Sunday Safari - Arachnophobia

 M. Dobuzinskij, D'javol from Zolotoe runo, 1907


Halloween is drawing near
time to face our wildest fear 

Odilon Redon, Smiling Spider, thanks to Japonisme

Bruno Paul, Plague in South Africa, illustration from Simplicissimus, 1901.

Many thanks to ihatemusic1943 for the info! 

 A. H. Watson, illustration from The Enchanted Blanket, 1936, thanks to ElfGoblin

 Aleksandra Waliszewska, Dom Babci

Film poster by Wojciech Fangor for Les Compagnes de la Nuit, 1956

Book cover by Rein van Looij, 1940s, thanks to 50 Watts

 Walter Martin and Paloma Muñoz, Traveler at Night

Michael Sowa, Spider on the wall

Book cover by Emanuel Schongut, 1960s

Film poster by Wiktor Gorka, 1964

Film poster by Werner Klemke for The Golden Spider 

from Graphis 1959-60, thanks to Sandi Vincent

Lorenzo Mattotti, illustration from The Raven

Sunday Safari - Four & Twenty Black Birds

Actually, if you count them all they are even more,

from Rooks and Ravens to Blackbirds and Crows.

A big flock for our last Winter Safari.

Welcome Spring!

Rooks in Ginko Tree by Diana Sudyka

Les Corbeaux de Pearblossom cover by Beatrice Alemagna

Cria Cuervos Cuban movie poster by Eduardo Munoz Bachs, 1977

Two works from Raven by Emmanuel Polanco

Raven by Lisa Congdon

Blackbird's nest by Joe McLaren

Blackbirds by Jantze Tullet, thanks to The Art Room Plant

Crow by Sebastiano Ranchetti

Raven by Ann Wood

Maggi poster ad from Reklamarsenaal

Cover of Graphis 116, 1964

The Raven by Lorenzo Mattotti

Corvo and Merlo by Marco Cazzato

Crows by Leonard Baskin

Crowed and Crowm by Lou Beach

Poster by Mehdi Saeedi

Rural Corvus and Urban Corvus by Dan Grzeca

Blackbird by Maarten Kolk and Guus Kusters

Drawing by Amy Dover

Mattotti's ancient creatures

Lorenzo Mattotti is one of Italy's finest and most internationally renowned artists. Starting with comics in the early eighties, during his prolific career he has produced many illustrated books and graphic novels, covers and illustrations for magazines like Glamour, The New Yorker and Vanity Fair, posters and advertising campaigns. Since 1998 he lives in Paris, where his wife Rina Zavagli recently opened the Galerie Martel, an art gallery specialized in contemporary illustration and comic book art.

Il mistero delle Antiche Creature, with texts by Mattotti's longtime friend and collaborator Jerry Kramsky, was published in 2007 by the always interesting and adventurous orecchio acerbo in Italy and Editions du Panama in France. This beautiful children's book tells the story of two curious young friends who venture into an abandoned garden. There, they make friends with the old keeper of a forgotten zoo, who creates paintings of strange ancient animals. The book alternates pages containing the story's text accompanied by black and white line drawings with stunning full-color spreads of the zookeeper's paintings. With a masterful sense of color and composition, Mattotti brings his lost wild creatures to life in a mysterious wonderland of pastel landscapes, from which they emerge to inhabit the world of our imagination.

You can watch a video trailer of the book (in Italian) showing more of its colorful illustrations here. I invite you to also take a look at the other well made children's book trailers available on orecchio acerbo's website and youtube channel.