O&G illustrations : Paul Bonner

I'm still in my Orchish phase and I continu to paint every day but today, I wish to share with you some illustrations of Paul Bonner. This artist is one of my favourite illustrator of the GW 80’s studio. He took part of the construction of my addiction of the the green skins. 

I love to compare his 2D work to the 3D work of the Goblin Master, both of them are very brilliant and IMHO they’re the fathers of this race.

Paul was commissioned for many works by GW but unfortunately only few of them are coloured, especially for fantasy green skins. the illustrations below are very evocative and carries me immediately in the past (Cf La madeleine de Proust). Click them, they're in high resolution, enjoy!

Besieging Goblins :

Illustration from Warhammer siege 1st ed and cover of The Doomstones Campaign (Blood in Darkness)

Some words of Paul about this illustration :

Way back in time - 80's - I guess, I got a great commission from Games Workshop as a freelancer to paint some besieging goblins. I was not so familiar with their world (GW - I knew all about besieging goblins) - and as everyone knows; goblins are lots of earthy colours, brownish based - not green.

Alas - GW goblins were - and are - green. They loved the first painting - apart from the goblins not being green, so I repainted the whole thing rather than try and alter it as I was very happy with it. If they wanted green goblins they could have them, but I was not losing my brown goblins. Sat up over a few nights and painted the whole thing again - and so we were all happy bunnies.

Well, maybe not the green ones, I still think they would rather have been Brown.

What do you prefer :Green or Brown skin?

Wolf Riders

Cover of Warhammer Novel: Wolf Riders and Cover of The Doomstones Campaign (Death Rock).

The last news about this illustration are note very good… Paul said : I think it (the illustration) got damaged in a flood we had some years back - but I'll try and dig it out.

See you soon for my next article, O&G banners !

Cheers!