The Deryni are a race of psychically empowered humans who lived among normal humans in a medieval civilization created by author Katherine Kurtz. Their origins are obscure, perhaps either extraterrestrial or elvish. Purebred Deryni look a bit like elves, with fair hair and brilliant eyes, but no pointed ears. They can interbreed with humans and so a number of empowered half-Deryni exist in Kurtz' world, whether for good or ill. The normal folk persecute the Deryni as witches and heretics. Kurtz' Deryni books contain many graphic depictions of this brutality.
Two of Kurtz' favorite characters are Rhys and Evaine, a married pair of full-bred Deryni. Rhys is a physician and psychic healer. Evaine is a scholar and researcher, the daughter of a great Deryni statesman, Camber of Culdi. In these miniature portraits, Rhys in the symbolic green of a Healer shows the tools of his trade, a scalpel and a bunch of herbs. Evaine holds a distaff for hand-spinning fiber, something which any good woman of any class would do in those days of old.
Katherine Kurtz is married to Scott MacMillan. They're friends of mine, and I did these nametags for them to wear at public occasions and conventions. But I decided to do a character switch with the portraits, symbolic of marital devotion: the man wears his wife's portrait and the woman wears her husband's portrait. This exchange didn't quite go as planned, as there were too many questions asked about why the nametags were switched.
Rhys and Evaine portrait miniatures are ink and watercolor (some restoration in Photoshop) on Fabriano paper, each 2 1/4" x 3 1/2", August 1984. Click on the pic for a bit larger view.
1 comment:
I know these people! Well, the people the tags were made for anyway :)
Nice work!
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