The Giordano Gambit
This image is based on Luca Giordano's The Fall of the Rebel Angels (1666), one of the masterworks used as reference in the latest Open Figure Drawing Workshop (OFDW), which our own Rebeccak often spearheads on both this forum and at CGTalk. The theme for session 021 is Angels & Devils, and the pose of the archangel in Giordano's work reminded me strongly of a sketch i did a few decades ago depicting a zero-gravity sport:
the clouds & hues of the masterwork immediately suggested to me a Martian dust storm, and so a new future sport was born, which i've christened Barsoomian Zingball (Barsoom, for the woefully underinformed, is the natives' name for Mars in the series of wonderfully pulpy Edgar Rice Burroughs novels featuring John Carter, Dejah Thoris, and scads of other of froody Martian denizens).
in the match depicted, the Blue Devils are executing the only sports play known to have been directly inspired by a 17th century painting -- the "Giordano Gambit" -- which is typical of the flamboyant acrobatics this sport is famous for. even the huge Martian dust storms can't impede attendance at major tournaments, and fans pay exorbitant prices for tickets and often have to reserve the floating box seats years ahead of time. Martian years, that is!
please do C&C to your heart's content, your insights would be welcome.
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