Golgotha by Victor Hardy

MarkusTay

New member
\"If I were a carpenter, and you were a lady, would you marry me...\"

Sorry, I love that song and I just heard it on the radio yesterday. :D

So Dave, you\'re saying JC was buff? The mental image is definately funny. Perhaps thats why he entered the priesthood (rabi-hood?), because he couldn\'t cut it as a construction worker? (Pun intended)

Anyhow, I\'m a Christian, albeit a rather liberal one, and I admire Victor\'s work when I consider it from a purely artistic veiwpoint. I could care less if it\'s 40K-ish, or sacriligious, or made out of pig vomit. It\'s still an incredible example of what a person can achieve with a mini, and by itself helps bring our little hobby closer to what is considered main-stream art.

Are we going back to the days of the Great castration, when Pope Pius IX hacked the penises off hundreds of statues because he found them vulger? Masterpieces created by the likes of Michaelangelo, Bramante, and Bernini... forever defaced because some old man found himself getting aroused by looking at them?! I don\'t personally like looking at naked men, but art is art, and should be taken as such, regardless of subject matter.

I didn\'t mean to get all serious there, but I feel the book-burners creeping up on me, and to say something isn\'t good because he didn\'t stick to the story? Since when is originalty frowned upon? At a GD, obviously. Sometimes you got to take chances and think outside the box. Maybe he should have gone to an independent con/show, like salute, where imagery wouldn\'t have been as important.
 

engine

New member
If Victor had used Horus/Emperor icons, the piece would not invoke the raw emotions seen on this board, because we have no emotional ties to those images.
It would have been a technical masterpiece with the Emperor, but this is something more. Christians who see this piece feel like they are witnessing blaphemy, which I would imagine is the point. A Demon Prince should invoke some terror, some doubt, some rage, and unbelievably, this miniature does that!

The fact that this mini can invoke such strong emotion from people proves that the Christian iconography was needed, and justified. Unbelievable.

Victor is genius.

engine
 

RangersRGO

New member
I saw this model in Baltimore. When I saw it I forgot everything else in all the other display cases.
The comments about it being too busy I totally disagree with. But that\'s what makes the world go around....we all have different opinions.
This model surpasses anything I have ever seen before. The religous overtones went unnoticed by me because I was so awed by the beauty of this piece.All I could think was \"WOW! I\'d give my bollocks to be able to paint like that guy!\"
Having met Victor at GD Baltimore, I have to say his humility and great attitude about the whole affair only add to my respect for him as both an artist and a genuine great guy.
 

supervike

Super Moderator
Yes it is offensive, and hard to focus on.

BUT, isn\'t that really the point?

It\'s a freaking demon for petes sake. Wouldn\'t it WANT to confuse, offend, intimidate, and mock you all at the same time all the while it makes you want to look and seduces you with its wiles?
 

supervike

Super Moderator
MODERATORS NOTE...

I merged the two Golgotha threads together. It seemed senseless to have the same conversation taking place in two different locations.

Hope this doesn\'t cause any inconvienence.
 

Prophet

New member
I can\'t believe I\'m going to defend Victor Hardy...
It\'s a demon. Victor is not making personal comments on JC, christianity, etc, the demon is. The demon is supposed to be twisting and perverting the imagery. Victor is not the anti-christ.

That being said, this has got to be the most pompous, self-important figure I\'ve ever seen. GW\'s imperium is a heavy-handed, fanatical theocracy. It loosely borrows many elements from both catholocism and nazi germany. The idea of the emperor as Jesus Christ and a virgin Mary figure as being in any way consistent with 40K is taking those similarities and extrapolating into utter absurdity.

Based on the paint quality, it should have won the sword hands down, but that whole \"consistency with the warhammer universe\" clause is a bit more arbitrary as far as the weight it carries. I can understand why GW would not want something that appears to be an affront to christianity in their magazine. There\'s the potential to alienate (the parents of) customers and I don\'t think they want to dedicate 10 pages to Vic\'s Symbolic Manifesto. A silver is stupid, because it\'s still going to be in the magazine. They should have either DQ\'ed it or given it the SS.

Just my opinion.
 

Evil Dave

New member
Originally posted by AinuLainour
The Emperor with an Iron Halo? Mother Earth? Bull.
Look at the fluff, man. I ought to know I\'ve been reading it for many, many years.
The Iron Halo is one of the most prestigious awards in the Imperium.
As to the Emperor many of the chapters that fought against the Imperium during the Horus Heresy believed they were doing the right thing, that the Emperor himself had been turned to evil.
Why would they not portray him as a demon choking the earth?
Almost all the fluff, almost all the drawings portray the Emperor in a \"Jesus-Like\" manner.
 

Maloink

New member
I\'ll leave the religious debate to those who care.

Artistically, it\'s just not that great a piece...someone mentioned eariler that \'art has no rules\'...I\'ll wager that person doesn\'t know a whole lot about art. Art has rules, theories, and principles heavily tied into mathmatics, color, proportion and anatomy. A great piece of art encompasses all this and more...and a great artist applies these principles in their work.

This piece by Hardy is technically ...ok. But I don\'t judge a piece by how long somone spent on it, or how many hundreds of layers they took to highlight a vein in the forehead of a 25mm mini. All the technique in the world does not a great mini make.

The composition is unbalanced; the pose is funny actually, and I\'m thinking that it\'s probably not supposed to be. It reminds me of the Winter Warlock from the Rudolph special...

\'..put one foot in front of the other...\' lol

Again...there\'s no focus whatsoever, the texture is almost exactly the same throughout the entire mini and it\'s far too busy with details that IMHO, would have been better left off the mini. It\'s nice to look at a mini and see something new each time...but each detail should add to, and compliment the whole...

That\'s simply not the case here...most of the details here serve to distract from the main body, kinda like glitter on a disco ball...it\'s too much; it just doesn\'t make it better.

The color is muddy, and runs from one area to the next. No contrasting colors, no sense of lighting on the figure, and the base looks like an afterthought.

The Tzeentch BeastMan has enough detail to please, without going overboard, the colors are sharp, as are the details and they compliment and even contrast with each other. The whole mini has a sense of flow, from top to bottom and back to the focus of the mini, the main figure. That mini works...technique, composition, pose, color and detail...it\'s all balanced and unified to make one excellent mini. No surprise it\'s a winner.

Even without the religious offensiveness, I wouldn\'t have given the Hardy mini the Slayer Sword.

I\'m not saying it\'s a bad mini...it\'s just not the uber, godly mini everyone\'s making it out to be...there\'s far better minis to be seen here on CMON, IMHO.
 
Z

ZeCorto

Guest
To me, the main reason this qualifies as art is the turmoil it causes. It does not conform to classical art rules, but who cares? There are as many contradicting art \"rules\" as groups of artists. And this fact means that there are indeed no hard set rules for art, just the rules, or masters, one is willing to follow.

Those who object that it is too complex are not seeing the forest for the trees. I like very simple minis (cyril\'s simplest pieces are my favorites) yet I love this one because it is so complex that it becomes a different picture if you look at it globally. That\'s my impression and I\'m proud to say that it is as wrong as anybody else\'s.

As for the religious part, people are so conditionned to repond agressively to whatever goes against their religion that the discussion is futile. Just like the muslim world reacted poorly to the bad taste drawings of their prophet not long ago, christians will hate this distorsion of their religion for a game setting. So be it.
 

vincegamer

Active member
Originally posted by Trevor
On a side note, how many of you knew that the whole halo thing originated from the collusus of Rhodes and early sun worshipping religions,
From my art history class in grad school I learned that the halo was a pre-islamic middle-eastern artistic convention of distinguishing the protagonist from the other characters and had nothing to do with holiness.
 

Jericho

Consummate Brushlicker
Is it just me, or does it strike you as ironic (and confusing) that most of the people making a big stink here are non-Christians attacking Christians for attacking Victor Hardy, which they aren\'t doing?

First off, I don\'t seperate my faith from my hobby, because they\'re both part of who I am. I have one cohesive opinion on the model (cohesiveness is something that will probably pop up a few times in my rantings here). In an individual level, yeah the brushstrokes show a lot of technical skill. But if you look at the forest and not the trees, it\'s pretty disappointing. There are a lot of people who I really respect for their hobby abilities and they seem to be agreeing with me here.

Never have I seen a model with such strong technical skill so completely ruined by a unifying theme or style on the model.

The pose is goofy, the assymetry in the murals on the wings is pointless and distracting, and the banner -- while technically brilliant work -- seems horribly out of place on a Khornate champion. In a word, the individual components of the model lack purpose.

I\'m not trying to be mean or judgmental, I\'m just trying to state my opinion in a clearly understandable way to avoid any further confusion on the subject. It doesn\'t bother me that the Christian imagery is thrown around, it\'s everywhere in the world today and not often in a positive light. That\'s nothing new.

I don\'t think anyone will have their faith rattled over something like this. As much as I hate to support any media frenzy, I think stuff like the Da Vinci Code is more of a threat right now, simply due to statistics like how 20% of Canadians think it\'s a factual account of history and not simply a fictional novel designed to entertain.

Righteous indignation is scriptually something we Christians are entitled to as God\'s living saints (move over, Celestine!), but I don\'t really think it\'s called for here. This is just a model, a nicely painted model in a lot of ways, but it\'s nothing to get your panties in a bunch over.

-Dan
 

hashmallum

New member
Originally posted by tagron
Im a Christian, so i guess my view may be helpfull.

Personaly im not offended, because up untill this point i had not heard the name victor hardy more than a few times. And if victor has some hazy ill concocted idea of christianity and wants to express it, why should i care?

He obviously doesnt understand the christian faith, if he did he would realize the crucifiction was not the thing to \'romp\' around for, atleast as far as the demonic faction was concerned. I think hes just putting pictures togather to look like its got a basis in RL religion. And really thats just the same as when i say \"Hung kong chun pow wee tang sung\" when trying to impersonate a guy speaking chinese, i literaly know nothing about chinese i just makeing noises. Thats how i see victor, hes just making noises, they dont actualy form any intellegent message let allone an attack worthy of offence.

So now that he has expressed this half braind conception of Jesus and the demonic realm on a GW hunk of led, why would that matter enough to offend me? I like shopping in Hot-topic (goth/punk clothing store) and i see allot of things that dont go with the christian message, i dont buy them, but i dont freak out either, its simply someone elses opinion.

You know this is called extremism ;)
Doesn\'t Christianity say - peace and love for everyone?
Why are you so so hostile?
People stick the sign of PIESCES (fish) and cross on their cars ,. Isn\'t this a blasphemy?
 

tagron

New member
Originally posted by hashmallum
Originally posted by tagron
Im a Christian, so i guess my view may be helpfull.

Personaly im not offended, because up untill this point i had not heard the name victor hardy more than a few times. And if victor has some hazy ill concocted idea of christianity and wants to express it, why should i care?

He obviously doesnt understand the christian faith, if he did he would realize the crucifiction was not the thing to \'romp\' around for, atleast as far as the demonic faction was concerned. I think hes just putting pictures togather to look like its got a basis in RL religion. And really thats just the same as when i say \"Hung kong chun pow wee tang sung\" when trying to impersonate a guy speaking chinese, i literaly know nothing about chinese i just makeing noises. Thats how i see victor, hes just making noises, they dont actualy form any intellegent message let allone an attack worthy of offence.

So now that he has expressed this half braind conception of Jesus and the demonic realm on a GW hunk of led, why would that matter enough to offend me? I like shopping in Hot-topic (goth/punk clothing store) and i see allot of things that dont go with the christian message, i dont buy them, but i dont freak out either, its simply someone elses opinion.

You know this is called extremism ;)
Doesn\'t Christianity say - peace and love for everyone?
Why are you so so hostile?
People stick the sign of PIESCES (fish) and cross on their cars ,. Isn\'t this a blasphemy?

Dude you dont get it, i dont give a rats, i said it like 5 times in that last post, i saw this and was going to pass on except there hadent been a post from the christian stand point yet. Im sorry i put my two cents in.

Its cool, i dont care enough to be offended, thats my stance plain and simple.
 

Legacy Account

Active member
Originally posted by Malfoy
...art should never be, in any way, offensive or provacative. Artists should never attempt to illict a reaction through their work and, most importantly, we should never have to question our own sensibilities.

What a load of bollocks! That statement almost perfectly sums up why most artists do what they do!! Artists have historically challenged the status quo and railled against the establishment. German Expressionists during the Third Reich and the Bolsheviks during the Russian Revolution are just two examples where artists have used their work to illicit a reaction.

That\'s not to mention all the \'concept\' stuff that\'s been done over the years where the only premise of it is to illicit a reaction.

I couldn\'t give a cobblers about religion. What I do know is that the faces on the banner are poorly drawn and comparing them to Renaissance work is a joke!
 

Dark Seraphim

New member
Originally posted by Spacemunkie
Originally posted by Malfoy
...art should never be, in any way, offensive or provacative. Artists should never attempt to illict a reaction through their work and, most importantly, we should never have to question our own sensibilities.

What a load of bollocks! That statement almost perfectly sums up why most artists do what they do!! Artists have historically challenged the status quo and railled against the establishment. German Expressionists during the Third Reich and the Bolsheviks during the Russian Revolution are just two examples where artists have used their work to illicit a reaction.

That\'s not to mention all the \'concept\' stuff that\'s been done over the years where the only premise of it is to illicit a reaction.

I couldn\'t give a cobblers about religion. What I do know is that the faces on the banner are poorly drawn and comparing them to Renaissance work is a joke!

Owie! :D Someone got the wrong leg out of bed this morning :D

But I agree on the artist part. Artists have always provoked the masses, that is why some people love their work, others hate it!

Provokation:

Remember the goldfish in a blender?

Or the pig carcases ?

Or what about an embalmed horse ?

If that isn\'t to provoke some kind of response from people, I don\'t know what is...
 

Klute

New member
I think its a bit dull. Technically very good. Just dull.

And before anyone says \" but its a demon and he is red and dark and brooding \"

Well yes you would be right.

Still dull though.
 

Infidel Castro

New member
Originally posted by Jericho

I think stuff like the Da Vinci Code is more of a threat right now, simply due to statistics like how 20% of Canadians think it\'s a factual account of history and not simply a fictional novel designed to entertain.

-Dan

To play devil\'s advocate here (what a silly term lol), a lot of people think the Bible to be a work of fiction. Horses for courses really, wouldn\'t you say?

To make the point Klute made up above, yes it is a demon and as such chaotic. That alone qualifies the overwrought nature of the piece. And using Golgotha as a name certainly states his intentions, but if someone can be offended by a lump of metal with some paint on it, they really need to assess how they approach their faith :eek:
 
Back To Top
Top