverse selction of art, covering everything from Egyptian naval warfare to the Assyrians, Thracians, Celts, Gladiators, Vikings, Byzantines, Normans, Mongols, Mamluks, Samurai, Medieval Knights, Aztecs, Pirates, Highland Clansmen, Napoleon's Dragoons, Zulus, Davy Crockett and the Women of World War II amongst other things. These selcetions are taken from around 46 Osprey titles.

Some of the highlights of the book include 'The Viking Battle of Svoldr', 'Celtic Charioteer', 'The Ancient Assyrians' and the 'Mongol invasion of Japan'. These are all highly evocative and atmospheric, and stand as a great testament to the skill of Mr. McBride.

If you are a fan of Angus McBride's work, or if you have a history buff then this book would be a great addition to your library. I give it four stars because I believe that they could have contained a bigger selection of art, as well as having the two-page paintings to occupy the entire page, instead of leaving the borders blank. A great tribute to a now deceased artist.

Recommended!

Additional information -

hardback book with removable dust jacket. Also contains a felt string bookmark.
Size: 25x29x1
Weight: 1 KG