{"id":2009,"date":"2016-04-27T02:36:37","date_gmt":"2016-04-27T02:36:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/?p=2009"},"modified":"2016-04-27T03:50:11","modified_gmt":"2016-04-27T03:50:11","slug":"the-2016-best-professional-artist-hugo-award","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/2016\/04\/27\/the-2016-best-professional-artist-hugo-award\/","title":{"rendered":"The 2016 Best Professional Artist Hugo Award"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p> $\"book-complete-elmore-2\"$ Need help\u00a0making sense of the\u00a0Hugo Finalist list in the Best Professional Artist category<\/a>? Grab yourself an adult\u00a0beverage. Easy on the ice.<\/span><\/span>\n

Got it? Good.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

After looking over the nominees announced today, I\u2019m seeing an absence of many talents that represent the best of the contemporary sf\/f art world. Off the top of my head, names like David Palumbo, Greg Ruth, Rebecca Guay, Gerald Brom, Peter Mohrbacher, Jeffrey Alan Love, Wylie Beckert, Sam Weber, Greg Manchess, Dan Dos Santos, and more. They all had Hugo-eligible bodies of work this year.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s rare that I share my personal views on\u00a0any award publicly. Exceptions include speaking up\u00a0on behalf of working 3D\u00a0artists and their professional value regarding the new World Fantasy Award design. Earlier this year, George R. R. Martin asked me to contribute a few Hugo\u00a0recommendations on his blog, and since he\u2019s a friend, I gave it a go. I\u2019m making another exception here.\u00a0The reason I\u2019m writing this post is there will be a group of people awarding a Hugo to a\u00a0pro\u00a0artist this year, and some of those voters might look at the finalist list and think all of the Pro Artist\u00a0finalists share equal value. In this case, that would be a poor assumption.\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

First, when reviewing the finalists\u2019 work, check eligibility. Don\u2019t cast a vote for a Pro Artist Hugo nominee unless you\u2019re certain\u00a0they have\u00a0eligible work published in 2015. Check it yourself. Don\u2019t assume.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

And here\u2019s an assist:<\/p>\n

Larry Elmore<\/span><\/span><\/span> is a legendary and deeply influential<\/em> fantasy illustration icon, who has had a huge impact on generations of Dungeons & Dragons<\/em> fans \u2014 game players, writers, artists, editors, publishers, designers, filmmakers, convention organizers \u2014 and beyond. More to the point, he has a major body of published eligible work in 2015 and that work doesn\u2019t take extensive sleuthing to discern whether it\u2019s\u00a0eligible. His book The Complete Elmore Volume II<\/a> <\/em>contains over 700 drawings from a career dating back to 1981, and was produced and first published\u00a0in the fall of 2015.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Was Larry Elmore amongst my nomination selections? No. He wasn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

Do I believe that \u2018No Award\u2019 is an option this year? It\u2019s the Hugos. It\u2019s always an option<\/em>.<\/p>\n

No\u00a0disrespect to the other finalists, but Larry Elmore winning a Hugo would not be a\u00a0lifetime achievement award but\u00a0it would<\/em>\u00a0recognize\u00a0a lifetime of professional art achievement by\u00a0someone who is legitimately eligible this year.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The history of\u00a0that winners list would be\u00a0shinier\u00a0with his name on it.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

If you\u2019re feeling disoriented as a voter\u00a0\u2014 don\u2019t get twisted. This is an easy one.<\/p>\n

Given this year\u2019s five choices, it\u2019s Larry Elmore.<\/p>\n

Good luck, Larry.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

**********<\/p>\n

BONUS HUGO THOUGHTS:<\/p>\n

Posts like this one should not need to exist, but if you\u2019re waiting for me to publicly say negative\u00a0things about this year\u2019s Hugo art finalists, it\u2019s not happening. I\u00a0do think this last two years of Hugo nomination results in the Pro Artist category represents a tidal shift in who is nominating\u00a0the Hugos. I think it\u2019s a missed opportunity for pro artists to let this moment slip past. Many sf\/f artists deservedly care about the Spectrum Awards, the Chesleys, or Infected By Art<\/em>\u00a0because they promote artists and celebrate what we do. I think the only thing that stops the Hugos from being more included in that conversation is ourselves as pro artists. I often hear artists say that only writers and literary fans vote on the Hugo, and that\u2019s why they don\u2019t vote. I always felt like that was\u00a0self-fulfilling prophecy. Why shouldn\u2019t we as pro artists expect the best from the Hugos as much as we do any other art award, if it has a Pro Artist category? I would\u00a0encourage us as pro artists to better shape\u00a0the Hugo discussion as we see fit next year. Be vocal about it. I\u2019m not saying to campaign for yourself, but I am saying to make your 2016 body of published work accessible where people can see that it\u2019s eligible for consideration. Promote your favorite works by others for Hugo voter consideration. Nominate and vote in the Hugos, even if the Pro Artist category is the only one you vote on. Pro Tip: Your single category ballot\u00a0is counted as equally valid alongside\u00a0ballots filled out across\u00a0their entirety.<\/em><\/p>\n

Weirdly, because of this recent flux, it feels to me like there\u2019s a real opportunity for more of the names listed at the top\u00a0to be recognized. The writers and literary tribes\u00a0aren\u2019t going to do this for us. We have to do it. I\u2019ve\u00a0often\u00a0heard artists say they have no nomination chance unless they attend Worldcon. Stephan Martiniere has won without attending a Worldcon. Julie Dillon was nominated before attending her first Worldcon. Dan Dos Santos has been nominated multiple times with 2009 being\u00a0his lone\u00a0Worldcon appearance (if memory serves). The point is \u2014 these people were Hugo finalists and\/or winners because of enormous professional art talent and visibility, not because of convention campaign skills. That Worldcon-or-bust myth\u00a0doesn\u2019t fly.<\/p>\n

My advice: If artists feel that the award\u2019s voting control is a monopoly beyond reach, the current chaos\u00a0has proven that view is obsolete at best. Part of the joy of being an artist is being a change agent. There\u2019s a\u00a0window of opportunity right now where major contemporary pro sf\/f artists can shape Hugo\u00a0nominations\u00a0toward a view\u00a0more reflective of the sf\/f field\u2019s rich\u00a0professional excellence. 2017 will be here before we\u00a0know it.\u00a0I don\u2019t know how long that window stays open, but I hope the best sf\/f artists notice. It\u2019s not about campaigning. It\u2019s about visibility.<\/p>\n

For as long as I\u2019ve had a career, pro artists have told me the Hugos are\u00a0uncool. Eleven years ago, a respected and popular pro told me one of the worst things that could happen to my career would be\u00a0a Hugo nomination. I thought he was joking. His reply, \u201cSeriously, man. You don\u2019t want that. I\u2019m not kidding.\u201d Maybe I\u2019m a dork, but hearing that it was so uncool to him made it cooler to me. It didn\u2019t hurt that Whelan, Frazetta, Di Fate, the Dillons, and more\u00a0must have been even more\u00a0\u2018uncool\u2019 for winning it. I wanted to be uncool like them. Awards are what we make of them, and I think the current disarray means this award\u2019s voting\u00a0base is being remade across all categories. Ignore\u00a0all of the histrionics, and if it makes you feel better, you can even ignore the\u00a0literary\u00a0categories. What\u2019s stopping the remaking in the Pro Artist category from belonging to the pro artists?<\/p>\n<\/body>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Need help\u00a0making sense of the\u00a0Hugo Finalist list in the Best Professional Artist category? Grab yourself an adult\u00a0beverage. Easy on the ice. Got it? Good. After looking over the nominees announced today, I\u2019m seeing an absence of many talents that represent the best of the contemporary sf\/f art world. Off the top of my head, names […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2011,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"The 2016 Best Professional Artist Hugo Award","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[85],"tags":[194,125,193,192],"class_list":["post-2009","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-awards","tag-best-professional-artist","tag-hugo-awards","tag-larry-elmore","tag-midamericon-ii"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/book-complete-elmore-2.jpg?fit=1000%2C1000","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5te7x-wp","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2009","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2009"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2009\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2021,"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2009\/revisions\/2021"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2011"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2009"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2009"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2009"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}