HR Giger fans, gather here!

[受尽庇护的女神]

This thread is dedicated to the late HR Giger and his fans, who have been inspired in different ways by this wonderful and great man. Let us share our experiences as well as how this man has influenced us.

I am a huge fan of HR Giger and have known about him and his work for two-thirds of my life (I am 25 this year). It began when I was a young child watching the first Alien movie on TV. From that point on, I grew increasingly fascinated by the creatures that HR Giger has created.

Over the following years, all through to this day, I have collected most of his hardcover and paperback artbooks and autobiographies, and have multiple copies of some of them. Some of my HR Giger merchandise include but are not limited to: the Arh+, Icon, Biomechanics, Necronomicon 1 & 2, Calenders, Games (Dark Seed), etc.

Like most fans, I saw the deep meaning and philosophy behind his art. There were hidden messages in every piece of art that he created. Most people who are not fans see his art as disgusting, grotesque nonsense, but as a fan and follower of his work, I saw the environmental messages concealed within them.

His art spoke of the problems of overpopulation. Examples include: landscapes made up of fornicating reproductive organs, pistols shooting babies as if they were bullets being fired rapidly and endlessly to overpopulate the world as well as seas of bodies laying side by side. His art also revealed his concern with mutation caused by nuclear fallout and his works are populated with such grotesque, deformed figures who sneer and leer at the viewer, mocking us who view them as if blaming us for their predicament. Perhaps they are a future vision of ourselves, for we shudder and tremble in fear when we stare deep into their accusing eyes.

But most noticeably, his art speaks of the fusion between biology and machinery. His creatures are known as the Biomechanoids, of whom the Alien Xenomorph is one (but used in a different context as an alien in a sci-fi movie by Ridley Scott). Giger had a vision of our future, where the deadly environment caused by the devastation of nuclear war, overpopulation and environmental pollution led to us merging with our mechanical contraptions merely to survive.

However, the Biomechanoids are not cyborgs. They are more than that. They are creatures whose symbiosis between their biology and their machinery have let to them becoming a new species, a new race that transcends both their biological origins as well as their mechanical slaves, who now support their life functions through tubes and gas filters and endless wires that run beneath translucent skin, merging with flesh and bone where one cannot tell the start nor end of each.

They are the essence of Giger's art and visions. Because they are us. They are what Giger thinks we would become if we continue on this path of environmental destruction, pollution, overpopulation and ceaseless global war and conflict.

Giger, haunted by night terrors, also had nightmares in his sleep of vast tunnels and deep chambers leading into the depths of the Earth. To him, they represented the dark place within all of our minds, that abyss hidden at the deepest, foulest recesses of the human collective unconscious. It is there that the evil within all of us haunts us in our slumber, giving rise to our nightmares. He has brought this vision into his art, creating paintings of winding corridors going down deep into the bottomless pit that represents that part of our mind we keep hidden from our consciousness, because within it are our darkest thoughts.

HR Giger has inspired my life in multiple ways. He inspired me to study Biomechatronics, a field where robotics are combined with medical science to create prosthetics, biomechanical aids and tools and to understand how one's body can work in tandem with the machinery we have constructed, in seamless, functional ways.

He has also inspired the way I look at things. I see the beauty in the grotesque now, and find meaning in those places where most people overlook and shun. He was a great man when he was alive, and the most regretful thing is that he died so suddenly in an unexpected manner.

The art world has lost a visionary, one who was able to see beyond the present and into the distant future and bring that vision to his work. He was an environmentalist who taught us about our mistakes and blunders through his art. He was a philosopher who preached relentlessly and tirelessly through his art.

His messages were always hidden, and only those who opened their hearts and minds and truly take a good, long look at his art would understand the true meanings behind them. For the many others who simply view his art with disgust and a closed, narrow mind, they never will see or understand him or his work.

[受尽庇护的女神]

I also hope the developers will give HR Giger a spot in the CREDITS sequence of Alien Isolation as a tribute to him and to commemorate him for all that he has done for this franchise.

[Berserk Slayer]

Hi Ashyne - I have said it before on this forum, I have a lot of respect for the man and his work, which I was introduced to by this franchise - I would consider myself a fan although I could not claim to be a knowledgeable enthusiast.

I thought it particularly good that his work features so well in Prometheus, it was really like Scott getting back to the roots of his creation.

Assuming the game turns out OK, I think it would be nice for them to acknowledge that the whole shebang is rooted in the works of H R Giger and Ridley Scott, without a doubt.

[Blurfester]

Awesome posts Ashyne. Yes, i certainly hope that HR GIger gets mention in Isolation at the very least. He was not utilized for Aliens and was even omitted in the credits in Aliens 3.
(Studio execs i just have no respect for) So, he deserves mention for sure. After all the Alien is his brainchild.

http://www.lettersofnote.com/2013/01/the-alien-father-is-hrgiger.html

http://www.lettersofnote.com/2010/01/i-felt-risk-of-being-overwhelmed-by.html

[受尽庇护的女神]

HR Giger also created the alien in the Species movies, and it is the most reminiscent of his Biomechanoids, with a distinctly feminine, humanoid shape that is made up of biomechanical parts.

The Species' Sil, was adapted from his art like this one on the cover of Necronomicon II.

http://ayay.co.uk/backgrounds/science_fiction/h_r_giger/necronom-002.jpg

The Alien Xenomorph, before it was modified by Ridley Scott and his art director, had a more feminine and humanoid body with pale, smooth translucent skin, and to me, that creature in the Necronom paintings has a very frighteningly erotic feel to it. It is much more terrifying than the Xenomorph we know of today, because it looked very much more human and plays wtih our emotional instincts when we look at it.

http://giger.com/gallery/giger-necronom-v-medium.jpg

[受尽庇护的女神]

Originally posted by Blurfester:

Awesome posts Ashyne. Yes, i certainly hope that HR GIger gets mention in Isolation at the very least. He was not utilized for Aliens and was even omitted in the credits in Aliens 3.
(Studio execs i just have no respect for) So, he deserves mention for sure. After all the Alien is his brainchild.

http://www.lettersofnote.com/2013/01/the-alien-father-is-hrgiger.html

http://www.lettersofnote.com/2010/01/i-felt-risk-of-being-overwhelmed-by.html

It is the LEAST that the developers can do- to credit Giger because without him, this game would not even exist because he is the father of the Xenomorph.

[受尽庇护的女神]

Originally posted by Hardtarget:

HR Giger is also responsible for video games DARK SEED 1 AND 2.
PS OP! HOWS YOUR copy and paste working? I think its excellent rip off !

Nothing was copied or pasted. I wrote everything as an original text to tribute HR Giger.

[Nemo]

I probably only knew about him 4 months before he died :c

[Kempa]

I don't think I'll blabber on about how awesome this bloke was because if we're Giger fans, it's already understood. What I would like to share, however is my first experiece with Giger.

So, I'm just-turned twenty at the time I'm writing this. I've been a drawing enthusiast as long as I can remember so back in school art class was always my favourite subject. Where others just saw it as another useless subject that they'll never use in life (which, in their case is probably true) but for me was a period of school that willingly let me sit down with my pen and paper and let my mind flow.

It was in 2009, I think. I would have been fifteen years-old. I was in art-class one day, I don't remember what I was doing for an assignment, I remember some class mates were rumaging through one of the back closets which contained art supplies and more. As I'm doing my assignment I hear my classmates voicing their disgust at something. I glance over and see them huddled about around this book. I get up and check out what they're looking at out of curiosity and for the first time saw the art of H.R.Giger.

I sat down next to them as they were going through the pages. My classmates were utterly disgusted at this book (I don't exactly remember which Giger book it was) and initially I joined them in their disgust. Seeing only filth and vulgarity for the sake of filth and vulgarity but as my classmates got back to their chairs and assignments I kept browsing through the book. As I was going through the pages, I was fascinated and eventually became quite interested in this artist I had never heard of. It was the combination of Giger's ability to make something so dark and disgusting become just that but in a way that's actually beautiful.

At fifteen, I had never been exposed to something so dark and macabre and was my true first experience of something truely surreal. After the school day had ended, I went home to google Giger's works and looked through more of it. I never forget it, after having looked through his artworks the second time I was inspired to make a drawing of my own but really pour my heart into it. Before this, my drawings would really just be half-assed, not really finished.

It was not related to Giger in any way but with that inspiration I drew an Orc from the old Warcraft RTS games, which I still have today. This was one of the few times I've experienced true inspiration, as in looking at an art piece that truely speaks to you and gives you the will to create something of your own.

Giger is now my all-time favourate artist and his works changed the way I look at art and helps shape many of my own drawings. Thanks to Giger, I learned to find the hidden beauty in that which is dark, macabre, ugly and surreal.

I draw both on physical paper and digitally with my drawing tablet. The ones made on the tablet can be found on my deviantART page.

http://buckarooskij.deviantart.com/

[Jonboy]

I think he was a tortured genius. I remember seeing one of his art illustration books. Very biological and esoteric. Beautiful, sexual and distrurbing , in equal measure. He was unique and certainly left his mark.

[CrumbleCat]

Wow, Buckaroo, thanks for that little tale about yourself. That's amazing that you got so much out of mister Giger.

I too am a big fan of Giger, though I do not draw or do art myself. I bought the Species movie just to see his designs, and I will pretty much buy anything he had a big hand in. I have some of his books too, which are amazing to look through. I wish the man had lived 10-15 more years, but aw well, maybe it was time.

Have everyone watched this video on him? It might be on the alien extras, I dunno.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6LkiilI7sEw

[Kempa]

Also, I was given Necronomicon II (hardback) and ARh+ (paperback) for my birthday. So very pleased.

[受尽庇护的女神]

Giger always had a fear of women, of their judging him and of his shyness at approaching them. He mentioned this many times in his books and interviews. Yet, although he feared women, he also lusted for them, and admired their form.

He combined this fear and attraction towards women in his artwork, turning his girlfriends and wives into demonic visages of their current selves (most notable in some of his portrait art and especially in the Species alien design, where women would turn into something horrifyingly monstrous). It was a way for him to cope with the conflict he had towards women.

He also saw the problem with sexually transmitted diseases, which prompted him to include condoms in many of his artwork to bring across the subtle message of birth control. For him, these worldly issues were taken and brought to life in greater emphasis through visual art, yet only a small number of people, those true fans of Giger, would understand this.

[TheDutchGhost]

Dammit OP, now you want me to make a post apocalyptic RPG or action adventure with those elements.

[受尽庇护的女神]

Originally posted by BlackWater:

I'll be impressed if any have heard of....Darkseed......

I have played both games a long time ago.

[BlackWater]

Originally posted by Ashyne:

Originally posted by BlackWater:

I'll be impressed if any have heard of....Darkseed......

I have played both games a long time ago.

Lazy over here (me) just noticed this mentioned earlier in the post...What i wouldn't give for remakes of both games, a 3rd game and a movie.