DragonCon in Atlanta, 1989: I was walking through the dealer's room, and noticed this guy selling pictures of cute little cartoon animals. I didn't pay much attention at first, but when I was coming back a couple of minutes later his portfolio was open to a different page... "Those are NOT for kids!" I thought to myself; so I went over for a closer look.
The guy was Steve Martin, and the picture was "Clara the Warhorse". I ended up buying that one, and a couple more. My sister-in-law was with us (us = myself and my wife) and she bought a couple too. We also got "Unicorn at Salon" for my mother-in-law.
I figured that Mr. Martin was probably the only guy in the whole world drawing this kind of stuff, so I didn't bother asking him about other sources. I certainly didn't suspect that there was a whole fandom out there. Fortunately, my luck outweighed my stupidity: Many months later, at Tropicon here in Florida, I found Scudder Kidwell's character "Beth the Unicorn".
Now I started looking in ernest. Pretty quickly thereafter I managed to find all kinds of publications, featuring characters like Red Shetland, Eva McEquus, and Mareody the Centaur. (You might notice an equine-centric theme here... I like horses!) Eventually I discovered Ed Zolna's Mailbox Books. Fur Heaven!
Epilog: My sister-in-law also collects furry art, but lost it all last year when she got divorced. Her ex-husband kept everything. She is now starting to build a new collection. My mother-in-law never started collecting on her own, but she still has (and displays) the various furry art pictures that she has received as gifts over the years, including her copy of "Unicorn at Salon".
Beast Wishes,
Tryll
Received on Thu Feb 21 2002 - 14:25:52 CST