Posted on 06/15/2005 1:08:24 PM PDT by Borges
David Sutherland, an artist whose work appeared in various Dungeons and Dragons rule books, has died. He was 56 years old.
Sutherland passed away at his home in Sault Ste. Marie, Mich., on June 6 from chronic liver failure.
Although he remained faceless to Dungeons and Dragons players, a generation of gamers grew up with Sutherland's otherworldly images in the 1970s and '80s.
Perhaps his best-known illustration is the one that appeared on the cover of the first Dungeons and Dragons set.
A simple composition, it shows a wand-waving magic user and a knight, his longbow drawn, squaring off against a dragon who sits – à la Smaug from The Hobbit – atop a vast pile of gold coins and jewels.
Sutherland's clean, expressive artwork helped players picture their own imaginary "campaigns," as the ongoing games of Dungeons and Dragons were called.
Working at the company Tactical Studies Rules under the game's co-inventor, Gary Gygax, Sutherland was part of a team of illustrators that produced pictures of battles and monsters.
His fellow artists included Erol Otis, Darlene Pekul, David Trampier and others.
Sutherland's work also appeared on the cover of the Dungeon Masters Guide, the book used by the referee who would oversee each gaming session.
He also did the cover for the Monster Manual, the compendium of foes that players fought for treasure.
A Minneapolis native, Sutherland trained as a commercial artist before going to Vietnam to serve as a military policeman. After his return, he launched a career as a fantasy artist while working odd jobs.
Sutherland's cover art for the 'Dungeon's Masters Guide.' Eventually, a university professor involved in developing Dungeons and Dragons put him in touch with TSR, the Wisconsin firm that emerged as the dominant publisher of role-playing games.
Sutherland also served as TSR's artistic director, but preferred working on his own art.
Sutherland's career stalled after Wizards of the Coast, another gaming concern, bought TSR in the late 1990s and did not rehire him. He recently divorced, and was reportedly still upset at the dissolution of his marriage when he died.
An auction of Sutherland memorabilia was held last year, raising $22,000 US that was used to set up a trust fund for his two daughters. He is also survived by his mother, a sister and a brother.
Following a visitation, Sutherland will receive a military burial on June 22 at Fort Snelling National Cemetery in Minneapolis.
"Let's face it: It's great for a guy to able to let the inner Geek out with a woman. Geeking out is fun! "
You do know that geeking is also a porn term.
If it's anything like it's Carney brother, I don't want to know.
My husband still wastes time playing these games. oh! Shhh! I said I wouldn't complain about it anymore. It's actually just every other Saturday.
A few crazy people focused their insanity on D&D and did dumb things, but they were whacky to start with. People with empty lives and a need to obsess will eventually find something to obsess on.
The Army off duty stuck in the middle of nowhere, lots of pop/beer and D&D.
Would have gone crazy without it.
Long Live Gary Gygax
That`s the on-line Traveler?
I used to play,thought they quit suporting it .
I never thought that Sutherland was particularly good, even compared with the downright awful David S. LaForce who also did some illustration for the first AD&D set from the late '70s. Now, I look back on their art (I still have my original books) with fondness. I'd pay good money for original prints.
What's mysterious is whatever became of David Trampier. That artist was far and away the finest of the lot working in the mathematically-complicated style of M.C. Escher.
Trampier seems to have fallen off the face of the Earth, and numerous attempts to locate him or any recent works of his have gone stone cold.
David Trampier, where the hell are you?
I don't know about suicides, but I knew some people who got *way* too wrapped up in it, to the detriment of other aspects of human existence.
RIP
bump for later
It's the Traveller created by GDW -- the oldest science fiction role playing game in existence (it's in its fifth and sixth incarnations).
Nope, all urban legends. One mother of a suicide (who killed himself when his girlfriend broke up with him) tried to blame D&D and organized some cockamamie group to 'warn' parents about it. The other purported case was a muddled telling of a kid who ran off from some university in the upper midwest where they had a LARP (live action role play) in the steam tunnels. It turns out on a whim he went to some relative's in Texas, and his 'disappearance' had nothing to do with the game.
alt.binaries.pictures.fantasy-sci-fi
alt.binaries.e-book.rpg
alt.binaries.dragonz
Thousands of wallpaper-sized images (most are kid safe)
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