TRIBUTE TO WOOD -- Little Rock sculptor Kevin Kresse unveiled his latest work Monday at the Hotel Metropole in Avalon on Santa Catalina Island, Calif.
Kresse was commissioned about nine months ago by retired lawyer Sam Perroni of Fayetteville to create a life-size bronze bust of the movie star Natalie Wood, who drowned Nov. 29, 1981, off the coast of Catalina.
What is Perroni's connection to Wood, you ask?
He's written a book, "Brainstorm: An Investigation of the Mysterious Death of Film Star Natalie Wood," which will be published Dec. 21 by Post Hill Press.
Kresse says Perroni was surprised that there wasn't already a memorial to Wood on the island.
"That's when he got the idea to commission me to create the bust and donate it to Catalina Island in honor of Natalie," he says.
"I think Natalie Wood deserves a place in Catalina Island history," Perroni told the Catalina Islander last week.
Kresse, you may recall, was chosen earlier this year to create a bronze bust of Arkansas native Johnny Cash that will be displayed at the U.S. Capitol. His 2018 bust of Levon Helm, another Arkansas music legend, is on view at Helm's boyhood home in Marvell and two of his murals cover walls in downtown North Little Rock.
He and Perroni were at the unveiling of his bust of Wood, the star of "Miracle on 34th Street," "Rebel Without A Cause," "Splendor in the Grass," "West Side Story" and more.
"I was proud as an Arkansawyer that Sam and I were there and that we are producing quality work."
Reaction was positive, he says. "The mayor was there and some other people and they were thrilled once they saw it. ... I was very happy and relieved."
The Catalina Islander reports that a Catalina Island Museum committee was to discuss adding the bust to its permanent collection.
CRITICAL ROLE MODELS -- "Vox Machina -- Kith & Kin," is a fantasy novel published Nov. 30 by Del Rey Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House, and features a cover image by Sherwood artist Nikki Dawes.
Written by Marieke Nijkamp, the book is the first novel based on characters from Critical Role, the company that livestreams tabletop role-playing games on YouTube and Twitch.
Dawes, who illustrated David Bruce Monteith's 2020 children's book "Ned the Nearsighted Butterfly," is a former Democrat-Gazette graphic designer. She began watching the Critical Role livestreams in 2018 and started creating her own fan art of the characters.
"I've only watched hundreds of hours of those characters," she says. "I'm super-familiar with them."
Her cover depicts the novel's protagonists, twins Vex'ahlia and Vax'ildan.
The process, from being a fan of the show to seeing her art on the cover of the debut novel, "has been fantastic," she says.
email: sclancy@adgnewsroom.com
CORRECTION: A previous version of this column included an inaccurate headline.