Artist Spotlight: Rachele Aragno! Til Death Do Us Part!

Behind the Scenes: Untold Tales of I Hate Fairyland

Stupid Fresh Mess editorial background character, Joel Enos, here with an exclusive preview of the next Untold Tales of I Hate Fairyland short. Our #6 story features artist Rachele Aragno, watercolor genius. And the new story is written by Skottie — marking his foray back into the Fairyland universe!

NO SPOILERS

I won’t be giving anything away, but this new story, which will be going live VERY SOON, is a bit of a flashback and a throwback to classic Gert…but is also very new… thanks to the beautiful artwork and watercolors from Rachele.

Of course, to get a new story from Fairyland by Skottie is pretty excellent too. This won’t be the last of those. Skottie is already working on new stories about Gert, Fairyland, and its many inhabitants, as I write this.

But it will remain a very cool thing for an artist to have full freedom to interpret a script, about Fairyland, from Skottie, in their own style and tone.

Rachele did a beautiful job with this new tale.

Rachele’s work is lush, colorful and strange. For me, as an editor, I found it somewhat emotional. The color, the anger (you know…Gert), the sheer beauty in the madness.

This is what Rachele sent over as a Gert illustration, with her signature watercolor.

That’s some artistic interpretation…with respect to the original, that you have to say, “yeah, YEAH,” too.

We also got an early sketch of the character of Seymour…exclusive preview commence now…

Rachele is a collaborative artist, which editors love, but also a very confident artist (which I think all editors love, I know I do). She asked a few smart questions about practical and technical specs. But her art just flowed in and I could really only say, wow, that’s even more amazing than I was thinking and…I was already expecting amazing.

Look at that.

Color. Watercolor. Emotion. Duncan.

So good.

COMING SOON(ER than you think!)

We’ll be sending Skottie & Rachel’s collaboration, Til Death Do Us Part, out to everyone actually later today!

I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed watching it all come together. And we should all be paying attention to Rachele Aragno. She’s been nominated for quite a few accolades lately, and rightfully so. Her first book, Mel the Chosen, is moving, haunting and lovely.

ABOUT RACHELE ARAGNO

Born in 1982 in a small town in Tuscany, Rachele Aragno planned to become a cartoonist from a very early age. She has a degree from the International Comics School in Rome and has worked as an illustrator for several independent publishing houses, the World Health Organization, Image Comics and Dark Horse, notably on a variant cover for an issue of Young Hellboy: The Hidden Land. Her first graphic novel, Melvino, was published in Italy by Bao Publishing in 2019 and by Random House Graphic, in English, as Mel the Chosen in 2021.

You can follow Rachele and see more of her artwork on her Facebook page and on Instagram.

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