A few weeks ago, CSotD featured Stephen King, the master of horror as
its Agent of Cool. This week we continue our traipse into the dark side
with the man who, in the late '70s, gave horror a makeover. The
nightmarish creatures that H.R. Giger designed for "Alien" and its
sequels are indelibly etched into the psyche of the filmgoing public.
Cool Site of the Day is honored to present H.R. Giger, Agent of Cool.
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The career of Swiss artist Hans Rudi Giger has been long and rewarding.
In 1969, four years after graduating from the School of Applied Arts
in Zurich, Giger teamed up with H. Kunz to print his first posters,
which were distributed worldwide.
In 1978, Giger was commissioned to design the alien lifeform for "Alien".
In 1985 Giger was commissioned by MGM, under the direction of Brian Gibson, to create horror-scenes for the film "Poltergeist II." The film was released worldwide in 1986, but Giger was unhappy with the result - apparently disliking the visual transformation of his ideas.
A year later, in 1987, a large exhibition took place at the Seibu
Museum of Art in Tokyo; Giger's Alien was one of the major
themes, with a Harkonnen Chair and other original pictures included in
the show.
In the early 1989, Giger produced illustrations for Pier Geering's Robofolk story. Later he created a poster for the 10th international Hell's Angels meeting in Agasul, Switzerland. That year he was also involved in the documentary film "Engel, Teufel und Dämonen" (Angels, Devils and Demons). As part of a PR-project for the first European Sci- Fi museum Les amis d'ailleurs, he produced an exhibition in Châ Yverdon.
In this decade, Giger continues his work on feature films, designing creatures for Alien III,
the "sil" alien in 1995's "Species", and working on the much-anticipated
next installment in the "Alien" series.