Purely by coincidence, my last article dealt in part with movie poster artist Drew Struzan. This time we start with another giant of that corner of commercial illustration, John Alvin. Sadly, John Alvin died suddenly of a heart attack this last February. Alvin painted this card for Christmas 1978 (the 1977 card was an imprint on a generalized holiday card, though one with a blimp flying over the Hollywood sign).
These cards came to my attention while researching for an R2 and 3PO article. To keep things simple here I'll just point out the polarity of the pair, silver and gold, lunar and solar, short and tall, etc. Despite this both are typically described as male, a matter of programming, and in R2's case it seems strictly arbitrary. In this piece John Alvin subtly assigns sexual characteristics to the two of them with their musical instruments, C-3PO male and R2-D2 female, easy enough to read when you look at the picture with this idea in mind.
This gender assignment is just as subtly reversed two years later on the 1979 card, which was painted by Ralph McQuarrie.
R2's stag horns are clearly masculine, while C-3PO's skirt level Santa coat is feminizing. Note that "he" is removing a false beard, his male disguise. Actually both figures here appear to be horned due to the candles behind 3PO's head. There's just no way that this is an accident of positioning, not in a painting. The pair of goddess figure candle holders, each holding twin torch emblems, is a blatant occult emblem.
McQuarrie channeled Rockwell for a UK LucasFilm card from the previous year, 1978.
The lamp post is the familiar Column. I find the wreath with the centrally positioned red-ribbon to be an easy way to present a stargate symbol at Christmas time, here on a Door as is often the case with wreaths. Notice the yonic, grail form and/or sun on the horizon detail in the architecture behind the Droids. The gridwork of window is echoed by the grid of the grate R2-D2 is positioned on. The grate beneath R2 is an odd detail. There's no reason for it other then to demonstrate that R2-D2 is On the Square.
For 1980 McQuarrie presented the Droids as Santa's helpers.
This reads as a Santa's workshop scene due to the wreath (the same format of wreath from the 1978 card), the toys and the context of the presentation, but truly it is an odd depiction beyond the sci-fi trappings. Santa is out of his traditional garb, perhaps dressed instead as Obi Wan, but the overall effect to my eye is an Alchemist in his lab before his hearth. The toy castle seems potentially indicative of Templarism. Note the three columns of window panes.
For 1981 McQuarrie presented Yoda as Santa Claus, and this was repeated on the above 1982 card, this time including reindeer and sled. I'm trying to determine what locale Santa Yoda is meant to be at here. His sled has California plates, but this desert might be Tatooine. Or Egypt. The lines of the "mountains" in the background are suspiciously straight. I suppose it could be the North Pole with golden light reflecting on snow, but my eye reads that color ground as sand.
McQuarrie gave the Santa treatment to the Ewoks for the 1983 card. The Ewoks' hunter/gatherer society allows interesting details like the floral headdress, which seems a nod to the pagan/solar/agricultural origins of Santa Claus and Christmas. Tree of Life symbolism is easy to include with Ewoks. Again we have the same essential wreath. Outside the pyramidal entrance are five torches in a ring.
For the 1985 card by Alice "Bunny" Carter, Ewoks (from the Saturday morning cartoon) and Droids come together for a Christmas house party. Again, we have the wreaths, one on each of the three spires of the house. Lots of fun guests at the party, including the Max Rebo band, a snow duck (likely Howard) and a couple of shadowy Rabbits.
The 1986 card was designed by David Craig. Ewoks make a snow man of C-3PO, a figure they worship as a god. Again the sexuality of the figure seems to be the emphasis given the area where the Ewoks are working, the snow balls they seem set to attach indicating that to them 3PO is a father god. I also find that the basic forms of the torn paper make it just as easy to read the broom the snow droid carries as a torch.
The Star Wars theme wasn't used again until 1994 when McQuarrie presented some Jawas on Christmas morning. I just want to point out that some lucky Jawa got a miniature obelisk that year.
The 2001 card by Kathryn Otoshi features Enkidu resonator Chewbacca in a recreation of the almost touching fingers of God and Adam from Michaelangelo's famous Sistine Chapel fresco. Inside the card Chewie is depicted as a shepherd to the children of the world.
The 2003 card, again by Kathryn Otoshi, shows Yoda gazing upon a constellation shaped like his head. What I find really interesting here though is his vantage point, apparently our Moon, or something visually like it. I suppose if Yoda's to scale it's a very small object, B612 sized. Wherever he's meant to be, it isn't Dagobah, Coruscant, or any other setting we might expect to find the Jedi master at.
I have more questions then anything else regarding the card for 2005. Painted by Christian Alzmann, it shows many LucasFilm related entities crossing the Golden Gate Bridge to celebrate the company's move to the Letterman Digital Arts Center in the San Francisco Presidio.
Note the Tatooine Double Sun setting on the horizon. There's something about this image that I find highly evocative, the combination of that specific bridge and some of these figures maybe. The dinosaurs from "Jurassic Park" add a real time-warp feeling. There are all kinds of things here presented in pairs or trios, twin suns and the golden dome, two X-Wing Fighters and a Pod Racer (itself paired as a chariot to the yellow roadster from "American Grafitti"), the black Darth Vader with white Stormtroopers paired with the white THX 1138 and two black Robot Cops, R2, 3PO and Chewbacca, Indiana Jones swinging mirrored by I believe two Ewoks, etc.
The golden dome at the lower right is the aerial view of the Palace of Fine Arts, situated just beside the Letterman Digital Arts Center.
Just as evocative is the card from 2006 featuring a photograph of a detail from the stained glass dome of the Skywalker Ranch library.
The column form of the eight radiating rays is especially prominent in the black and white line drawing on the left. Here's the full dome.
I can't help but be visually reminded of the CERN ATLAS detector.
So then also to the floor plan of the Dome of the Rock, another Golden Dome.
The 2007 card by Lorraine LeBer features a pop-up of thirty caroling Stormtroopers for thirty years of LucasFilm. I find this one kind of creepy, Merry Christmas, Fascist New Year.
Dedicated with wishes of health and recovery to R2-D2 portrayer Kenny Baker. As far as I'm concerned anyone who can make you love a beeping cylinder on wheels is an actor of the highest ability.
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