WFC 13 Adds Alan Lee as GoH

Alan Lee, the Academy Award and World Fantasy Award-winning illustrator, will be Artist Guest of Honour at WFC 2013 in Brighton.

Sharing a studio with Brian Froud in the 1970s, together Lee and froud created the groundbreaking illustrated book Faeries. Other noted works include the delicate watercolour illustrations for Castles by David Day, Michael Palin’s The Mirrorstone (in collaboration with Richard Seymour), The Moon’s Revenge by Joan Aiken and Merlin Dreams by Peter Dickinson.

Lee’s fame is intertwined with that of J.R.R. Tolkien, as illustrator of the 1,200-page centenary edition of The Lord of the Rings trilogy and many other works by and about Tolkien. Lee also won an Oscar in 2004 for Best Art Direction-Set Decoration for his work on Peter Jackson’s The Return of the King.

The artist is currently based in New Zealand, working again with Jackson on The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey and The Hobbit: There and Back Again.

The full press release follows the jump.

[Thanks to Andrew Porter for the story.]

ALAN LEE WILL BE WORLD FANTASY CONVENTION 2013

ARTIST GUEST OF HONOUR

World Fantasy Convention 2013 is pleased to announce that Academy Award and World Fantasy Award-winning illustrator ALAN LEE will be our Artist Guest of Honour in Brighton.

Alan Lee began his career working as a commercial artist, contributing work to dozens of paperback book covers, including reissues of The Fontana Book of Great Ghost Stories edited by Robert Aickman and R. Chetwynd-Hayes. After moving in the mid-1970s to a small village on the edge of Dartmoor, in Devon, he shared a studio with Brian Froud and together they created the groundbreaking illustrated book Faeries.

The success of this picture book gave the artist the freedom to spend several years bringing the Celtic myth of The Mabinogion to life, and he went on to create the delicate watercolour illustrations for Castles by David Day, Michael Palin’s The Mirrorstone (in collaboration with Richard Seymour), The Moon’s Revenge by Joan Aiken and Merlin Dreams by Peter Dickinson, along with numerous book cover designs.

However, Alan Lee is best known for his association with perhaps the greatest fantasy author of all time, illustrating the 1,200-page centenary edition of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. Artist and author soon became inextricably linked through such collaborations as Tolkien’s World: Paintings of Middle-Earth, the 1993 J.R.R. Tolkien Calendar (and many subsequent editions), Realms of Tolkien: Images of Middle-Earth, a new edition of The Hobbit, The Children of Húrin, Tales from the Perilous Realm and David Day’s non-fiction study Tolkien’s Ring.

The artist’s work for Rosemary Sutcliff’s Black Ships Before Troy received the prestigious Kate Greenaway Award in 1993 for distinguished work in the illustration of children’s books in the UK. In 1998 he won the World Fantasy Award for Best Artist.

Alan Lee has also enjoyed an equally successful career as a conceptual designer for movies, and his credits include Legend, Erik the Viking, the Jane Yolen-scripted Merlin and the Dragons, the 2005 King Kong and the 1998 TV mini-series Merlin.

Director Peter Jackson contacted the artist to work on his acclaimed cinematic trilogy of The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers and The Return of the King. After being nominated for The Two Towers the year before, in 2004 Alan Lee won an Oscar for Best Art Direction-Set Decoration for his work on The Return of the King. The artist is currently based in New Zealand, where he is working again with Jackson on the eagerly-anticipated prequels The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey and The Hobbit: There and Back Again.

“I’m very flattered to be asked to be Artist Guest of Honour,” says Alan Lee, “and happy to accept the invitation. I’m meant to be finishing on The Hobbit movies some time this year. My work on the The Lord of the Rings films went on for six years beyond what I was originally anticipating, but even if I am still involved I can arrange my annual trip back to England to coincide with the convention. I look forward to seeing everyone in 2013!”

ALAN LEE joins previously announced Author Guests of Honour RICHARD MATHESON and RICHARD CHRISTIAN MATHESON , along with Master of Ceremonies CHINA MIÉVILLE, in the picturesque and vibrant seaside town of Brighton, on the south coast of England, over the weekend of October 31 – November 3, 2013.

Other authors, editors, agents and artists already registered include Joe Abercrombie, John Joseph Adams, Peter Atkins, Ben Baldwin, James Barclay, Simon Bestwick, Joshua Bilmes, Holly Black, James P. Blaylock, Ginjer Buchanan, Pat Cadigan, Ramsey Campbell, Ted Chiang, Vincent Chong, Donna Condon, John Peyton Cooke, Paul Cornell, Peter Crowther, Benoit Domis, John R. Douglas, Hal Duncan, Alistair Durie, Les Edwards, Jo Fletcher, Stephen Gallagher, Mark Gascoigne, Barry Goldblatt, Christopher Golden, Jon Courtenay Grimwood, Liza Groen Trombi, Karen Haber, Joe Haldeman, Lee Harris, Nina Kiriki Hoffman, Robert Hood, John Jerrold, Stephen Jones, S.T. Joshi, Michael Kelly, Nancy Kilpatrick, Jay Lake, Samantha Lee, Tim Lebbon, Alison Littlewood, Karen Lord, Brian Lumley, Len Maynard, Farah Mendlesohn, James Minz, Thomas Monteleone, Howard Morhaim, Mark Morris, Lisa Morton, Kim Newman, Stan Nicholls, Garth Nix, Jana Oliver, Jonathan Oliver, Reggie Oliver, Rosalie Parker, Sarah Pinborough, Charles Preploec, John L. Probert, Tina Rath, Lynda E. Rucker, R.B. Russell, Mark Samuels, Darrell Schweitzer, John Silbersack, Robert Silverberg, Mick Sims, Angela Slatter, Michael Marshall Smith, Cat Sparks, S.M. Stirling, Simon Strantzas, Steve Upham, Gordon Van Gelder, Mark Van Name, F. Paul Wilson, Stephen Woodworth, Rio Youers, and many others . . .

Over the coming months we will be releasing more information on the official website (www.wfc2013.org) about Guests of Honour, Themes, Dealers’ Room, Art Show, Room Rates, Programming, the World Fantasy Awards, special events, promotions, advertising and all the other things that make WFC the one date in the convention calendar that no professional or fan can afford to miss. You can also follow the latest news on our special Twitter, Facebook and RSS feeds, or via our free iPhone and Android phone apps, so sign up today!

Although the convention is still nearly two years away, we already have more than 400 registered memberships! Please be aware that there is a firm limit on the number of Attending Members, so once the convention is sold out there will be no more memberships available. Remember, last year’s World Fantasy Convention in San Diego sold out eight months prior to the event, so the sooner you join, the sooner you are guaranteed a place. Plus the membership rate will increase at regular intervals as we get closer to the dates of the convention.

All the information can be found on the website (www.wfc2013.org), under HOW TO JOIN on the left-hand menu. You can easily register now by following the instructions on the page and paying via the PayPal buttons. The membership fee will be automatically converted into your local currency at the time of the transaction. Please also remember to complete and submit the details of your registration for our files. You will not be considered to have registered for the convention until we have received BOTH your payment and the registration form.

If you attended the previous two UK World Fantasy Conventions or the World Horror Conventions in Toronto and Brighton, then you know that we are committed to giving you an event that will be unforgettable. This is your opportunity to participate in one of the most exciting and exhilarating conventions ever held in Europe, for both professionals and fans alike.

World Fantasy Convention 2013 will equal the very best in the history of the event. If you are serious about your writing career, or simply enjoy reading in the genre and want to meet like-minded people, then you really cannot afford to miss it . . .

DON’T JUST WISH YOU WERE HERE . . .

WORLD FANTASY CONVENTION 2013, BRIGHTON, ENGLAND

—The WFC2013 Team

[email protected]

www.wfc2013.org

All appearances by Guests of Honour (GoH) and other advertised attendees are subject to change without notice, although we will do our best to make this information known beforehand, when we can. As our events will take place whether a specific GoH cancels or not, we therefore cannot issue admission refunds if a particular GoH or professional ends up not attending the convention, for whatever reasons.