Dolmen aka Shadaan

About the artist

My Username is Dolmen,

Aka Shadaan.

I've been into art my entire life. First it was terrible street fighter stickmen, then it was DBZ stickmen with spikey hair and balloon muscles. Soon after that it was horrible drawings of all my favorite Disney and DC And Marvel characters. Maybe some stuff I realize now was early studio Ghibli anime. I drank it all up, told myself stories in the shower like all proper nerdy kids do, and id scribble it all down in science class. Sure art class and english worked too but Science class was the gold-mine. Not sure how you dealt with me Mrs C.

My art development took a turn for the technical when I met kids drawing better stickmen than me. I tore up tons of sex-ed and softcore nudie mags, not for the traditional uses but for the bodies. I spent hours sketching them up. Then i realized somewhere in my teens that the best artists, the Stanley Laus, the Jim Lees and Ian McCaigs were going digital. I looked for a tablet, got myself a monster genius tab and never looked back.

Around that time i found this odd book in the school library titled Memories of Ice. I read it all in 2 days and it was and still is my best reading experience ever. I zipped back for what I thought was the 'prequel', Deadhouse Gates. After hermitting my weekend away and loving the story I was horrified to learn this was infact the second book of the series and MoI was the third. My love of all things Malazan started right there.

As I read i'd sketch out the characters. The stories were so rich I was surprised I was the only one in the library reading the books. I asked around and learnt no one knew anything about SE and ICE. They were all too busy reading Harry Potter.

A quick google search showed me why. Back then we didnt have much of a fan art presence. I think that sparked the love most of all, the desire to show my friends just how cool Cotillion was, how unstoppable Caladan Brood could be. I just had words, I needed pictures, preferably good ones.

So i started painting up all my sketches in photoshop, it was awful at first but alot of my friends on ME showed interest in what I could manage. I've kept at it and eventually came close to my original goal. Producing art that shows people how incredible the stories I enjoy reading are to me.

And I dont plan on ever stopping. ^_^

Dolmen also publishes his art under the name Shadaan on Deviant Art.

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