Briefly: Celebrated contemporary Swiss artist HR Giger, best known for his work on Ridley Scott’s Alien, has died. His surrealist art captured the imaginations of many, and inspired the word “gigeresque” to describe his inimitable scenes of nightmarish biomechanical hell.
Any neophyte film student or sci-fi fan has seen Ridley Scott’s Alien; the design of the xenomorph the film is named for was HR Giger‘s most famous creation. It was inspired by his work on Necronomicon, the 1977 compendium of biomechanical art itself inspired by the work of horror fiction writer H.P. Lovecraft.
If you’re interested in appreciating some of Giger’s thought-provoking and terrifying artworks, you can find them on the official HR Giger website. He worked extensively to bring the utterly inhuman world of Alien to life in Ridley Scott’s film — a behind the scenes album of that production is here.
Giger passed away after suffering injuries from a fall; he was 74. [The Guardian]