Sitting down with 17-year-old Alexander Vincent and his publisher and mentor, Alexander Finbow of Canmore-based Renegade Arts Entertainment, you quickly realize Vincent is not only a talented and creative artist and illustrator; he has what many people 20 years his senior lack – professionalism.
He’s on time; in fact he’s early. He’s polite and well–spoken, but more importantly, when offered an opportunity, he runs with it, producing work quickly and, according to Finbow, with surprising results.
Vincent, who begins Grade 12 in the fall and has been drawing since he was seven, already has maturity as an artist and an artistic vision years beyond his age.
“I’m very impressed and very glad that we found him,” Finbow said, Monday (June 20). “I’m excited.”
And without missing a beat, Vincent jumped in saying, “You’re excited? I’m excited!”
Giving someone like Vincent an opportunity is exactly what Finbow hopes to achieve with Renegade Arts, which publishes comic books and audio books featuring classic horror tales. Finbow also wants Renegade Arts to be an active member of the community and as such, the company sponsored Migratory Words during last weekend’s artsPeak arts festival and regularly hosts workshops in local schools for students eager to learn the art of producing comics.
Finbow hoped all along to find local talent to work with. And that is exactly what he found last year when Vincent joined one of Finbow’s workshops at Canmore Collegiate High School.
Finbow was wrapping up production on one of Renegade’s new titles, Turning Tiger, a robot story with heart, which will be available at Café Books in Canmore this Saturday (June 25) starting at noon for a two-week sneak peek, and Finbow urged the students attending the workshop to submit portfolios.
Finbow was putting together a gallery at the back of the comic and he wanted to include a young, local artist.
Vincent sent Finbow a portfolio and, based on that, Finbow asked the young artist, who was 16 at the time, to produce a piece for the gallery.
“I gave him no notes, just a digital script to read and I was stunned because it was such a mature take on the subject matter for a young boy.
“What shocked me even more was I thought it was all done traditionally. I thought it was a sponge painting and he said he did it all in Photoshop.
“So he’s our local man who stepped up to the plate when given the opportunity,” Finbow said.
And he’s in good company; the others in the gallery are all successful comic book artists.
Following that, Finbow wanted to find another opportunity to work with Vincent, so he asked him to create an image for a print card that accompany Spinechillers, Renegade’s line of classic horror audio books read primarily by Doug Bradley, who starred as Pinhead in Hellraiser.
And less than 24 hours later, Vincent sent Finbow his response, which also happened to be his first kick at a comic-book style featuring a gargoyle breaking free of its stone base.
“It was almost like I hung up the phone and there was an email with a link to the finished piece. I looked at it and thought, ‘it’s really good, don’t change anything’,” Finbow said, adding that illustration was Vincent’s first commissioned piece.
Vincent sold his second piece – a dragon – this past weekend during the Calgary Entertainment Expo where he joined the Renegade Arts team at its booth.
With success building on success, Finbow decided to offer Vincent a larger challenge: providing 22 illustrations for the novel adaptation of The Loxleys and the War of 1812, which is also being produced as a 140-page comic, written by Alan Grant (2000 AD) and illustrated by Claude St. Aubin of Batman fame.
Vincent has completed one illustration – a digital painting – so far, and like his work for Turning Tiger, Finbow said it too demonstrates a mature vision.
Renegade Arts is also planning to release the first 30 pages of The Loxleys and the War of 1812 as a stand-alone comic this August.
And even though Vincent, who is inspired by video games like Gears of War and Halo, Dungeons & Dragons and now comics, will be a working professional freelance artist over the summer, he still hasn’t quite comes to terms with it.
“I’m technically,” he said pausing, “technically a professional.”
But to be on this path, even if he hasn’t come to terms with the fact that he’s already well on his way, is a dream come true.
“I would love to do this for the rest of my life. Drawing for a career? That would be awesome,” he said. “I feel like I’m in a movie.”
Finbow is also working with Canmore native Meaghan Hotz who, like Vincent, has illustrated a print card for Spinechillers audio books, and Banff Elementary School librarian and storyteller Mandi Kujawa.
“Alex and Meaghan stand out (because) when they commit to something they follow through and do it and there’s not many creative people who can do that.
“That’s a huge plus in Alex’s favour. The quality of his work goes without question, especially the stuff he has been doing for us, and we would be hard pressed to see the difference from his work and an artist doing this for 20 years.
“It’s his maturity of vision.”
As part of the Café Books sneak peak, Renegade Arts will also offer the first issue of Shame: Conception, written by Lovern Kindzierski and illustrated by John Bolton (two comic heavyweights) and the French and English versions of Turning Tiger, which features a story by Richard Clements and art by Alex Moore (both new to the comics world) scheduled for release at the end of August.
Both Vincent and Finbow will be also be on hand Saturday at Café Books to talk about their work.
