I have a penchant for drawing knights and warriors. The reason for this isn’t because I enjoy seeing blood or that I’m a perverted and sadistic individual (what you do in your own time is your business, no judgement), but rather it’s what I was brought up on.
One of the first films I remember watching as a kid was Disney’s Robin Hood, and this was quickly followed up by The Sword in the Stone. The animation in these films, for their time at least. was top tier. I can’t count the number of viewings I must have given them. It wasn’t just the animation that fascinated me though, it was also the time period and the stories. The timeless battle between good and evil (spoilers: good always won), knights, maidens, wizards, dragons, anthropomorphic Lions playing morally bereft kings, the list goes on. Indeed the list of films goes on too, from Peter Pan (1953) right up to Treasure Planet (2002) I was gripped. Disney dominated my formative years, and so many of those films were inspired by folklore that just so happened to include knights, soldiers, and a whole litany of swashbuckling characters.
I was also encouraged to read. And I love reading. Often I had no other choice, because social media hadn’t been invented yet to ruin my life and I wasn’t that into sports. I was introduced to books like The Hobbit, Magician, and The Discworld series, all of which were filled with the same types of characters as the Disney films, albeit more mature versions. On top of that I devoured all the Asterix books which were filled with fights between the invading Romans and magically enhanced Gaulish warriors (I heavily suspect the magic potion brewed by the druid Getafix in these book was in fact the first written documentation of the use of steroid doping in ancient warfare – it’s even in his name; Get-a-fix).
So, given all this literature and film exposure is it any wonder I draw the things I do? The above piece got me thinking about the ‘whys’ of my interest in this genre and it was nice thinking about what helped mould me. Anyway, sorry there’s so much blood!
Cheers
Matt
mattwalkerart.com 