The House of Crunchy Art: Award-winning Sci-Fi and
Fantasy Art by
FRANK WU
2002 Hugo Award Finalist - best fan artist
"Nice stuff. Very expressive."
Bob Eggleton - "Highly imaginative concepts." Vincent Di Fate
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text on dark background
These images may contain hidden
messages. Or not.
Prints (brilliant, high-resolution, 11 x 17 inch on nice,
shiny photo paper) of all these images are available for $10 each (with volume
discounts: 2 prints, $20; 3, $25; 4, $35, 5, $45, 6, $50). Really big prints of Losing
Memories (24 x 30), and
The Sad Girl and The
Tower of Babel (each 24 x 36) which are huge and sharply detailed, but on
ordinary paper, are $15 each (2 prints, $30; 3, $40). Prints are mailed in
a tube and postage and handling is $4/order. The prints are
numbered and limited to a total run (including large and small) of only 25.
Email me for details.
I commissioned Christina Sng to write poems for The
Sad Girl, Resurrection Man,
and Indifference and Keep
the Universe Beautiful.
FOR EARLIER ARTWORK, CLICK HERE
AUTOMATIC ART!
To set your computer to bring up a new Wu
image every 6 seconds, click here.
(Only works well with hi-speed connections.)
EMAIL ME.
Please tell me which piece you like the most. To see photos of me with various
luminaries of the sci-fi world, including Joe Haldeman, Ellen Datlow, Vernor Vinge, Gregory
Benford, Hal Clement, Bjo Trimble, Frank Kelly Freas, Bob Eggleton's hair, Tim Powers, William
F. Wu (no relation), Nina Kiriki Hoffman, Julie Czerneda, 4E Ackerman, Vincent
DiFate, Val Lakey Lindahn and Ron Lindahn, Robert Sheckley, Kent Brewster of Speculations, Derryl Murphy of On Spec, Chris Butler,
Marina Fitch, Mary Anne Mohanraj of Strange Horizons, Patrick and Honna
Swenson of Talebones, Ken Wharton, Lori Ann White, Jay Lake, Eric Witchey, Fiona
McAuliffe, Ray Vukcevich, Jerry Oltion,
Kathy Oltion, the Bill from School House Rock, and
many more, click here.
Images (c) 1998-2002 Frank Wu
UPDATED 03/14/03
A SHORT BIO OF ME
Frank Wu’s art has
materialized in many magazines, including Fantastic Stories, Talebones,
Darkling Plain, Altair, E-scape and Strange Horizons. He’s also
painted covers for books from Aardwolf Press by Mark Siegel, Jennifer Barlow and
Daniel Pearlman. Due out later this year is a Wheatland Press book of short
stories by Jay Lake, each illustrated by Wu;
the collection will be entitled Greetings from Lake Wu. Frank won the
Illustrators of the Future Grand Prize and was a finalist for the Hugo Award for
Best Fan Artist. When not doing art, Frank can be found hanging out with monks,
hunting for mastodon bones, riding in banana-shaped mopeds, touching art when the museum guards aren’t looking, searching for a river of
molten lava to drop keys into, or walking the earth, meeting people, getting
into adventures, you know, like Caine in Kung Fu.
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MAJOR AWARDS
2002 HUGO AWARD FINALIST - BEST FAN ARTIST! I made the final ballot (of five people) for this award, which celebrates both fan artists
and semi-professionals like myself. Whoopee! This was my first Hugo
nomination! While I eventually did not win [the trophy was taken home by
(now) four-time Hugo winner Teddy Harvia], it was thrilling and fun just to be
nominated. It was an exciting ride, and I really am looking forward to, I
hope, possibly being nominated this year (2003). Just
being nominated for a Hugo award is a great honor, privilege and
responsibility. It is, in effect, a love letter from the fans, and I
promise to try to respond to this love with the best, most honest and heartfelt
artwork I can - this is my love letter back. To see samples of work by all the
nominees for best fan artist, click here.
To see a complete list of the 2002 Hugo nominees and winners - with a list of links
to their stuff! - click here.
It is now open season for nominating for the 2003 Hugo awards and my 2003 Hugo
page is here.
ILLUSTRATORS OF THE FUTURE GRAND PRIZE WINNER! I won the Grand Prize
($4000!) in the 2000 Illustrators of the Future contest. (This award was founded by L.
Ron Hubbard but is kept separate from Scientology - I am a Christian and not a Scientologist.)
My winning illustration, for
a story by Dan
Dyson, was published in the book Writers of the Future, Vol. XVI. For
more on the contest, click here
or here or here.
ANOTHER AWARD! At the Philadelphia WorldCon (2001), I
received an award for my Frank R. Paul tribute site
cataloguing and displaying the work of that great
early sci-fi illustrator. ASFA
(the Association of Science Fiction and Fantasy Artists) honored me with one of
their first website awards, in the category "Best Archival Webpages".
I am deeply touched, as I am sure Mr. Paul would be, were he still with us.
To see my listing in the Locus magazine
index of Science Fiction awards, click
here.
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ARTICLES AND INTERVIEWS
My most recent interview has been posted at
Artist Interviews, Jan. 2003
issue. I talk about art, music, and being a Christian. You can read the
text here.
Bay Area TV producer Natasha Levitan has made a half-hour documentary about me.
It is the first episode of a new local TV show called Modern Masters. My
episode has aired repeatedly on Cupertino, California, cable TV, and will
shortly also be broadcast in Mountain View, California, and in other areas.
Please contact me if you would like a
copy. (December, 2002)
Dave Romm of KFAI-Radio Minneapolis, who runs
the Shockwave weekly sci-fi radio show, interviewed me at World
Fantasy Con '02. The interview is now available via RealAudio
here. (Posted Nov. 11, 2002).
Marsdust (July 1, 2002)
posted an interview of me, too. Read the text
here. Strange Horizons posted an
interview
of me done by Terry Hickman (May 2002). Read the text
here. At BayCon 2002 I gave a slide show and they wrote a very
nice article about me in
the con's twice daily newsletter (May 2002).
The Sunnyvale Sun published an
article about me after I won the
Illustrators of the Future Grand Prize (Oct 2000).
Etc.: A foto of Bob Eggleton, Warren Lapine and I flinging our long hair
at each other was published in the November 2002 Locus magazine; you can also
see the picture here. A foto of me sitting with Frank Kelly Freas and Laura Brodian Freas
appeared in the Oct. 2002 issue of Locus (page 9). We are
celebrating Kelly's 80th birthday (congrats!) and you can see the blue hair I had done
up
especially for WorldCon. I also appear in a group shot (page 71) with the
other nominees for the Hugo award for best fan artist. The first time I
was in Locus was in the May 2002 issue (page 12) as I stood in for Julie Czerneda
at the Philip K. Dick awards - and held a huge cardboard cut-out of Julie's
face. |
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PUBLICATIONS
2003
Right now I'm wrapping up work on illustrations for the
book Greetings from Lake Wu, a collection of stories by Jay
Lake and art by me. I should complete this within the next month or
so. When published, it will total 14 illustrations. This book
will also see the print debut of my portfolio
piece "Love Is the Plan -
The Plan Is Death," inspired by the James Tiptree, Jr. story. I did
this piece back in 1998 or thereabouts, so it's nice to see it finally
published.
Last year I completed a large project for Fantastic
Stories magazine. This was going to include illustrations
for several stories. The large, full-page illustrations for four of
the stories would fit together into a single larger image. This
would be constructed by carefully tearing out four pages of the magazine
and re-arranging them to make the larger picture. Unfortunately,
since I completed this project, DNA Publications, which publishes
Fantastic and several other magazines has undergone some financial
difficulties (as have we all). The four illos that make the one
larger one are now going to be divided between two different issues.
Darn. The good news is that this issue is going to press in April,
and should be available soon. A preview of the first of the four
images, for the story "Stored Dreams" can be seen
here. In the next
few weeks, I'll trot out the next three images and you can see the
completed image.
But that's 27 illustrations in the works or in the can
waiting to see the light of day.
In addition to these projects, I just finished up the
cover for the e-book The Vessel of Heaven by Jamie Rosen, published
by Jintsu (an electronic imprint from
Eggplant Productions);
it's just come out now.
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2002
I wrap up the year with four publications, including a
book cover; plus 27 in the wings for next year.
Published in December was a painting for a story by Sean
Klein called "Event Horizon," which involves both Columbus and ring
singularities (rotating black holes), which may be a gateway to another
universe. This is for Talebones
magazine. Published earlier this year was my acrylic
painting-sculpture illustration for a story by
Ilsa Bick, who was in the same Writers/Illustrators of the Future class as
me. Her story for Talebones
magazine is called "Build Me." Every time I do an illustration
I try to do something I've never done before. Sometimes this means something more colorful or more sentimental or more
monumental than before. This time I am doing a work more disturbing
and frightening than before - it has screaming baby
faces and weird, sculpted baby hands reaching out toward the viewer.
Talebones editor Patrick Swenson liked it so much that he used it for
mini-posters at NorwesCon advertising an evening of readings called "Talebones
Live."
I completed a second project for Fantastic
Stories (the print SF magazine formerly known as Pirate Writings), to do
an entire issue of interior art. I got to illustrate stories by Alan Dean
Foster, Tom Piccirilli, Jeff Carlson, Mary Catelli, Mark Fewell, and Catherine
Wells. My over-arching plan is this: Each of the stories gets one full-page
illo and a smaller illo. After you are done reading the magazine,
you can pull it apart and assemble the four of the full-page illos together into
one larger image.
I also finished up work on a large acrylic painting (24 x
36) for the cover for the third book to be
published by Aardwolf Press, the first novel,
Echo and Narcissus, by Mark Siegel.
I have another big project in the pipeline. This is
a collection of stories by Jay Lake and art by me, to be published by
Wheatland Press. We have decided on the title, Greetings from
Lake Wu. Also out earlier this year was the second issue of the print sci-fi
magazine Darkling Plain, which contains my rune-filled illo for K. Bird
Lincoln's story "Losing
Memories."
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2001
I finished the year with a total of 22 publications!
These included illos for four different magazines, a con program book where I
was Artist Guest of Honor, and two book covers! ... My final
credit of 2001 was my 29th pub over all: an
acrylic painting (with an astronaut kissing a spacebabe!) for the story "Silence Before
Starlight" by Carrie Vaughn for the print sci-fi magazine Talebones,
issue no. 23. ... Recently published was
my irresponsibly colorful cover for
Hamlet Dreams, Jennifer
Barlow's first novel, from Aardwolf Press. ...
Also out recently is a piece of art I call "The
Good Daughter" for Talebones
issue no. 22, for a touching story by James Van Pelt - a story I sincerely
believe should be nominated itself for a Hugo for Best Short Story.
...
Earlier in 2001 I saw the publication of my two illustrations of a girl with a gun for the story "Slugball,"
by Mark Hoover, in two May issues of Strange Horizons
ezine. Part of the fun of doing that one was designing a hi-tech dart
gun. I had wanted to draw cool guns ever since I noticed that one of the credits
on the Japanese anime movie Akira was for a "weapons designer"
(what a cool job title). One of my "Slugball" images is now available on a mug,
T-shirt (long and short sleeve), ladies' T-shirt, sweatshirt, and tote
bag. For a short time, it was even available as a Christmas ornament; this
seemed odd, since Christmas ornmanents should promote peace on earth and good will toward man,
and perhaps best not to feature a
girl with a gun. Nonetheless, this is my first bit of merchandising. However...
Shortly, there will be "Slugball"
beanie babies, "Slugball" bubble bath and "Slugball" Rock 'Em Sock
'Em Robots. Just kidding - but I feel almost like
Lucas.
...
Also published in 2001 was the first
book from the new imprint Aardwolf Press, a collection of short stories entitled
The Best-Known Man in the World
by Daniel Pearlman; it has a cover
by me. ... The project before that depicted alien runes and ruins for a story called "Losing
Memories" by K. Bird
Lincoln; this was for the second issue of a new print SF magazine called Darkling
Plain, due out eventually, as the editor is now in law school. I
really enjoyed doing that piece, as I got to make up my own language. ... At the beginning of the year I finished the main poster
for the WillyCon 2001 sci-fi convention, where I
was Artist Guest of Honor. This piece depicts girls with guns and after months of hemming and
hawing I eventually decided to call it "GIRLS/GUNS". Click here
to see a special inside
peek into the making of the WillyCon poster, since people keep
asking me how I do my art.
... Published at the end of February was the Spring 2001 issue of Fantastic
Stories, formerly known
as Pirate Writings. For that issue, I got to do 12 illustrations
(all the interior art!). I took off a month from my day job in biotech
patent law to do that
project. ...
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2000
The
piece I called "The
Sad Girl", created for the
print magazine Talebones for a story called "Blood Culture" by Eric Del
Carlo, was published in issue no. 20. ... As noted above, my
award-winning illustration
for the story "Guildmaster" by Dan Dyson, was in the anthology, Writers
of the Future, Vol. XVI ... Summer 2000 saw the premiere issue of the new
SF print magazine Darkling
Plain. This features my illustration
for a re-telling of the
destruction of the Tower of Babel, written by Michael Lane Baker. (A
larger, revised and corrected version of this image was printed in the Spring
2001 Fantastic Stories, too.) Congratulations to the DP editor, David M.
Cox, on the birth of his grand new magazine ...
My first print publication was in issue No. 5
(Spring 2000) of the Australian print SF magazine Altair. It features interior BW art by me for a story called "Colors
of Pain" by Lyn Nichols and Ron Collins. The illo depicts a man recently and unhappily turned into a
vampire and the wary and frightened looks of people who pass him on the street. |
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CONVENTION UPDATE
While I won't actually be attending many, I have been ramping myself up
to either (a) mail in art; or (b) send out freebie postcards, to a whole
lot of cons this year.
Cons I'm planning on attending are: Ad Astra (Toronto, March); ICON
(Long Island, March); Norwescon (April 17); possibly BayCon (my local
con), Memorial Day; and definitely Torcon (Toronto Worldcon,
Aug. 28).
I plan to mail in art to: Confusion (Detroit, Jan. 24); Arisia (Boston,
Jan. 17); ChattaCon (TN, Jan. 17); VeriCon (Boston, Jan. 24); Farpoint
(MD, Feb. 7); Boskone (Boston, Feb. 15); ConDFW (Dallas, TX, Feb. 21);
Technicon (VA, March 14); LunaCon (March 21); Millenicon (Cincinnati,
March 21); AggieCon (TX, March 20); ICON (March 28); MiniCon (Minneapolis,
April 18); and Jersey DevilCon (April 25).
Also, I will be sending out freebie postcards to many cons. Check
the freebies table or your registration packet for these postcards at:
Georgia Filk convention (weekend of Jan. 10); OhayoCon (Jan. 10);
Pandemonium (Toronto, Jan. 17); JonesCon (Gainsville, Florida, Jan. 24);
SuperCon (Rochester, MN, Jan. 24); WinterCon (Detroit, MI, Jan. 25);
Dreamation (Elizabeth, NJ, Jan. 30); OwlCon (Houston, TX, Feb. 7); Winter
War Campaign (IL, Feb. 7); Genghis Con (Denver, Feb. 13); GAGG (Geneseo,
NY, Feb. 7); KatsuCon (Crystal City, Feb. 14); UberCon (NJ, Feb. 14);
ShevaCon (VA, Feb. 21); Branscon (Rockaway Beach, MO, Feb. 28); KeyCon
(Winnipeg, May 16); Wiscon (Madison, WI, Feb. 23); MilwaukeeCon (Aug. 1).
Whew. |
| Click here
to see fotos of me from various cons. If you are running a con and would
like me to show art or be a guest/panelist, please don't hesitate to contact me at Qarlo999@hotmail.com |
THE HOUSE OF CRUNCHY ART
THE OFFICIAL FRANK WU HOMEPAGE
OTHER FUN STUFF:
Images (c) 1998-2002 Frank Wu
except those from The Empire Strikes Back, eXistenZ and Amazing Stories.
Site established 9/3/98. Additions constantly.
To send email to Frank Wu
click here
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IF YOU'D LIKE TO EXCHANGE LINKS WITH THIS SITE,
PLEASE EMAIL ME AND PLEASE
CONSIDER USING ONE OF THESE BANNERS:
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Email me
For archived comments, click here.
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From my friend Jeff Berkwits, when he found out he was a nominee for the Hugo
award for "best fan writer":
Hi Frank:
Remember when I said I couldn't be happier...well, I just found out ... that I
REALLY couldn't be happier!! I received notification from the Hugo committee
that I too had made the final ballot in the Best Fan Writer category (I'm
guessing it took them a bit longer to count those ballots than some of the other
categories). So we BOTH have secrets to keep for a little while longer! I'm
looking forward to seeing you at Con Jose and celebrating our
nominations...Plus, I've always wondered what skullduggery took place at the
Hugo nominee reception...now we'll both be able to find out (or perhaps engage
in a little skullduggery ourselves :-) )!!
As you can see, I'm darned excited too -- Can't wait to spread the word about us
both!
Talk to you soon -
Jeff "Excited Boy" Berkwits
Additional note:
Jeff Berkwits is up against five other nominees, but I will definitely be
voting for Jeff. Check out the links below for some of his writings.
Way to go, Jeff! Wahooo!
Jeff on where to see what he's written: "I had a few items
posted at GalaxyOnline.com before they went bust, along with my various
commentaries at Locus Online (in case you did not see them, here are links to
two of them...http://www.locusmag.com/2001/Commentary/Berkwits0514.html,
http://www.locusmag.com/2001/Commentary/Berkwits08.html),
my work at SciFiNow.com (before they too went bust), my contributions to the
Argentus fanzine, interviews with Algis Budrys (at Science Fiction Weekly -- http://www.scifi.com/sfw/issue209/interview.html)
and Frank Kelly Freas (in Outré magazine) plus, of course, my usual Science
Fiction Weekly writing."
Congrats, Jeff!
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From Ray Vukcevich (author of the Philip K. Dick Award-nominated story
collection Meet Me in the Moon Room) 4/22/02:
Hey way to go on the Hugo nom.
Ray
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From Chris Barzak (author of the wonderful, touching story "Plenty"
published at the Hugo-nominated ezine Strange
Horizons), 4/23/02:
Dear Frank:
Hi, Chris Barzak here. We haven't met yet, except through your art and
my fiction, but I found my name mentioned a few times on the internet in
connection with you, i.e., you'd been drumming up fans for my story, Plenty,
for the Hugo among other things. I really appreciate that! It's
really wonderful to find someone excited enough about something I've written
that they actually take the time to post messages about it.
I've enjoyed the artwork you've had up at Strange Horizons as well, and on
your website. Congratulations on the Hugo nomination! I hope you get
it.
Yours,
Chris Barzak
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From Sheryl Birkhead (who like me is a nominee for the Hugo award for best
fan artist - though this is her second nom, and it's only my first), 4/23/02:
Dear Frank,
I wanted to congratulate you on your fan artist Hugo nomination, but could
not find your address. I am a bit thecnologically challenged, do not
attend conventions, and have not seen your art in any of the zines I get -- so I
was reduced to sending you electronic congratulations. I finally had to
admit that I would have to trust the ether and cyberspace-- so--
congratulations!
Sheryl
Yes, and congratulations to you, too, Sheryl! It's nice to get this sense
of collegial chumminess within nominees for my category.
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From Steven H. Silver 5/7/02:
Frank-
Congratulations on your Hugo nomination and welcome to the club. I have
to disappoint you and Jeff by telling you that there is no skullduggery at the
Hugo Nominee reception, only lots of food and pictures. Oh, yeah, we also
get to see the rocket before the Award's ceremony.
-- Steven H. Silver
Hugo Nominee, Best Fan Writer
Check out Steven's writing at: http://www.sfsite.com/~silverag
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From Hopper May 29, 2002:
FRANK...
Just come across your site, much by chance. You are a very talented
illustrator. Congrats on your nomination. YOU GO !!!!!
THANKS,
HOPPER
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From Matt Taggart March 12, 2003:
Hey Frank -
Nice work and a sense of humor.
If I can get past all the F#^&($@#! that one has
to do just to scrape by, I'll be submitting my own work to Illustrators of the
Future.
Happy doodling -
Matt Taggart.
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If you would like to send me an email, please click
here.
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