Warhammer and Warhammer 40k illustrator Karl Kopinski is currently recovering from a stroke, itself a side effect of long term cancer treatment, which has left him unable to work. Fans have rallied to his side, pledging $73,000 (£56,900) to a fundraiser to help support him and his family.
Kopinski launched the fundraising campaign on GoFundMe on Friday. In the description he states “three weeks ago I suffered a pretty major stroke affecting my left side”, adding that it has left him “unable to work for the time being”.
Kopinski was an in-house artist at the Warhammer and Warhammer 40k design studio at Games Workshop from 1998 to 2005, a major influence on the aesthetic of several Warhammer 40k factions. He has been active as freelancer since leaving the firm.
Kopinski’s stroke is apparently a side effect of aggressive cancer medication. “I’ve privately been fighting a battle with myeloma for the past six years”, Kopinski says, “treatment for which caused two more minor strokes and a heart attack”. Myeloma is a cancer of the white blood cells which affects the bone marrow, where blood is produced.
Kopinski says “I continued to work throughout all of this as my art has been my obsession and therapy through all these difficulties”. You can find and support his GoFundMe via this link.
Kopinski’s time at the Games Workshop design studio coincided with third and fourth edition Warhammer 40k and sixth edition Warhammer Fantasy. He left an indelible mark on both worlds.
Similar to his forebear Adrian Smith, Kopinski is skilled at creating high contrast, high detail, highly rendered character studies and battle scenes. But where Smith leans into gothic exaggeration with extremely stark shadows and inhuman proportions, Kopinski’s work borrows more from military art.
He was very accomplished at illustrating the less fantastical 40k armies, particularly the Astra Militarum and the Space Marine chapters. This gave third and particularly fourth edition 40k a grounded tone, which resonated well with the resurgent interest in World War Two that had been sparked by the 1998 film Saving Private Ryan and 2001’s Band of Brothers.
Kopinski’s work at Games Workshop still has plenty of pulp flare, whether in the comic-book framing of poses for small illustration pieces, or the heroic composition of battle scenes.
As a freelancer, Kopinski worked for many studios, and is a prolific Magic: The Gathering artist. His work has appeared in dozens of MTG sets and on many iconic cards, including Acidic Slime, Chord of Calling, and Faithless Looting.
The whole team at Wargamer wishes Kopinski a speedy recovery.
If you’re interested in the evolution of the Warhammer 40k aesthetic, the upcoming movie The Grim and The Dark delves into it, and particularly its foundational figure, the artist John Blanche. Our exclusive interview with the production team reveals a lot more – including why the documentary is hosted by the man who played Napoleon Dynamite.
Source: Wargamer
