These past months since I last blogged have been interesting, on both the personal and creative fronts. I don't have much to share on the former at the moment, save that once again, I'm going through some unexpected and tumultuous changes. Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose....
On the creative front, however, I've spent the last several months hard at work on my ongoing opus, FLICKER STREET. I've wrapped up the last long storyline I was working on, on and off, for the last three years (during the same period i was working on the 17 chapter Flicker Street backstory found on this blog), "Austerity". The follow up arc to "Austerity" is "Ellinger", which will take place, in the world of Flicker Street, during the years 2010-2014 ("Austerity" spanned 2004-2009).
"Ellinger" has been much easier to write, thus far, than the long, erratic, and often torturous process that was "Austerity". I've been able to pick up the lives of various denizens of the Flicker Street Universe from the prior story arc, and have been heavily inspired to create new and distinctive characters to flesh out the ongoing mythos. There was ample room for new blood in the story, as "Austerity" had ended with many longtime, and even many newer, characters, permanently dispatched. It was a clearing of deadwood in many ways - a way to decisively move the narrative forward into new areas, but also to restore certain qualities that had made this tale so enjoyable for me to write over the many years since it was first conceived.
Not only did I come up with an interesting assortment of new characters, I was also able to develop some longtime peripheral characters, some of whom had been simply too young to participate meaningfully to the ongoing storyline, but who had now come of age and could carry on another generation of the saga. And "Ellinger" is also an opportunity to bring back a few characters long absent from the canvas - some once major, some never more than minor, creations. A handful of these characters were never intended to be brought back; some of them seemingly deceased for good.
Unlike many other fictional universes, my characters, once dead, tend to stay well and truly dead. Still, this is a universe with magick and outre phenomena at play, so, on occasion, a character can be plausibly restored - if done in a (hopefully) dramatically compelling fashion. And one of the characters returning in a huge way in the Ellinger arc wasn't permanently deceased - I'd left his fate obscure simply from lack of interest in resolving the character's fate. But an opportunity presented itself, and this long-languishing creation suddenly had not only a long overdue raison d'etre, but revealed himself to be a perfect prime mover of events across the entire arc.
In penning so much new material, I was eventually convinced that I should pick back up the drawing pencil after far too long and capture the likenesses of many characters that will be prominent in the new story arc. Some I'd designed previously and decided to update visually. Some characters I'd always had in my mind but could never adequately visualize. And some were brand-new characters that I had a fresh vision of, and was eager to capture it.
So, I began a Facebook fan page, Henry Covert's Flicker Street (here: https://facebook.com/flickerstreet/) and began adding brand new character portraits there and on my Deviant Art page (https://henryzeocovert.deviantart.com/). My latest Flicker Street art is generally much less stylized and cartoonish than that of the last several years. There's still a fair share of loose impressionism, but more of a concentration on realism and capturing distinctive features and moods of the individual characters. I've compiled a huge file of photo references, as well as drawn (literally) on some interesting real-life acquaintances, to incarnate the key figures in the "Ellinger" arc. Seen here are some of my recent pieces, and all of them can be found at the two links cited above.
That's it for now, but I'd like to thank a few folks who've aided and abetted me, personally and creatively, with their loyalty and support: Sean Lee Levin, Mark Baranowski, Scott Mosley, Tim McLain, Jan Takehara, Steven Levin, Rhett Thompson, Delphine Levesque Demers, Cynthia Renee, Iren Frost, Tom and Dahlia Peterson, and my ex-girlfriend Stevie Lenn (I miss you).
Henry Covert
January 19, 2018
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