Andy Bennett is an artist who really should be a superstar.

He did art for a bunch of books from Caliber Press, since moved on to draw some of the official Vampire: The Masquerade comics for Moonstone Books, and has done a lot of illustration work for a number of game publishers (including White Wolf’s Vampire sourcebooks). Every time I run across more art by Andy Bennett—which is unfortunately few and far between, it seems—I’m always pleased to see that someone out there is recognizing his brilliance. Hopefully the rest of the comics industry will catch up before long.

I do have to laugh in that sometimes people glance at this piece and think, “Oh, it’s just a girl drinking wine.” And others look a little closer and instantly realize that’s not quite it. It works either way, of course, but one has a little more bite to it. So to speak.

Steve Lieber is one of those artists who, I think, has drawn just about everything. He’s tackled Batman over in Detective Comics and a sequel to The Road to Perdition for DC Comics, and had a pretty hefty high-profile Civil War: Front Line mini-series at Marvel when their huge Civil War event was published. He’s drawn Grendel Tales for Dark Horse, and so many other projects I can’t keep listing them.

Oh yeah, and there’s this little book called Whiteout that he drew, of which the movie starring Kate Beckinsale has finished filming. I love Whiteout, with its tight and tense story from Greg Rucka and the gorgeous, atmospheric art from Steve Lieber. (I actually own all five pages of art that tell the historical prequel that kicks off Whiteout: Melt, in fact.) So I was delighted that Steve Lieber’s contribution featured Whiteout star Carrie Stetko, chilling (no pun intended) out in an igloo.

As an added bonus, I had to laugh at how he signed the art. Too, too funny.

Carla Speed McNeil is a witty, sharp, amazing person. She’s also a great storyteller. Her comic Finder mixes anthropology, mystery, adventure, tribal ways, virtual reality, and anything else that pops into her head. She’s one of those creators who honed her craft in public, each issue of Finder stronger than the one before.

These days she’s posting her comics directly onto the web, then releasing them in collected editions. She’s also very savvy in that she’s put the first chapter of several of her longer works online. (I highly recommend checking out Finder: Talisman for a story all about the love of reading books as well as creating one’s own stories, and Finder: Dream Sequence for an entrancing, slightly-disturbing look into virtual worlds and games and businesses.)

The second one to contribute to the wine-book, I remember her staring at the empty page for about five seconds, then diving right into an illustration that makes a lovely mathematical joke. (All it needs is some Moebius crackers on the side, really.) And of course, beautifully drawn to boot. That’s just the kind of person she is.

When I first kicked off the wine-book, there was one artist whom I absolutely, positively, had to have as the first contributor. Namely, Andy Lee.

Andy Lee creates his art in the Buddhist Cha’an splash style—it’s amazing to watch him flick the paint onto the page and then move it around with brushes and fingers and anything else necessary. Every piece of his is nothing short of amazing, and I just love to watch him work.

So with that in mind, I asked him to christen off the book. He said he was honored, asked me if I preferred white or red wine, and what year I was born. He then went and created… well… just look for yourself. How beautiful is that? I can’t think of a more gorgeous beginning.

Before I dive into Wine-Book Wednesdays, I feel like I should explain exactly what this is all about.

While I’m not sure how the practice got started, one common practice at a comic book convention is that artists might draw a quick sketch for you. It’s an incredibly generous thing to do, really; their art is their livelihood and they’re creating a piece of it just for you. (Some artists don’t feel comfortable with the practice and don’t; others have stopped due to a combination of rude fans and the fact that some slightly conniving poeple have taken their convention sketches and sold them on eBay.) As someone who can’t draw, I’m always amazed at just what people will create.

My initial sketchbook which I began bringing to shows back in 1999 was a “generic” sketchbook; whatever the artist’s fancy was what ended up on the page. But as I went to more and more shows, I began to see some really clever “theme” sketchbooks, where all of the art was centered around a character, or item, or concept, and so forth. I remember seeing some friends’s sketchbooks and just loving what I saw, like Johanna Draper Carlson’s Max Rebo book, or Karon Flage’s nightmares book. So in 2001, I decided I would start my own theme sketchbook. Except, of course, I was missing one thing. A theme.

It was when I was shopping for the actual book that inspiration hit. I like the wirebound sketchbooks because the artist can lay them flat without worrying about the other side flipping back over and hitting them, and they just seem a bit classy. So I’d picked out the book, and was standing in line to pay for it when I saw the corkboard covers in the book and it suddenly hit me.

Corkboard. Corks. Wine. I quite like wine. So why not… a wine-themed sketchbook?

And so, the wine-book was born. I first took it to Mid-Ohio-Con in November 2001, and the book has gone strong ever since then. It’s actually almost full at this point, which both excites and saddens me. I love seeing what people come up with when given the simple request of wine; as you’ll see, over the years it’s gone in all sorts of different directions.

The idea is that I’ll post one or two images every Wednesday (the nice thing about WordPress is that I’ve already cued up all of the entries for this month), and with them I’ll talk about where I got the art and from whom. I hope you like looking at this art as much as I’ve enjoyed receiving it. Because trust me, I treasure every single one of these pieces.

I feel like I should be sipping a glass of wine as I post these, but who am I kidding? I’d be terrified that I would splatter it all over the book.

Salute!

(For people coming here specifically for the wine art, you can see all of the entries posted to date at any given moment by using this link.)